Tag: wordpress

Why Reviewing Books is an Act of Love

Whenever I finish a book and prepare a review, I ask myself why I am doing this. Why I dedicate time reading books and time writing reviews and even more time structuring the blog post. Do you know how many times I revise a post before it goes public? Too many times. Some of the posts you love the most have been revised upwards to twenty times because I want it to be done to the best of my ability. It may not even be done right but at least I know I’ve done what I can. If I think before I speak then it means that I must also think before I write. Of course, typos fall through but the point is that to prepare and schedule a post takes time. So, after days (sometimes weeks and months) reading the book, hours writing the review and a few hours scheduling the post I ask myself, why am I doing this? This question led to this post.

Book Bloggers are individuals who offer their service as nothing more than an act of love. It is a selfless act in which the person or persons expect nothing in return. Reviewers are not paid, have no agendas and to be real, we really don’t even have the time which is why our to-be-read piles are always sky high. Book Reviewers read books and write reviews even under pressure and harsh criticism because love endures. And the real ones, those opting to give much more than glowing five stars, these reviewers give even more. Not only do they give their time and attention but they are also genuine. They open up about how they truly felt about the work and add even more value to the service by giving authors the opportunity to grow.

As I finish a book and prepare the review, I find myself feeling really good. I am not burdened or worried or obligated. I am doing what I enjoy doing and am always excited for the authors I get to promote! It humbles me to be a part of their journey. Sometimes I scroll Amazon just to see how my authors are doing.  I remember reviewing books that had just a few reviews when I reviewed them. Then I see they have ten, twenty and thirty. I smile inwardly. In some way, I helped someone to grow.

You see, Book Reviewers do this, largely, with nothing coming back to them except the valuable qualities that no one can take away because it is something that people cannot touch and that money cannot buy: Love, Respect, Dignity, and Courage.

No Whining Wednesday – The Strength in Others

Welcome back to No Whining Wednesday, your (and mine!) weekly reminder not to whine, complain, or criticize for this twenty-four hour period. If you’re new to this blog or this segment, please refer to the first post HERE which explains in detail. (You can also see the other weeks we’ve done so far. Just click on the pingbacks)

The No Whining Wednesday Badge

Today’s reminder is all about looking for the strength in others, instead of the weaknesses:

“It is much more valuable to look for the strength in others. You can gain nothing by criticizing their imperfections.”
– Daisaku Ikeda

We have a habit of seeing only the bad in people. Every day we place judgment on others in subtle ways. Maybe we saw a blog post we didn’t agree with so we murmured under our breaths. Maybe someone bypassed us on the street and we wondered why they wore those shoes. Maybe we rolled our eyes because someone did something we thought was the wrong thing to do. Maybe an author is not winning in our eyes. Maybe he or she is losing because they aren’t doing it the way we’ve been taught it should be done. Maybe, maybe, maybe. These “maybies” add up. Sometimes they come out of our mouths. Other times they stay in our heads. Either way, consciously or subconsciously, we tend to see the negative in people first and then, only if we’ve chosen to accept the person anyway, do we see the good.

What if we could see the good first? What if instead of counting my weaknesses, you can count my strengths? What if instead of seeing what I am doing wrong, you can see what I am doing right? Today, try not to criticize people’s imperfections. Instead, look for their strengths.

“Don’t criticize what you don’t understand, son. You never walked in that man’s shoes.”
– Elvis Presley

I challenge you to list a strength you see in someone in your life in the comments section! Could be a fellow blogger, author, sister, brother, mom, friend. Anyone in your life. (You cannot talk about yourself).

The Perfect Piece

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Repost for World Poetry Day.

 

To the lyrically talented
the brave who do not stop at sing-song
and music
but poems whose words themselves
are like melody
like the rhythm of rocking chairs
like serenity
like soldiers stomping truth into the torso of the earth
like Assata’s
like revolution
like Maya Angelou’s
and Ntozake’s
perfect like marching orders
like biblical
like Deborah’s
and Sara’s
like faith
and the wisdom of the eyes
the fire of truth
the sweet delicate of love
real love
the perfect piece

I anxiously anticipate undressing you
pulling back the symbolic layers of your metaphors
and deciphering your definitions
your rhymes curve perfectly around the waist of melodies
and swim better than oceans
you taste
why you taste like deserts springing forth with water
like tongues taste new wine
bringing the heat of our passion together
like fire to chocolate
like when bodies melt
and pens bleed both love and pain
you give birth to both truth and wisdom
the perfect lyric over a tight beat
you’re
the perfect piece

Blogging: Establishing Your Fine Print (Blogging with Purpose)

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A couple years ago I wrote a post Does Your Blog Reflect Your Purpose? about how focusing on my purpose helps me to continue to write and also about living in the moment as a catalyst for post ideas. As I sit here, I decided to update my views on this topic with a follow-up: Blogging: Establishing Your Fine Print (Blogging With Purpose).

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Each blog is different because each individual is different. We each have our own set of thought processes and routines that we feel makes our writing better and our blogs overall capable of expansion. As such, I have noticed one thing in common with each blog that I follow, the ones I have come to really enjoy: Purpose. Most of the blogs I follow touch on a variety of topics. Our posts have the potential to scan the horizon. From poetry, to short story, to news articles, to quotes, you name it we’re writing about it. I love this because variety makes it possible to reach  more people than a singular subject ( or niche) and for this I love diving into varying topics.

The Fine Print

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Fineprint – inconspicuous details or conditions printed in an agreement or contract

While my blog, like most, is filled with variety, there is also a primary purpose that remains in the fine print and I have found it in each of the blogs in which I read. That purpose is the inconspicuous detail. It doesn’t matter how many topics the blogger touches on, each person has his own primary purpose for blogging and that is the foundation I think we should each take into account as we build readership. I call this The Fine Print. Everyone has one because we all have a certain set of values that govern how we live. This doesn’t mean we have to shout to the rooftops about it, but it is the underlining foundation to how we live our lives. If we apply this to blogging, I think it will help us to build and maintain focus. By us I mean myself as well. These posts are not professional blog advice, in fact its not really advice at all but thoughts I tell myself to help me to become better that I’d like to share.

Finding Your Fine Print:

1). What are you passionate about?

Think about what matters most to you outside of blogging. Your passion usually will lead to your purpose. Your purpose is then incorporated into your everyday life: including blogging.

2). What is the one thing that motivates you to blog? 

I didn’t ask you what your blog was about because it’s deeper than that. Your reason for creating your blog is also not necessarily that thing that keeps you blogging. Your blog can be about puppies but puppies do not get you up every day to publish posts. I also did not mention why you write because not all bloggers are writers. Some bloggers are photographers, chefs, etc. But I asked you what was the one thing that motivates you to blog because if you can name that thing that insists that you must blog, that thing that tugs at your being and demand that you release words into this public forum, then that is the first step toward finding your Fine Print.

3). Do not Preach Your Fine Print

Your Fine Print is for you. To help to keep you focused. Once you’ve defined your purpose, it’s not going to help you to preach to the choir. The reason this is called a Fine Print is because it’s a foundation to the entire document. You can read through an employee handbook, but the fine print is what sets the document apart as serious business.

A bloggers fine print is their driving force, their purpose, their one motivating factor, their reason for doing. Its not something they have to bring up in every conversation, but it is that thing in which they strategically incorporate into their blog in a way that drives curiosity and helps readers to get to know them better. If you bring your purpose up in every post it will drive people away. No one wants to be preached to or forced to accept anything. Your fine print is to help YOU to stay focused. When people sign a contract they are agreeing both to the contents of the document itself and also to the fine print. Fine Prints are that underlying message. When you follow a blog, you may not know it, but you’re not just supporting that blog, you are also agreeing with that blogs Fine Print, which is the whole point. In other words, that bloggers purpose for writing intrigues you in some way and has prompted you to endorse them.

Does your blog have a Fine Print?

Find out what drives you to blog and keep that as the underlying message to everything that you post. This is your Fine Print. It doesn’t mean bash everyone over the head with your ideas. It is instead using your purpose as a driving force to produce quality material. People follow blogs for so many different reasons that it is possible that your one weekly feature was their sole purpose for following you. In this way, you have reached them. Though your Fine Print is inspiring people, your weekly feature became the catalyst for which this was done, the method that has proven effective in a way that will continue to drive traffic.

4). Stay Focused

Purpose – the reason for which something is done or created or for which something exists.

Don’t get so caught up in the purpose of someone else that you subtly make their purpose your purpose. Your fine print is not really for them, it’s to help YOU to stay focused. Blogging is a communal activity. This means that one thing we all have in common is that we want our blogs seen by the online public for whatever reason (< your fine print). Otherwise we would all just keep. private journals, diaries, notebooks, whatever but we would not be writing so openly on the Internet. For whatever reason (fine print, purpose) we are writing online. No, we are not just writing for ourselves. I do not believe that. To publish material as openly as the internet has to be for a reason deeper than personal gratification. For whatever reason, we are blogging. We serve this community by interacting with one another. In essence we serve one another. But what I think keeps a good blog going is the individual’s  focus on their fine print once they’ve found it. It is not something they are willing to compromise and it is not something they will allow others to take away.

Have you ever read a book that was so good in the beginning but towards the end it fell short? That can happen with our blogs. We must remember that the fine print is not so much for readership as it is for our own individual marker to help keep us focused. This naturally makes it easier to produce material without compromising the integrity of the blog.

And that’s it for me. I hope these tips are helpful to each of you as you continue your blogging journey.

Top Commenters!

Drummm rollll

First, let me say that I am excited about today’s stats. Ya’ll got the views jumping which gets me pumped, YES. #Winning.

Anyway, as I logged into my dashboard to take a look-see, I noticed something interesting. I have some top commenters! It was right on point too and I could have determined these names myself. These people are very supportive of The PBS Blog and there are so many more names to add here but these guys, according to my WordPress stats, comment the most and I want to take a moment to esteem them! I appreciate you:

Tess from How a Cookie Crumbles Blog! Whoo Hoo!

Adele from Firefly465 Blog! Whoo Hoo!

Don from Don Massenzio Blog! Whoo Hoo!

Roger from Heroicallybadwriter Blog! Whoo Hoo!

Sarah from Heartstring Eulogies Blog! Whoo Hoo!

Felicia Denise from Nesie’s Place Blog! Whoo Hoo!

Go SUPPORT these guys! They will support you back!

 

Don’t Box Me In

I come from a place where twitching mouths and search for the white stuff on the floor is protocol. A place where the White Gods ruled, food stamps sacrificed to glass pipes and crack is the answer to every question and yet, I don’t plan to leave any of them behind. Not the government cheese, hand-me-down clothing or the streets chalked with junkies. I ain’t nobody special so if I can be healed they can too, if they choose. I won’t miss a trip to Egypt or beautiful Germany (I almost went one time..bummer that it didn’t work out). I can be found quoting the likes of  Whitman, Dickinson, or Frost and I think Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet is beautiful (even though his eyes look weird to me.) I’m a sucker for deep conversation, red wine, and education. I love to learn, pray, and study scripture. After all, what’s a beautiful woman whose mind is weak? I don’t mind walking into your fancy dinners either just as long as you’re paying for the plate. I hate the spotlight, true (though I will stand by my word). Shy most definitely. You can have the credit. I’ll wait and speak when the time is right because I’m kind but not weak and humble but not timid. Don’t box me in. My overcoming is a bridge for all people, not a closed door. Two Xs and no spaces except the one I found outside the box. No boxes please.