#i'm probably going to change the quality once the interview is on youtube

[emmaduerrewatson]

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#taylor swift #tswiftedit #i'm probably going to change the quality once the interview is on youtube #gif

[cytarabi]

Hey! I've become a huge fan of your fics on ao3. I wanted to know how do you push out so many beautiful chapters so quickly? What's your writing process like? I'm working on a big JB fic, which I'm trying to finish timely, but high quality. Always like to see how other writers do their thang! Thank you!

Hi! I remember your name!! <3 Thank YOU for the question and praise, that’s so sweet!!

I love seeing how other writers do their thang, too! And I’ve found it can be very, very different for each author.

TLDR I write a lot of my fic ahead of time. I outline the entire fic, chapter by chapter before I start writing. I use several tools to speed the process and/or to make it more artsy fartsy.

I’ve found that I’m a “plotter” and not a “pantser” (two main ways of writing, unless you hate being labeled lol.)

Plotter means that I prefer plotting out most of the story before I write the details. Here’s been my process for my multichapter fics:

1) I come up with an idea and let it brew! I think about key scenes or dialogue I love and I jot them down in my phone on Google notes. Write down your ideas, you’ll probably forget them.

2) During this brewing time, (for As Black As Thunder and my next fic) I take the time to read, read, read. I read works and jot more notes! I have an entire Google doc for Rebecca by Daphne de Maurier where I wrote down her tone usage, figurative language and summary of each chapter. I can’t tell you how much this has helped get me in the write TONE for the work. Tone is SO important. Readers reading a thriller will expect thriller beats! Deep Fried Drinks was a rom com, so the verbs, adjectives etc are very different from creepy Gothic. When I started As Black As Thunder (ABAT), wow, it was hard to nail the tone at first. But by the second half of the fic, I’m fully immersed in it and it’s much easier to create the tone naturally. Without using inspiration, I don’t think it would have turned out as well. For ABAT, I think I took two weeks of no writing, when I’m used to writing every day. It was hard not to write, but wow, was I ready when I started!

3) When I’m ready to outline, I do! I open a google doc for the fic and start throwing everything I can think of in there. My ABAT doc was only like three lines for 6 months... lol! I’ve only just started looking into story structure, so my older fics are all wonky. BUT for ABAT and Deep Fried Drinks, I tried to follow story structure for plots. First act, second act, third act, character arcs, etc. My longest fic, Time Stops, dropped a bunch of readers in the middle and I think it’s because my middle SAGGED majorly. I didn’t try to follow a structure, just sort of plotted it out how I wanted to, and it was probably very repetitive and boring. For ABAT, I plotted a mid point turn to spice things up, chose things to make the character more proactive, etc. I highly recommend Ellen Brock on Youtube for any plotting advice. She’s an editor, and I’ve learned so much!

4) Organize plot into chapters, write key notes for chapters and fill out background info. The first two are self explanatory, but the third is my favorite! One thing that speeds my writing (I have no idea if people do this or not) but I have lists. So many lists! For ABAT, I have lists of common outfits for characters (I usually hate writing about outfits but I’m glad I wrote more for this work). I also write the character arc for each main character. For ABAT, I have the following for Brienne:

Brienne 

Symbols: white crocus flower (purity, youthfulness, sensitive to rain), White begonia, Small birch saplings struggling for light

Goal: serve public, be idealistic, honorable

Lie: (hidden for spoilers)

Truth: (hidden for spoilers)

Flaw: stubborn, idealistic, watched her father get fame and respect for his engineering, wants to do the same thing and do it perfectly, doesn’t understand systemic racism 

Motivation: serve people, be accepted by the public, belonging, abandonment

Stakes: public rejection, Tarth name on the line, mockery, insanity, failure

So when I think about a curve ball for Brienne at any point of the story, this character section helps me stay true to character. I have a section for Brienne, Jaime, Cersei and Missandei. Cersei has a larger section because she’s a villain... ;)

In addition to this section, I also write down their personalities and strengths. You know, like if they went to an interview lol. For example, I have Missandei have the following strengths: 

Missandei

Adaptability: able to adapt

Intellection: introspective and appreciate intellectual discussions

Consistency: all people should be treated the same

Futuristic: fascinated by future

Learner: loves to learn

I ALSO have an emotion worksheet and this is SO USEFUL. They say in writing: show that the character is angry, not tell the reader. WELL, IDK about you but I can’t keep track of all the little quirks characters do and yet, I want them to be consistent. If while writing a scene, I sometimes think, “Hmm what is Jaime doing if he’s in awe right now?” I search for “awe” at the top of my fic, and bam, I have options, more or less. For a lot of emotions, I brainstormed ideas based on character traits, arcs, Gothic tone etc. I fill all of this out before I write the first chapter. 

Here’s an example of some emotions I have for ABAT:

Emotion List (remember to have introspection, unique perspective) 

Awe:

B: wrinkle deepened between brows, parted lips, fixed gaze, stands still

J: arched brow, open mouth, stare, goes closer

C: lowering chin or raising chin, goes closer

M: adaptable, quick to react

Deceptive:

B: looking away, walking away

J: scratching ear

C: smiling, neatly placed hands

M: long blink

Thoughtfulness:

B: staring off, quiet, daydreaming

J: staring at object important to him, twisting pencil or object in his hand, squeezing his hand

C: squeezing hand, staring at object she wants to get rid of or improve

M: daydreaming, staring off at her own outfit—it’s foreign

5) Now the fun part: writing! I used to write with scene structure outline, but I think I’ve grown off the training wheels. But it really helped me in Deep Fried Drinks to plot out the chapter scenes ahead of time, and I used Ellen Brock’s proactive and reactive videos to help me out with that. I throw on some music to get me in the mood of the story and I write during my kid’s nap, about two hours every day. Sometimes I’ll write at night, but lately I’ve been too tired to do that. My tip for this part is to try and figure out what you want to improve. What are you good at, and what could you improve as a writer? My first fics had like zero figurative language. Awkward. This takes a level of awareness that’s hard to reach but watching or researching creative writing technique really helps me. For example, I used to NEED to write all five senses out for each chapter ahead of time. Now it comes naturally to me! I would say now my main issue is phrasing? Pacing? And I need to tone down the melodrama for my next work....... lol! I write, write, write--and usually, I write 60-90% of the fic before I start editing!

6) Editing. Fun fun fun. I don’t mind editing, I just don’t think I’m that GOOD at it. I try to read through my chapter twice and edit as I go. I look for things I want to take out or add, look for show vs tell, formatting, etc--do things make sense? Did I miss anything? In ABAT, I’ll write something in chap 20 that I need to start in chap 18, so I’ll go back and make a quick note to “add part about document somewhere in this chapter” so I don’t confuse readers. When I edit chap 18, I’ll add that line or paragraph in. It’s all an intricate web! I also have a list of vague words I try to eliminate or replace with stronger words (I have more words if you want them). I found that I have certain words or phrases that echo a lot, like “while”, “turned around”, “turned” or “did not”--now I search for these phrases/words and try to change them:

Get rid of vague words, fix by explaining more:

Some 

While

Thing

Stuff

Very

Really

Big/small

Good/bad

Simple verbs: had, was, went

Got/get

Few

Several

What

Do/Did

It

Like with all writing “rules”, they can be broken, but it helps to know why they are rules. I steered away from adverbs, and I think it improves my writing. Other writers have different prose and adverbs work so well--it all depends on your style! If I find these vague words in dialogue, for example, I almost never change them because dialogue is usually freaking vague lol!

7) Beta reader(s)! I honestly think this work is better than my other stuff because I have a newer beta reader, theunpaidcritic!!! *I bow* She’s literally an expert so it’s SO helpful for me in every way--I can’t fangirl about her enough. If you’re struggling to get a beta reader, I recommend joining a JB discord (transformative werk is my favorite discord, and there is a beta read request thread) or post a request on reddit!

8) Post! Once you’ve edited and gone over beta reader notes, it’s time to post! Congrats!!!!!!!!!!

For time reference, I started this process around mid-May for ABAT, and I will be done by early September. Maybe I’m just a fast writer? Compared to angel-deux, ha, I look slow. Everyone is different! Please let me know if you have any other questions, I am ALL about helping out! :) <3 <3 <3

#cytarabi answers #jaime x brienne #writing #braime

[tamiddyinyourcity]

Reality is scary

Time to break the fabric of reality.

Alright, what am I scared of now?

Vulnerability. Who needs future employers or potential dates seeing my posts? "Hey, we'd hire you for this job, but we see you have blatant mommy issues and your rant about dudes you got rum drunk and had punched you on dates, so..... are you sure you're the best candidate?" But who am I kidding, I already don't get hired, aaaay! Or dates where someoned see shit I post and go, "yeah, this chick aint it"... but newsflash, I'm not taken seriously for dates and relationships either, so let's chill with the thoughts of that, lmfao.

Fear. Why am I so worried of being stalked? I dunno. Probably since all I did was make ONE COMMENT on a YouTube video, and next thing you know, a friend I haven't spoken to in a fucking YEAR now is watching videos of my life quality.... And that dude is in AUSTRALIA. HOW DID THAT ONE SPECIFIC FRIEND I GHOSTED FROM AUSTRALIA FIND MY PAGE AND NOW CAN REACH ME.... BUT IM SUPPOSED TO BELIEVE NONE OF MY EXES WILL COME HAUNT MY LIFE AGAIN? (I dunno, gives me the heebiejeebies that anyone could be watching my videos and there will be no way to ever know. Asshole kids from middle school stalking my page? Friends of family members that will then tell my family about my life? Yikes... no.) But if that does happen, I hope any of my exes, bullies, old harsh friends, or anyone in general enjoys whatever I have to say on my vlog channel.

Topics. I get nervous talking. My laptop is busted, so I couldn't really record the way I'd like to without plugging my busted screen from my teeny tiny computer into a hug ass fucking TV. I'd love to rant, just... I feel less cool doing it into a set of pandora earphones, or just shouting into my phone. With my fancy Fifine mic, it's like I'm a fancy podcaster or a news reporter, confidently spitting facts. Like Charlamagne the God when he interviews people. Like the baddest bitch thus FAR.... but with just speaking into my phone? Sounds like the worlds most depressing phone call ever where the other person doesn't respond..... yikes, man. Or like a bitch having angry phone calls with someone and then crying every few seconds.... it looks a lot less cool from the outside looking in to sadly cry into a cell phone, with nothing being said back, then it does to temporarily get sad watching myself speak into a mic, before reminding myself that ive still succeeded so far, and thus, that ive fucking *GOT* this.... does that make sense? Its a self-esteem thing, basically.

When is too much, TOO much? Where's the line get drawn? What will weird people out? Will "I once got offered to watch someone consensually get their dick cut off on skype" scare people away, or will "hey I've got some mental issues" be the REAL killer?

I'm kinda worried I'm focusing on others more than myself... I always do. It sucks. Would be nice if I could just have something to really find nice in my life these days... and so far theres not much. Recording videos and rants go well, but eh.... as well as one could expect... not having the best period of my life at this point in time. With some hope and success hopefully, then maybe that can change sometimes?

I hope whoever see this enjoys my rants.

I'm gonna go trip out for a few extra hours.

#rants #life

[booksbroadwaybbc]

1 simple rule to figure out which advice you should follow via /r/selfimprovement

1 simple rule to figure out which advice you should follow

Humans love hacks, tricks and tips. We spend an incredible amount of time reading about how other people have been able to achieve what they have achieved. We want to believe that there is a simple solution behind very complex problems and if we know it, we can have it easy.

We also love anecdotes. An anecdotal argument is when somebody uses a personal experience or an isolated example instead of a sound argument or compelling evidence.

You probably encounter anecdotes all the time, because that's how most people argue: since they know very little about a specific issue but they still have an opinion about it, they simply draw from memory one specific instance that proves their point.

We love anecdotes so much because it's often much easier for people to believe someone's testimony as opposed to understanding complex data and variation across a continuum. Anecdotes exempt us from having to prove our point: it's happened once; that's solid proof as far as I'm concerned. The fact that Jeanne Calment, the longest living person of all time, smoked until she was 116 is strong proof that cigarettes are good for your health.

We like advice we can understand and stories or examples are an easy way to explain something. However, we must be conscious of anecdotal arguments because this way of thinking carries dangerous consequences by disguising bad advice as wisdom.

A storytelling monkey

From an evolutionary point of view, there is a reason why we do this. We are not built for rationality or logical explanations. We are built for stories.

Indeed, our ability to create and believe stories is what has made us humans the dominant species on Earth.

Stories are what we have invented over the millennia to make society work: religion, money, culture, law. They are all stories that don't exist in reality but because we believe them, they allow us to cooperate on a large scale.

We are, above all, storytelling monkeys.

And there is no better example of that than business, where our love for hacks, tips and anecdotes is fully displayed in our obsession for the Secret of Growth™.

This is the main reason why articles like "Top 10 tips to grow your business" or "5 easy ways to 5X your productivity" are so popular and we just can't help but click on them. It's also the reason why we spend money to go to conferences to listen to people who "are successful" or "have made it", hoping to grasp the ultimate secret; the key that will open the door of our success.

People listen to what "successful" entrepreneurs say because they hope to discover WHAT has made them successful. These "successful" people, in return, feed exactly this hope (for a fee, of course) so everyone's happy: the "successful" entrepreneur makes money - which in turns keep them "successful", basically perpetuating the myth - and not-yet-successful entrepreneurs believe they are "cracking" the code to success.

As a rule of thumb, when somebody is selling you something there is a good chance that they are adding artificial complexity in order to charge a premium. Nat Eliason has written a great article about this which I highly recommend.

Unfortunately, we completely forget (or rather prefer to ignore) that a big chunk of what makes or breaks a business is pure randomness and the perspective of the "successful" entrepreneur is very likely skewed by the survivorship bias.

I'm not arguing that randomness is the ONLY factor. I'm saying that it's arguably one of the main factors. This is actually simple to prove: regardless of where you stand on the political spectrum and your preconceived ideas about business, there is ample research that proves how timing, innate talent, macroeconomic conditions, serendipity and technological breakthroughs play a much bigger role than our skills or decisions.

Of course, this is a sad story. And since we are brought up to believe we are free to choose the story we want, we prefer to pick the "other" story. The one where it does exist a secret key to unlock the mystery of success.

Hard-wired to seek causation

If you recognise yourself in that description, if you have ever found yourself reading one of these articles or watching one of there Youtube videos, don't worry: we are all like that. Our brain is hard-wired to seek answers and ultimate causes. It also hates uncertainty and prefers weak answers to no answers at all.

But when the cause is not certain or obvious, as in the case of "why was a company successful" − which has literally thousands of variables to be considered and the chances of any single one being the determining factor are infinitesimal − we will happily accept the weak-but-certain over the strong-but-uncertain answer every single time. 

Here's the problem though: you can justify almost any cause-effect relationship in hindsight.

In early 1999, Google founders decided to sell it for US$1 million to Excite but Excite's executives rejected the deal. A simple "yes" instead of a "no" could have changed history forever. Yet, lots of people see Google's success and dominance "inevitable". When they interview Google's founders and ask them why they have been successful they are more likely to make a list of products they have released, business models they have invented and people they have hired but probably the single most important cause of their success is likely to be Excite's executive saying "No".

In an ideal world, you would run controlled tests: you have one universe in which Google does A and another in which Google does B. Unfortunately, that's not possible and we are left with speculation.

Yet, there is a simple way to figure out whether something has actually had an impact or not, which accidentally is also the best way to figure out if an argument is anecdotal or not. And that is to ask if something happened "because of" rather "in spite of".

This is a subtlety that a lot of people find confusing.

When X happens "because of" Y it means that without X, Y would not have happened. When X happens "in spite of" Y it means that we don't know if Y causes X, but its presence is not required.

You’re not Elon Musk

Let's say Mr Smith has just sold his company for a lot of money. Naturally, people will be now interested in hearing his story and he'll be invited to podcasts, youtube channels, guest posts on various blogs, etc. At a conference, a person asks THE Question: "Mr Smith, why were you successful?"

Mr Smith talks about the quality of his team, the great product they have built, the choices that "crushed" the competition. Then, at one point, he mentions the strategic importance of having a remote team. He'll explain that being a remote company gave them the advantage of hiring from a larger pool of candidates, the broader perspective brought to the company from people living in different parts of the world and yaddi yadda.

Don't get me wrong: I'm not saying that there aren't advantages to being a remote company. As a matter of fact, my own company is fully remote. But the likelihood that this factor has any impact whatsoever on whether or not companies are successful is minimal and has NEVER been proved. 

Statistically speaking there are more successful companies that are NOT remote than companies that are remote, which means that Mr Smith is more likely to have been successful "in spite of" being remote and not "because of".

Now, the obvious question is: why did he mention it at all? The answer is simple: he needs to justify events. The answer "we have been successful for thousands of factors, most of which were completely out of our control, including a large chunk of randomness and timing" is more likely to be the truth but it isn't satisfactory enough for most people.

Mr Smith is not the only one who needs to find a causal correlation between his actions and results. Most people WANT to believe that there is a reason, because its existence proves that it can be replicated and if enough successful people attribute their success to THAT cause, then.. there is a pattern!

And once they find a pattern they simply need to repeat it and voilà... success!

But if there isn't a primary cause that explains the success of successful people and companies, if there isn't any pattern, where does that leave us? It leaves us with the sad thought that our abilities count FAR less than we imagine and the stories we tell ourselves and others about our success are, well.. just stories. And that's a sad thought indeed. 

Let’s consider another example. Elon Musk, the visionary inventor behind Tesla and SpaceX, reportedly works 100 hours a week but this is unlikely to be a recipe for success. The man runs two multibillion-dollar businesses, one of each is trying to put humans on Mars (!). You are unlikely to ever be in that position in your life. Even if you are, there simply haven’t been many people in history who have run massive businesses at the same time (one of them, Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s and Square’s CEO actually works way less than 100 hours per week and yet he’s highly successful. Do you see what I did there? That’s an anecdote ;) )

It is therefore impossible to draw a direct correlation between long hours worked => success.

If anything, there is ample research the proves how sleep deprivation and being always “on” has massive negative side effects on our productivity and body, including the inability to focus, aggressiveness, decrease in empathy and more. Even if we completely ignore the side effects on health (eg: higher chances of heart attack, diabetes and stroke), it’s obvious how the CEO of a multibillion-dollar business needs to be able to focus and concentrate on long-term solutions. Does Elon Musk really need to work 100 hours/week to run his businesses successfully? Probably no.

Elon Musk is more likely to be successful "in spite of" working a ridiculous amount of hours than "because of". Getting the two mixed up can be very detrimental to your physical and mental health.

How not to be stupid

I believe that an important skill everybody must learn if they want to be a better human being (and especially better entrepreneurs) is to figure out when things happen "because of" rather than "in spite of” a specific cause. But how do we do that?

The first step is to "unlearn" what we are pre-wired to think, which means being sceptical by default of what our mind is inclined to believe. This is not something we can do overnight. It's a process that involves reading a lot, especially completely different opinions than ours on a very broad range of subjects, learning how to think by first principles and adopting several mental models.

The best thing we can probably do, however, is to learn to use “Via negativa”, a way of thinking invented by Roman philosophers and popularised by Nassim Taleb in Anti-fragile.

The idea is that you benefit more by focusing on what you need to get rid of, than what you should keep. Another way to say it is that it's better to define complex problems (such as how to become successful) by identifying what you don't need for sure rather than what you "might" need.

Since it's very difficult or even impossible to know what makes a business successful (although we know luck and timing play a BIG part), we are better off concentrating on knowing what DOES NOT make a business successful.

We don’t know for sure if having a remote company increases the chances of success and probably never will, but we do know for sure that scamming your customers will ultimately lead to a company going bankrupt.

When you approach your life this way, the question "how do I become successful" has a simple answer: "Get rid of anything that we know for sure will cause you to fail.”

Charlie Munger, Warren Buffet’s historical business partner at Berkshire Hathaway, famously said: 

It is remarkable how much long-term advantage people like us have gotten by trying to be consistently not stupid, instead of trying to be very intelligent.

Most people, especially first-time entrepreneurs are devoured by FOMO (fear of missing out). They think that they haven't “cracked the secret” yet, but if they read yet another biographyor attended yet another conference they would learn it and then they will be unstoppable.

Sorry to break the news: there is NO SECRET. At best, there are things that you should avoid doing. Believing that doing what others "think" is the cause of their success is naive and foolish. Instead, focus your energies and resources on avoiding obvious fallacies and wrong models.

Ask one simple question: "Did X happen because of Y or in spite of it?"

It's not easy to think this way. It feels unnatural. But if you care about the truth, rather than stories to make you feel better, this is probably your best shot.

Submitted September 18, 2018 at 03:07PM by Manu66 via reddit https://ift.tt/2pg8xBR

#IFTTT #reddit