After my first draft, my first round of editing is about getting the story right and sharp. In that round, I focus on getting the character, its conflict and the resolution of that conflict correct and smooth. My second (and usually last) round of editing is more technical and focused on finishing. Here is my … Read more
When a piece of music is good, it gets a lot of claps. When a piece of music is great, it gets silence. It is easy to compose and deliver music that gets claps. It is the work of a true genius to compose and deliver music that gets silence. No claps, no words, only … Read more
I had been told to get on Facebook when I started writing. I did. I used to have an author page where I kept posting blog posts regularly at one time. Then I was told to publish them on LinkedIn. I had never bought a book, especially fiction, after reading about it on LinkedIn. Or … Read more
50 isn’t very different from 49, I discovered the day after my 50th birthday. Did the above line catch your attention? I just wrote it as an experiment. When I started writing, a lot of courses told me that the first line of a story is very important. So, I cultivated this habit of noting … Read more
“I think Raichand is back to his shenanigans,” Swami said when we met at the café the other day. Jigneshbhai and I stayed silent. In the past, we had seen Swami suffer due to his boss Raichand’s penchant for making money by hook or by crook. “He wants me to talk to some placement consultant … Read more
“Every time I am unhappy with the work scene, Raichand calls me and gives me some pep talk,” Swami told me and Jigneshbhai over his coffee the other day. We thought maybe he was telling us how he felt like a wanted employee due to that. But it turned out that he was not happy … Read more
The source of irritation and anger is within us. Whenever some act by someone else creates that emotion within us, the source of it can be tracked back to an unfulfilled expectation within. The only freedom from this is to fix that expectation. But it does not mean leading a dry life without expectations. It … Read more
When someone gives us compliments for a job well done, we sometimes get into the mode of touting how we have been doing this for a while and are experts at it in any case. This may not be tomtoming about ourselves but it is definitely a reflection of we liking the compliments. This is … Read more
We make a conscious decision by the intellect not to get pulled into certain things or situations or people which we might have learnt are not conducive to our growth. Sometimes we are successful at it due to grace of God. We can see situations and are able to discern them we having potential for … Read more