Category: Philosophy

Friday Morning FYI – 5/20/2016

Ron Delaney JrLeave a comment

Welcome to your Friday Morning FYI – my chance to share observations/wisdom/rants in short, easily consumed form.

Last week, I wrote that I had something to say about first impressions and marketing but got sidetracked by it having been Friday the 13th. Let me show you what I was originally getting at:

Switchel label

That pic is of a label for a bottle of switchel. If you’ve never heard of switchel, that’s OK, most people haven’t. Delich, by the way. Anyway, after the first few sips, I spun the bottle around and read the back side. After seeing, “Shake bottle liberally (or conservatively, if you lean that way) before enjoying.” I became an instant fan. Why? Because whoever decided to put that on there, and more importantly whoever approved it remaining, could have gone with some generic blah-blah-blah label that I wouldn’t have cared about, but didn’t. They had fun with a little wordplay joke, and as someone who loves that stuff (and hates with a passion flat, safe, broad, say-nothing, no-personality marketing language), I appreciated that. That’s this week’s FYI:

It gets more and more difficult everyday to separate yourself from the pack. One of the ways for writers to do that is by sharpening their voice. Agents and publishers are always saying they’re looking for unique voices. I didn’t really know what that meant while writing my first book, but it’s finally clicked in my WIP. If you need a hint, it’s what you see on that label. Something different, maybe something fun. Whatever, as long as it doesn’t sound/read like everyone else. Sound easy? It’s not, but keeping this in mind will help:

You can’t have your own voice if you’re mimicking what someone (everyone) else is doing. Don’t be just another bottle on the shelf.

 

Thanks for reading,

{RDj}

Friday Morning FYI – 5/13/2016

Ron Delaney JrLeave a comment

Welcome to your Friday Morning FYI – my chance to share observations/wisdom/rants in short, easily consumed form.

This morning, I had something to say about first impressions and marketing and standing out, but then I did something I’ve never done: I sprayed myself with ketchup from a ketchup pack. Hearing the story of how I’d opened it, forgotten I’d done that when I put it down to talk to someone, and then became an ad for one of those detergent pens, a coworker informed me it was Friday the 13th. While I don’t suffer from Paraskevidekatriaphobia (try to pronounce that, I dare you), it leads us to this week’s superstitious FYI (we’ll get to my original topic next week):

It’s Friday the 13th. Be happy if you make it through the day without getting ketchup on your shirt, or, you know, being burned at the stake.

 

Thanks for reading,

{RDj}

Friday Morning FYI – 4/22/2016

Ron Delaney JrLeave a comment

Welcome to your Friday Morning FYI – my chance to share observations/wisdom/rants in short, easily consumed form.

I was working on my WIP earlier in the week and hit a snag. My MC was to confront someone with whom she has a heavy history, but a problem I hadn’t anticipated manifested. See, she was all set to speak very plainly, reflecting on their previous conflict to address the crisis at hand, but others were present who didn’t know who she is. That impacted what she could say and how, and blew-up the dynamic and result I’d planned – a result needed to move the story forward. Now, stuff like this happens all the time when writing, but this was the most impactful issue I’ve encountered (I’m a rabid outliner and that’s where I usually find this stuff, before the writing starts). I could have removed the other folks, but the scene was in an interrogation room in an FBI office, so they were observing from behind a two-way mirror. I could have moved the scene, but the guy with whom my MC needed to talk was in custody. I could have had him not-in custody, but that would have sent a shockwave of changes one hundred and fifty pages back through the book. None of those options were viable, so I decided to go with it, giving my MC a hurdle to overcome. Yay conflict! That’s the focus of this week’s FYI:

Someone much smarter than me once said, “Life imitates art.” In the same way a story you’re crafting can go in directions you didn’t anticipate, life often won’t go according to plan. You can either fight against it, trying to force something into an unnatural shape, or go with it, seeing what happens.

 

Thanks for reading,

{RDj}

Friday Morning FYI – 4/15/2016

Ron Delaney JrLeave a comment

Welcome to your Friday Morning FYI – my chance to share observations/wisdom/rants in short, easily consumed form.

I didn’t learn anything this week. Well, nothing deep to put here, anyway. I know that sounds absurd to the, ‘Learn something new every day,’ crowd (of which I’m an adjunct member), but I’m OK with it (and absurdity in general, but that’s another story). That’s this week’s FYI:

Those of us interested in growth can put a lot of pressure on ourselves, which can occasionally result in feeling down or unaccomplished (I’m looking at you, writers-who-missed-their-word-count). It makes sense. Humans by nature are seekers, and seekers need to discover. But sometimes the best thing you can do is cut out the noise and just be. Lessons will always be there to be had, you can self-examine tomorrow as well as you could today, and that chapter will get written.

 

Thanks for reading,

{RDj}

Friday Morning FYI – 3/25/2016

Ron Delaney Jr2 Comments

Welcome to your Friday Morning FYI  (in under the wire edition) – my chance to share observations/wisdom/rants in short, easily consumed form.

A few friends recently lost their jobs. The one who knew it was coming had a choice. He could have kicked his feet up on his desk and thrown a middle finger at the company he felt betrayed him, or do what he did, which is go to work everyday and keep his responsibilitiesand team tight until the hammer fell. That brings us to this week’s FYI:

Life is really just a long series of choices. Some are generally unimportant, while others directly determine how you’re viewed by both your peers and yourself. Faced with adversity, make decisions you can most easily live with, and won’t keep you up at night worrying about the kind of person you are.

 

Thanks for reading,

{RDj}