Questions

For example, it could be like “write a poem about a dead lover, it has to be no more than 100 words” or more intricate than that.
- CrowsFeet

Creating images in a reader’s mind is what writing is all about. But oftentimes, finding the right words to express the meaning we want our readers to gain can be tricky. Writers toil over their words and nothing seems quite right. And this problem can have several different causes.

Perhaps your vocabulary isn’t broad enough—in other words you don’t know or don’t feel comfortable using the words that mean what you want to say. Or maybe you’re unknowingly writing in the passive voice and so your sentences come out awkward and your meaning is lost. If any of these challenges sound familiar, consider the following tips for finding the right words for what you want to say in your writing.

1. Vocabulary Builders

Heading to the thesaurus to discover new words can be risky—it often results in misuse and confused meanings. But a thesaurus, when a word’s meaning is double-checked against a dictionary, is a good way to build your vocabulary and give you confidence when selecting words to use in your writing. To ensure you don’t misuse any words when you refer to a thesaurus, show your work to someone who can point to unwanted connotations and unintended confusion.

2. Simile and Metaphor

For situations when you need more than just the right word to express your thoughts, you need an image. Simile and metaphor are excellent ways to accomplish this—when used effectively, they create an image in your reader’s mind that resonates beyond what a regular old word can ever achieve. Simile is a comparison using “like” or “as,” such as: that boy is as lanky as a loblolly pine. “Loblolly” is such a great word a reader doesn’t even need to know the tree is tall and thin to understand the simile. “The boy was a loblolly pine amongst shrubs,” is an example of metaphor.

3. Active versus Passive Verbs

If your sentences don’t seem to say precisely what you want them to, then the problem may be with your verbs. Consider the following sentence: “There is a girl walking slowly down the street.” The verb in that sentence is “is walking.” “Slowly” is an adverb meant to describe the way she was walking. Now compare the effect that sentence has with this one: “The girl sauntered down the street.” “Sauntered” does the work of both verbs and the adverb from the first sentence because it’s stronger. Automatically the reader can see the girl on the street.

Finding Your Right Words

Writing is a practice, and the more of it you do, the easier it will be to find the right words to communicate exactly what you want to say to your readers. When you feel stuck, you can use these three tips to write more effectively and find the right words every time.


- Melinda Copp

Have you given up on writing your book? Don’t give up! Others have taken their dream off the shelf this year. You can too! First, let’s get rid of the top two book writer blocks. You don’t like to write that much and think you have to hire a ghostwriter. You hate research and think you have to do tons of research. The good news is you don’t have to hire a ghostwriter or do tons of research.

Your readers just want solutions to their questions and challenges. If you have the answers, you can be on your way to writing an easy to read, well organized, compelling book. Don’t hold back any longer; tap into your natural book writer. Your audience will love reading your book full of solutions to their challenges.

Here are some tips to help you tap into the natural book writer inside you:

1. List top questions and topics of your audience.

For instance, if you want to write a book to help those in your work field, what questions do you hear the most in your daily work? What concerns and topics always come up in your area of expertise? In a book about dieting versus life style eating changes, my dietician friend asked questions like: where are you now in dieting? Why do you go from diet to diet with little success? What are your weight goals? Her topics included 7 solutions through life style eating changes and exercise.

2. Write the number one challenge your book will solve.

Successful book writers focus on one topic per book. Each chapter of information must support this number one challenge. Again, my dietician friend’s audience number one challenge was how to lose weight naturally through lifestyle change eating and exercise without pills, surgeries, etc. All of her chapters are solutions supporting that one goal.

3. Develop a working title.

Speak to your audience in this title. In a few words let them know how your book will help them. “Lose Weight Naturally in 7 Easy Steps” could have been a working title for my dietician friend. Even if this working title is not quite the one you end up with. It will serve to help keep you inspired and your writing focused. Focused writing becomes a compelling book. If your writing becomes scattered and unfocused your reader’s attention may scatter as well. If you lose their attention, they may never finish your book.

4. Group your top questions and topics into categories.

Your categories are actually your chapters. Give each category/chapter a working title. When you start writing the solutions to each chapter, you don’t have to start with chapter one. Start with whatever topic you feel passion bubbling at the moment. Better yet, start with the easiest to build momentum. Load benefits into your chapter titles.

5. Write your chapter introduction.

The introduction should include a hook and a short statement about why your audience will read the chapter (thesis statement). The hook need only be 1-2 sentences like a powerful quote or 2-3 questions that lead the reader into the content. Though short, your thesis statement should include benefits. Remember keep answering the question for your reader, “What’s in it for me?”

6. Assign one question per chapter.

Focus on one question or challenge in each chapter. After asking the question, write the solution with your tips, how-tos, inspiration and stories. This will become the bulk of your chapter. Don’t forget to use engagement and interest tools like headings, sub-headings, list, pull quotes, side-bars, worksheets to keep your reader engaged and reading. A straight page of text may put your reader to sleep. When they wake up they may never pick your book up again.

7. Write your chapter ending.

Your non-fiction chapters should always have a summary. Give each chapter an ending of about the same length. After the ending, you can include action steps or thought prompters followed by a 1-2 sentence enticer statement leading your reader to the next chapter. Make it your mission to get your reader to want to keep reading to the next chapter. Include a couple benefits that they can look forward to in the next chapter.

If you don’t use the above principles, you may be this time next year still wondering if you can make your book dream a reality. My vote says you can do it. You know the problems your audience face; now write the solution. Your audience will reward you by buying your easy to read, compelling book and telling all their friends about it. Go ahead tap into the book writer inside you and make your dream a reality.


- Earma Brown

One of the greatest challenges of writing a book is staying motivated throughout the project—this is something every writer struggles with at one time or another. And that’s okay. No one can stay focused 100 percent of the time. What’s important is that you stay committed to writing your book and you know how to re-motivate yourself when you feel like setting the project aside.

When you feel your inspiration waning, consider the following ways to snap out of it and stay motivated to write your book.

1. Just WRITE!

The best way to overcome a lack of writing motivation is to write—just put your head down and plow through. Don’t worry about whether or not your words are perfect because you have to go back and revise later. If you’re not sure about things like grammar and spelling, don’t worry about it until the book is finished. A good editor can go back and tell you how to fix the writing. In the beginning, focus on getting your thoughts on paper or on the screen and organizing them.

2. Get Help

Don’t be afraid to ask for help to stay motivated. If you haven’t written a book before you might need to hire a writing coach or read some books about writing to get started and stay on track. If you need help and don’t get it then you’ll be more likely to give up on the book, and if you give up on the book you could be giving up on a brand new career or a great new income stream for your business—or a hobby that you might really enjoy. So whatever you do, don’t give up on writing your book.

3. Communicate Your Challenges

Sometimes, just sharing your struggles with motivation can help you overcome them. One way to do this is start a blog and write about the process of writing the book. Your blog reader’s comments and support will help keep you motivated to write and make sure you meet your deadlines—you won’t want to disappoint your following. You also will have an audience of readers ready to buy your book the minute it’s finished if you cultivate supporters during the writing process.

4. Keep Your Eye on the Prize

If you’re stuck on the writing, think about how great it will feel to finish your book—and imagine what you’ll do with the money that you make from your book. You can expand your business, go on an exotic vacation, treat yourself to a luxury spa weekend, buy a house, buy a car, or thousands of other things. Writing for the pleasure of writing is great. But when writing doesn’t feel pleasurable anymore, it helps to think about book sales—and there’s nothing wrong with that, especially if it keeps you writing.

5. It’s Not Just About You

Another great way to get motivated is to think about how your book will benefit others, which is an underlying desire almost every aspiring writer possesses. Sharing your experiences might really help someone else who is in the same situation that you were, so let the satisfaction of helping others motivate you to keep writing your book.

Staying Motivated in the Future

Motivation comes and goes. The key to completing your book successfully is to recognize when you need a motivational kick in the pants and take action. When you feel like setting your book project aside, consider these strategies for overcoming your motivational challenges—your future success as a writer may depend on it.


- Melinda Copp

Writing can be one of the most challenging skills you can ever master. Some people find writing incredibly easy whilst others will sit for days just to push out one single article. One of the challenges all writers will face at some time is writers block. Essentially writers block occurs when the words you are trying to articulate just do not come out in the manner you wish. In some cases you may find, during writers block that you have no inspiration to write an article or do not know how to start it.

Writers block for me usually occurs when I am stressed and overworked so there are three things I recommend you try to break out of a case of writers block.

Item #1 - List Points and Write A Paragraph on the Points

When I am really challenged at writing an article I will go back to the basics. First of all I will write my heading which simply defines what I am writing about. The next step I follow is to write simple list points on what I want to cover in my article. For example in this article I wanted to give you three tips on how to over come writers block. I simply wrote them as -

Item 1. List Points and Write A Paragraph on The Points

Item 2. Meditation

Item 3. Listen to Music

Most web articles need to be a minimum of 600 words for article directories to accept them so by simply writing two or three paragraphs for each item, it will not take long to meet the criteria of 600 words.

Using this technique makes creating articles like, Seven Tips to … Four Strategies for etc really simple. By listing the items you want to share and writing a paragraph or two for each item you will easily and quickly create your article.

Finally, to complete your article simply write a lead in paragraph to the first item and a lead out paragraph after the last item to conclude your article and before you know it, you will have another fully written article.

Item #2 - Meditate

Whenever I find it really difficult to write I simply go and do a good 20 minutes of meditation. What you will find is that when you meditate, if you are doing it correctly, it should help you to clear your mind and to bring you to focus. The objective of meditation is to take the chaos we go through every single day, and to move the chaos into some form of order. Once you achieve this you will then be able to reflect on your inner self and find peace.

Okay, I can hear it now, “Oh Yeah Hippy, Want Us to Meditate do ya?” Absolutely! Look whilst meditation has certainly been a thing of fringe groups in western society or associated with eastern religions many researchers are now coming to the distinct conclusion that meditation can make a huge difference to our day-to-day lives and helps us to overcome stress and in particular writers block.

The core advantage meditation will play in your life is to help you to relax and deal with challenging situations more effectively. The more relaxed you are the more creative you can be in dealing with your creative issues. I certainly recommend that when you are meditating, that you use baroque music with your meditation as it will help increase the alpha waves which will help lead you to a calm feeling. This is especially useful if you do not have a long period to meditate. I recommend a 20 minute meditation session at least once a day preferably two. You will be really surprised the difference it makes to your day. Just try it out, you have nothing to loose and a few hundred articles to gain.

Personally I find after a good meditation session I can pump out five to ten articles which I think is a great way to get ahead.

Item #3 - Listen to Music

Listening to music is a great way to beat writers block however, be warned, some music can in fact make your writers block worse. The sort of music you should be listening to is Baroque Music at 60 beats per minute. Research has shown that this type of music actually releases alpha waves in both our left and right sides of our brains. In doing this, it helps us to fell calm, similar to whistling a happy tune.

The “Alpha” state of mind is ideal for developing articles as it heightens creativity and learning. Many of my colleagues use Baroque music in their memory learning seminars specifically because Baroque Music heightens the learning and creativity parts of the brain.

Writers block can be one of the great challenges you will have to face at some stage in your writing career. These three items I have listed above have helped me breeze through a writers block saga and ensure that I can effectively continue to do the work I enjoy. Just to finish off I want to reiterate the three things I recommend you try if you are suffering writers block:

Item #1 - List Points and Write A Paragraph on the Points

Item #2 - Meditate

Item #3 - Listen to Music


- Chris Le Roy