Book Review: 100 Ways to Improve Your Writing by Gary Provost | 46 Pointers from the book!

100 Ways to Improve Your Writing: Proven Professional Techniques for Writing With Style and Power by Gary Provost


As the name suggests, this book by Mr. Gary Provost outlines 100 ways to improve writing. These 100 ways are divided into crisp eleven chapters. The book is a handy treasury of ideas, interesting examples and functional pointers that may turn out to be super-useful for anyone seeking refinement of their writing, and accelerate the momentum of their writing process. In this review, I share 46 pointers that I curated upon reading the book.

For easy rememberance, I’ve divided the video into 3 parts – Quick Tips & Tricks, Lessons in the Craft of Writing & Common Errors and Mistakes To Avoid in Writing.

Let’s breeze through these!

QUICK TIPS & TRICKS
#1 Get some reference books
• Get some Reference Books such as a dictionary, encyclopedia and thesaurus.
#2 Improve Your Spellings
#3 Expand Your Vocabulary
#4 Read
• Read, and listen to what you read. Listen for the sound of the language, the music. Note the punctuation, the spelling, the logical progression of information.
#5 Take a class
#6 Research. Join a library.
#7 Eavesdrop
• Be nosy. Listen to conversations on the bus, in the elevator. Screen out the words sometimes and listen only to the music. Tune into teenagers’ conversations and you’ll pick latest slang. Find out what people are talking about, what they care about. All of this will help you to communicate more effectively through your writing.
#8 Write in your head
• If you have spent time writing in your head, you’ll have a head start when you actually sit down to write.
#9 Copy Something
• Copy quotes, sentences, paragraphs and writing from some popular or famous works.
#10 Keep a journal
• If you’ve some sort of notebook or diary that you return to often with your written thoughts, opinions, observations and various bits of wit, you’ll have a place in which to exercise your writing muscles. You’ll learn to write succinctly and clearly the events of your daily life. You’ll learn to pluck from each event just the details needed to create a sense of the whole. If you keep a journal, you’ll grow as a writer, and you’ll find that sooner or later, no matter what you’ve to write professionally, your personal experiences will play a part.
#11 Do Writing Exercises
#12 Organize Your material
• Organizing will help you lock in the logic of what you say, and it’ll speed the writing process. Organizing will help to create an overall unity as well as several interior unities.
#13 Make a list or a checklist.
#14 Picture a reader
• Write a letter to your imaginary reader. icture the reader to be in the room with you.
#15 Steal
• Be a literary pack-rat.
• Brighten up your story with a metaphor you read in the Sunday paper. Make a point with an anecdote you heard at the barber shop. Let a character tell a joke you heard in a bar. But steal small, not big. Be wary of plagiarism.
#16 use examples, quotations, quotes, facts and anecdotes in your writing
#17 Colour your stories with your opinions
• You don’t have to care whether the reader agrees with your opinion or not, the reader only has to respond to it.
#18 Ask Yourself Why You’re Writing
• What are your goals? Are you trying to make your readers laugh? Are you trying to persuade them to buy a product? Are you trying to advise them? Are you trying to inform them so you can make a decision?
• You must know what you want done before you pick the tools to do it.
LESSONS IN THE CRAFT OF WRITING
#19 Find a Slant
• Do not try to write everything about your subject. All subjects are inexhaustible.
• Tie yourself to a specific idea about your subject. This idea is called slant. Ex: Glass windows – stained glass windows
#20 Write a strong lead
• The lead is whatever it takes to lead your readers so deeply into your story or article that they’ll not turn back unless you stray from the path you’ve put them on.
• A good lead is the one that is provocative, energetic, of appropriate respective length and gives the readers something to care about.
#21 How to Write Beginnings
• Cross out every sentence in the initial drafts until you come to the one you cannot do without.
• Set a tone and maintain it.
#22 Use Pyramid Construction
• Writing in pyramid style means getting to the point at the top, putting the “who, what, when, where and why” in the first paragraph and developing the supporting information under it.
#23 Use topic Sentences
• A topic sentence in a paragraph is a sentence containing the thought that is developed throughout the rest of the paragraph.
#24 Write short paragraphs.
#25 On Transitions In Writing
• Use transitional phrases to make the transition between sentences quick, smooth, quiet, reliable and logical.
• Use bridge words for transitions.
• Don’t use transitions to conceal information. Ex: Don’t write “John went to the museum” if later you intend to show that John had an accident while going to the museum.
• Explain, not acknowledge, the awkward transitions.
#26 On STYLE
• Style is the way an idea is expressed, not the idea itself.
• Style is form, not content.
• A reader usually picks up a story because to the content but too often puts it down because to style.
• there is no subject that cannot be made fascinating by a well-informed and competent writer.
#27 Writing is music
• To write is to create music. The words you write create sounds and when these sounds are in harmony, the writing will work.
• Listen to your writing.
• Listen for the dissonance. Listen for the beat. Listen for the gaps. Listen for the sour notes.
#28 Vary sentence length.
• This sentence has five words. Here are five more words. Five-word sentences are fine. But several together become monotonous. Listen to what is happening. The writing is getting boring. The sound of it drones. It’s like a stuck record. The ear demands some variety. Now listen. I vary the sentence length, and I create music. Music. The writing sings. It has a pleasant rhythm, a lilt, a harmony. I use short sentences. And I use sentences of medium length. And sometimes, when I am certain the reader is rested, I will engage him with a sentence of considerable length, a sentence that burns with energy and builds with all the impetus of a crescendo, the roll of the drums, the crash of the cymbals–sounds that say listen to this, it is important.
SO, write with a combination of short, medium and long sentences. Create a sound that pleases the reader’s ears. Don’t just write words. Write music.
#29 Know how to use punctuation correctly
• Don’t use punctuation as decoration. Avoid using unnecessary dashes, ellipses or quotation marks, the way drunks use whiskey.
• Use Commas to add clarity to a sentence. Read it aloud. In a pause really needed for clarity?
• Use a Semicolon when a comma would not give your sentence the sufficient pause. Also, to separate a word series that contain commas. For instance, He bought soda, potato chips, icecream and candy; several games; three record albums.
• Colons are used to introduce lists, formal quotations and examples.
• Use exclamation only when exclaiming and question marks only when asking questions.
• Trust your sentences to reveal emotions. Don’t rely on punctuation to show how much feeling you bring to your writing.
• All words taken directly from another’s speech or writing must be set off in quotation marks. Do not use quotation marks around the words that are not directly taken from a speech or writing. If a quote is contained within a quote, use a single quotation mark for the inner quote. Use quotation marks around word or phrase you intend to explain.
#30 Respect the rules of grammar
• The rules of grammar organize the language just as the rules of arithmetic organize the world of numbers.
• Grammatical rules about tense, gender, number, person and case provide us with a literary currency that we can spend wherever english is spoken or read.
#31 Prefer Good writing to Good grammar
• Keep in mind that good grammar, even perfect grammar, doesn’t guarantee good writing any more than a good referee guarantees a good basketball game.
#32 Create a strong title
• a good title is short.
• a good title will make the reader curious
• a good title reveals information, not hide it
• a good title suggests the slant of the story
#33 On Writing Complete & Incomplete Sentences
• “The cat jumped off the roof” is a complete sentence. “The cat jumped” is also a complete sentence. ‘The cat” however, is not a complete sentence.
• Write complete sentences 99% of the time. But every now and then, if a partial sentence sounds right to you, that’s what you should write. Period.
#34 Show don’t tell.
• Trust the reader to understand what you’re showing through your writing.
#35 Use parallel construction
• Just as the steady beat of a drum can often enrich a melody, the repetition of a sound can often improve the music of your writing. This is called parallel construction.
• Fish gotta swim and flying is something that birds should do. – Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly.
#36 Use words that are short, dense & familiar
• Instead of once a month, use monthly.
• Instead of something new, use novel, etc.
#37 Use strong verbs. Use active verbs.
• Verbs, words of action are primary source of energy in your sentence. Active verbs do something. Inactive verbs are something. Set your sentence in motion by using strong & active verbs.
• Ex: The clock was in the corner of the wall. – The clock towered in the corner of the wall.
• Turn look into stare, gaze, peek, etc.
• Be suspicious of adverbs.
#38 Be specific
• Picture a box. Picture a black box. Picture a black box with silver hinges.
• Be specific in your writing without being too wordy.
#39 Don’t force a personal style
• Style is not something you can put into your writing like a new set of clothes. Style is your writing. It is inexorably knotted to the content of your words and the nature of you. So do not pour the clay of your thoughts into the hard mold of some personal writing style that you’re determined to have. Do not create in your head some witty, erudite, exciting persona and try to capture him or her on paper. Strive instead to write without self-consciousness. Then your style will emerge.

COMMON ERRORS & MISTAKES TO AVOID IN WRITING
#40 On Editing Early Drafts
• You’ll make mistakes in your early drafts. That’s okay. But before you type the final draft, let atleast a day pass, and then think carefully about what you wrote before turning to your typewriter. You may find that what you thought was brilliant prose on Tuesday borders on the moronic by Friday. On the other hand, you may discover that, what seemed trivial when you wrote it, is, in fact, profound.
• Cut unnecessary words. They’ll slow you down.
• Read aloud your work.
• Avoid using too many footnotes, jargon, parentheses and clichés
#41 Use specific nouns.
• Be on lookout for adjectives that are doing the work that could be done by a noun.
• Adjectives do for nouns, what adverbs do for verbs.
#42 Avoid Splitting infinitives
• A splitting infinitive when an adverb is placed between the word to and the verb. Ex: she wanted to quickly reach home. She wanted to reach the home quickly
#43 Avoid shifts in pronoun forms
• When one has written the paper, they should take a break. – when one has written the paper, one should take a break.
#44 Avoid Dangling Modifiers
• A dangling modifier is a word or a group of words that appears to modify an inappropriate word in the same sentence.
• The error occurs most often when passive rather than active voice is used.
• In drawing the picture, his wife was used as the model. In drawing the picture, he used his wife as the model.
#45 Do Not change tenses in the sentences of the same paragraph.
#46 learn how to use the possessive case
Ex: The perfume lost it’s scent. (Incorrect)
The perfume lost its scent. (Correct)

Thank you! 🙂✍️💟

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Animated Book Review: The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human

The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human by Jonathan Gottschall

Most of us humans like stories.

In fact, we love stories.

But why and how do we seem to love them?

For science, that may still be a puzzle. Nevertheless, our understanding of the human mind leads the way to the insight which streams in the backdrop while we’re immersed in a story and our mind is processing, forming connections, feeling emotions, rewiring neural pathways and churning information presented to us through the story.

The Storytelling Animal by Jonathan Gottschall takes us through an immersive wordscape that is peppered with oodles of metaphors, pointers, insights, and lessons, pertaining mostly, to the topic of storytelling. The book features an interesting embroidery woven together with the intricate threads of researches related to evolutionary psychology, neuroscience and various other sciences.

Encapsulating several stories-within-stories and pop-modern terminology, the book delves deep into some of the fundamental concepts and quintessential elements that make up the overall idea of storytelling. In this review, I’m going to share with you, 18 interesting pointers that I learned and curated after reading the book. Basically, my primary takeaways from the book…

So, let’s get started with these!

#1 The Origin of Storytelling
Storytelling is not some new-age science. But rather, it is as old as the existence of life itself on earth. Mr. Jonathan says that human beings are creatures of an imaginative realm called as Neverland. He also says that the primate version of human was not merely Homo Sapiens but also Homo Fictus that is, the great ape with the storytelling mind!
"And long before any of these primates thought of writing Hamlet or Harlequins or Harry Potter stories – long before these primates could envision writing at all – they thronged around hearth fires, trading wild lies about brave tricksters, and young lovers, selfless heroes and shrewd hunters, sad chiefs and wise crones, the origin of the sun and the stars, the nature of God and spirit and all the rest of it." – Jonathan Gottschall, The Storytelling Animal

#2 ON SCIENTIFIC VIEW OF FICTION
The book describes how bringing science into fiction is not the best suited thing to do. We should not do intellectual dissection of fiction, as Wordsworth also said, "To dissect is to murder".

However, this doesn’t at all mean that fiction is by any means in conflict with science. Fiction, as a matter of fact, is deeply rooted in science. It enables the reader to envision new and creative ideas by requiring their willing suspension of disbelief.

The main thing, Mr. Jonathan writes, is to pry away the veneer of familiarity and to accept the bizarreness and strangeness of the story worlds, as they really are.

"Fictions, fantasies, dreams – these are to the humanistic imagination, a kind of sacred preserve. They’re the last bastion of magic. They’re the one place where science cannot – should not – penetrate, reducing ancient mysteries to electrochemical storms in the brain or the timeless warfare among selfish genes." - The Storytelling Animal 

#3 Humans are Addicted to stories
We, as human species, are addicted to stories. Of all, there are three main reasons to that.

First, we can’t resist the gravity of the alternate worlds. Secondly, our mind is addicted to patterns. The human mind is tuned to detect patterns. The same mental software that makes us very alert, to human faces and figures, causes us to see animals in clouds or jesus in griddle marks. This is part of the “mind design” that helps us perceive meaningful patterns in our environment. 

"Our hunger for meaningful patterns translates into our hunger for stories." - The Storytelling Animal

Thirdly, humans conjure gods, spirits and sprites to fill the explanatory voids.

What we don’t understand, that’s a story!

#4 Reader’s imagination is the catalyst for the storyteller
Writers and storytellers merely create storyscapes. But it’s the reader’s imagination that acts as a catalyst, churning the received information into an experience.

#5 Writing IS ANALOGOUS TO painting
"Each word is a daub of paint. Word by word – brushstroke by brushstroke – the writer creates images that have all the depth and crispness of real life. But writers are merely drawing, not painting. Our minds supply most of the information in the scene – most of the colour, shading and texture." - The Storytelling Animal

#6 Children are natural storytellers
Kids & children – what do they do? Mr. Jonathan writes that they do story mostly. The world of make-believe and pretend play is spontaneous and natural to children – they don’t need to be taught how to create stories. They are natural storytellers.


And even though we may grow up into full-fledged adults, but this inner child prevails within us.
"We are all more like Peter Pan than we know. We may leave the nursery, with the toy-trucks and dress-up clothes, but we never stop pretending. We just change how we do it. Novels, dreams, films and fantasies, are provinces of Neverland." - The Storytelling Animal

But at the same time, this doesn’t mean that the worlds of make-believe are all rainbows and sunshine. Actually, they are far from this. Explaining this, Mr. Jonathan says,
"Grown-ups have a tendency to remember the land of make-believe as a heavenly, sun-kissed bunny land. But the land of make-believe is less like heaven and more like hell. Children’s play is not escapist. It confronts the problem of the human condition, head on.
Pretend play is deadly serious fun. Every day children enter a world where they must confront dark forces, fleeing and fighting for their lives...
This play is the work of children." 
- The Storytelling Animal

#7 Stories DOMINATE OUR LIFE
Story’s role in human life extends far beyond conventional novels or films. Story, and a variety of storylike activities, dominates human life. From the skills we learn to the conversations we have with people, stories dominate nearly every aspect of our life. And its not only the writers and the storytellers and the filmmakers who tell stories but everybody including archaeologists, business executives, political commentators, and all.

"We are soaked to the bone in story. Human mind was shaped for story, so that it could be shaped by story." - The Storytelling Animal

The reason for this, could be, that stories universally focus on the great predicaments of human condition. Story is where people go to practice the key skills of human social life. They help us with real-world problem solving. And "Like a flight simulator, fiction projects us into simulations of problems that run parallel to those we face in reality. And like a flight simulator the main virtue of fiction is that we have a rich experience and don’t die at the end.We get to simulate what it’d be like to confront a dangerous man or seduce someone’s spouse, for instance, and the hero of the story dies in our stead." - The Storytelling Animal

"Story = Character + Predicament + Attempted Extrication" - The Storytelling Animal

#8 Stories & REPETITION
Repetition of fictional problem solving enhances the skill of real life problem solving too.

#9 Hell is story-friendly
Mr. Jonathan points out a brilliant insight pertaining to stories. That is, there is a huge difference in desirability between what we desire in real life and what is desired in stories.

He writes,
"There is a yawning canyon between what is desirable in life (an uneventful trip to the grocery store) and what is desirable in fiction (a catastrophic trip). In this gap, I believe, lies an important clue to the evolutionary riddle of fiction." - The Storytelling Animal

While in real world, we may not like to face conflicts and dilemmas and troubles, in the matter of storytelling, conflicts, dilemmas & troubles make the bread-and-jam of stories.

"In life, conflict often carries a negative connotation. yet in fiction, be it comic or tragic, dramatic conflict is fundamental because in literature, only trouble is interesting. Only trouble is interesting. This is not so in life. As Charles Baxter puts it in another book of fiction, 'Hell is story-friendly'." - The Storytelling Animal

However, this doesn’t at all imply that fiction is absolutely an escapist entertainment. An escapist entertainment is meant to be pleasant, on the flip side, a good fiction is far than pleasant. Instead, it is webbed with the tentacles of conflict and drama.

"If fiction offers an escape, it is a bizarre form of escape. Our various fictional worlds, are, on the whole – horrorscapes. Fiction may temporarily free us from our troubles, but it does so by ensnaring us in new sets of troubles – in imaginary worlds of struggle and stress and mortal woe." - The Storytelling Animal
"Stories of pure wish fulfillment don’t tempt us but what about stories that show us life as it is actually lived?" - The Storytelling Animal
"Trouble is the fat red thread that ties together the fantasies of pretend play, fiction and dreams, and trouble provides a possible clue to a function they all share: giving us practice in dealing with the big dilemmas of human life." - The Storytelling Animal
.
#10 Practical People, Story people & The Riddle of Fiction
The book mentions the metaphor of two groups of people - Practical People and Story People.

Story people fill their leisure time with rest, gossip and stories but practical people don’t waste their time on stories – they keep on working for their bellies – the story people prevail more often than the practical people – and this is the great riddle of fiction.

#11 Even Music Tells stories!
"Of course, not all music tells a story. There are also symphonies, fugues and avant-garde soundscapes blending wind chimes and bunny screams. But the most popular brand of music tells stories about protagonists struggling to get what they want – most often a boy or a girl. Singers might work in meter & rhyme, and alongside guitarists & drummers, but that doesn’t alter the fact that the singer is telling a story, it only disguises it." - The Storytelling Animal

#12 Daydreaming, Fantasies & Imagination – The Witchery of Life
"Daydreams are hard to study, scientically, but if you tune into your stream of consciousness, you’ll discover that daydreaming is mind’s default state." - The Storytelling Animal
"We spend half of our waking hours – one-third of our lives on earth – spinning fantasies. We daydream about the past: things we should have said or done, working through our victories and failures. We daydream about mundane stuff such as different ways of handling conflict at work. But we also daydream in a much more intense, storylike way. We screen films with happy endings – in our minds, where all our wishes – vain, aggressive, dirty – come true. And we screen little horror films, too, in which our worst fears are realized.
Imagination is an awesome mental tool. While our bodies are always locked in a specific here and now, our imagination frees us to roam space-time. Like powerful sorcerers, all humans can see the future – not a clear & determined future, but a murky, probabilistic one." - The Storytelling Animal

#13 CHARACTER CREATION IS A NATURAL TALENT
Good fiction means skillfully-crafted characters. Mr. Jonathan writes that, character creation is an innate process that we begin learning while we are still a kiddo.

"2-year olds begin learning how to develop a character. When playing the king, they pitch their voices differently than when they’re playing the queen or the meowing cat." - The Storytelling Animal

#14 STORY STRUCTURE IS THE BONY SKELETON & THE UNIVERSAL GRAMMAR
Mr. Jonathan says in the book that stories, nearly all stories, follow a pattern of structures. Every story is confined to this structural pattern.

"Think of this structure as a bony skeleton that we rarely notice beneath its padding of flesh and colorful garments. This skeleton is somewhat cartilaginous – there is a flex in it. But the flex is limited and the skeleton dictates that stories can be told in a limited number of ways." - The Storytelling Animal

This, however, at first, may appear to be a limitation in the way of a writer or storyteller, but these structural constraints actually free the writer or the storyteller to tell their stories more expressively.

"The idea that stories slavishly obey deep structural patterns seems at first vaguely depressing. But it shouldn’t be. Think of the human face. The fact that all faces are very much alike doesn’t make the face boring or mean that particular faces can’t startle in with their beauty or distinctiveness. As William James wrote, “There is a very little difference between one man and another, but what little there is, it is very important. The same is true for stories." - The Storytelling Animal

Patterns of complications, crisis & resolution, a universal grammar, a deep pattern...

#15 Human Brain AND fiction
How does the human brain respond to the stimulus of fiction? Well, to understand this, we’d need to understand the basics of the mind design. How our brain is designed? There are neurons firing information and linking with each other to form connections. Then, there are certain type of neurons called as the mirror neurons.

When we read or watch a work of fiction, these mirror neurons cause our brain to respond to it as if the fiction was happening in real life.

"Knowing that fiction is fiction doesn’t stop our emotional brain from processing it as real.
When we see something scary or dangerous in a film, our brain lights up as though that thing were happening to us, not just to a cinematic figment." - The Storytelling Animal

We feel what the protagonist is feeling.

And that is stupendous, isn’t it?

Well, moving on…

#16 DREAMS – NIGHT STORIES & Alternate Dimension of Reality
Driven by the rule of fight or flight, the dreaming consciousness is a form of nature’s storytelling. In the book, Mr. Jonathan writes that dreams are the night stories with their own plot, setting, scenes, point of view, characters, perspective and theme. Dreams are encrypted messages from the spirit or in Freudian terms, from the Id.

"While the body lies dormant, the restless brain improvises original drama in the theater of our minds." - The Storytelling Animal

#17 Ink People – they change the world
Using the metaphor of Ink People for storytellers, Mr. Jonathan says in the book,

"The characters in fiction are just wiggles of ink on paper. They are ink people. They live in ink houses inside ink towns. They work at ink jobs. They have inky problems. They sweat ink and they cry ink and when they’re cut, they bleed ink. And yet ink people press effortlessly through the porous membrane separating their inky worlds from ours. They move through our flesh-and-blood world and wield real power to it. They shape our behaviours and our customs, and in doing so, they transform societies and histories." - The Storytelling Animal

#18 Story is the glue of the world
"Story is the grease and glue of society. Story is the center without which the rest cannot hold." - The Storytelling Animal

Taking the example of a movie, Mr. Jonathan explains that if the movie is good, people watch it as a single organism. They laugh together. They gasp together. They react to the movie together as if, in a psychic unity. And this way, story ends up binding people together.

"Fiction writers mix the powder of a message with the sugary jam of storytelling. People bolt down the sweet jam of storytelling and don't even notice the undertaste of the powder." - The Storytelling Animal

In a nutshell, whether you are a writer or a storyteller or just an avid reader, I hope that you love stories. Because, I do and you should too!

Thank you! 🙂✍️💟

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Book Review: Show Your Work by Austin Kleon And 19 Pointers from the Book!

Show Your Work!: 10 Ways to Share Your Creativity and Get Discovered by Austin Kleon
In three words, SHOW YOUR WORK is a book that reveals to you, exciting ways to “show your work” and to put it out there into the world.

Embellished with photographs and snippets of blackout poetry, the square paperback is a crisp guide offering tips and tricks that are not only interesting but quite practical & relevant to follow through.

In this review, I am sharing nineteen clear-cut and key pointers from the book. Read on!

#1 In order to be found, you have to be findable
In simple words, be online. If you have a skill that you can share or teach, or if you have a work that you do, then put this skill or bits of your work out there for people to see.

#2 Send out a Daily Dispatch
Consistently post bits & pieces of your work. Share something small every day. Take it one day at a time, and it gradually compounds over months and years. Find the time to do this, each day, between tasks, just as you find spare change in nooks and crannies of your house

#3 You don’t have to be a Genius. Be a scenius.
Lone genius is a myth. He says, that great ideas are often birthed by a group or a community of creative people. So, to share your work you don’t have to be a genius. You can consider being part of a scene of people who do the work similar to you or take interest in the work you do.

#4 Be an Amateur
Mr. Kleon writes that raw enthusiasm is contagious. While you do your work, be an amateur. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities. In an expert’s mind, there are a few. Every time you think you’re getting too comfortable or stale in your work, change your instrument. Try something new, something you’ve never tried before.

#5 Find Your Voice & Shout It From The Rooftops
First things first, you can’t find your voice if you don’t use it. Share what you love and the people who love the same things will find you. Secondly, as you find your voice, shout it from the rooftops and keep doing it until the people that are looking for you, find you.

#6 Ask Questions For a new Tool
While employing a new tool for your work, ask these three questions to make the most efficient use of this tool. What was it made for? – How are others using it? – What purpose does it serve for me?

#7 Read Obituaries
Mr. Kleon writes in the book that, thinking about death every morning, makes him want to live his life to the fullest. Thereupon, he suggests reading obituaries every day for inspiration and for reminding ourselves that each passing day, we’re moving closer to our death.

#8 Think Process Not Product
Take people ‘Behind the Scenes’. Don’t believe surface appearances. Process is always messy, even for the glossiest of products.

In the book, Austin Kleon writes that one should focus on art work (process) more than the artwork (product); focus on the verb painting (process) more than the noun painting (product).

Become a documentation of what you do. Start a work journal. Jot down your thoughts in a notebook or record in an audio recorder. Keep a scrapbook of your work process. Record various phases of your work process.

#9 Turn your flow into stock
Stock & flow is a concept of economy. But here, in the book, it is used as a metaphor pertaining to the work process.

If you work on something a little bit everyday, you end up with something that is massive. This is referred to as the ‘stock’ of your work’s ‘flow’.

The magic formula is to maintain your flow while working on your stock in the background. When the stock reaches a considerable size, flip back through it. Notice patterns in your work flow.

#10 Open up your cabinet of curiosities. But don’t be a hoarder or a spammer.
All of us have our own collections brimming with bits, pieces and snippets of others work. Share your collections however, at the same time be aware of the thin line between sharing and oversharing. Don’t turn into human spam. When its time to listen, listen. When its time to share, share. Use the Hoarder–Contributor-Spammer scale to measure what you should do.

#11 Discover yourself from the work of others
Mr. Kleon writes that in the first few years, our work is not that good, but the taste is still killer. Meanwhile what we can do is, we can discover our taste, our voice, through the work of others; drawing inspiration from others’ work.

Where do you draw your inspiration from? Whose work you like? What element specifically you like or take interest in, in their work. Dig deeper and discover for yourself.

#12 Work doesn’t speak for itself. Tell good stories.
“Everybody loves a good story but a good storytelling doesn’t come easy to everybody. It’s a skill that takes a lifetime to master. So study the great stories and then go find some of your own. Your stories will get better the more you tell.”
Adding to this, Mr. Kleon says that pictures can say what we want them to say. And hence, become a good storyteller. Understand what good storytelling is.

‘The cat sat on a mat’ is not a good story. ‘The cat sat on the dog’s mat’ is a story. – John le Carre

Structure is everything. Understand the structures of stories. Once you understand story structures, you can start filling in the gaps with characters, settings and circumstances for your own story.

#13 Teach what you know. Share your trade secrets.
Suggesting that one can share knowledge of their work, Mr. Kleon writes, “When you share bits of your work and knowledge with others, you receive an education in return. Think about what you can share from your work process. Where did you learn your craft? What techniques you employ in your work? What are the tools & materials you are skilled at using? What kind of knowledge comes along with your job?”

#14 Focus on hearts not eyeballs
If you want to be interesting, you have to be interested first. If you want to be noticed, you have to notice first. Don’t go by the number of your followers. Rather, seek to enhance the essence of your work.

#15 The Vampire Test
One upon a time there was a painter. He had a characteristic of draining people just the way he squashed the tubes of oil paints. Whenever people met or interacted with him, they felt drained of their energies in the aftermath. Sharing this story, Mr. Kleon offers us the idea of ‘the vampire test’. Whatever excites you, go do it. Whatever drains you, stop doing it. Be with people who excite you and not drain you. Simple!

#16 Learn to take punches
While engaged in a creative work, or any work for that matter, critiques and their criticism is inevitable a thing. Mr. Kleon says that the more criticism you take, the more you know that it can’t hurt you.

Do not take critiques and criticism too personally. The trick is not caring what everybody thinks of you and just caring what the right people think of you. He writes.

Also he suggests that, although one should protect one’s vulnerable self, but shouldn’t go into avoidance of their vulnerability. Keep the balance of what criticism to take and what to avoid.

Adding to which, he writes, “Don’t feed the trolls”. “Keep a mental firewall against these trolls. And don’t forget that the worst troll is the one that lives in our head.”

#17 Keep Jealousy & Greed Out of your Way
Don’t be jealous of other people’s successes. Don’t be greedy to make money too soon and too early either. Saying this, Mr. Kleon shares this quote from Walt Disney.

“We don’t make movies to make money. We make money to make more movies.” – Walt Disney

#18 Stick around.
Don’t quit your show. If you want a happy ending, it depends on where you end the story. Every little step in your work contributes to a chain reaction, each subject leads to the next.

#19 Keep moving forward & Take Sabbaticals.
Take daily-weekly-monthly sabbaticals in order to separate your work from the rest of your life.

Once you’re done with something, begin again. Rethink things completely. Keep old work aside to make space for new work. Move on to the next pipe dream.

For inspiration & wrapping this up, here’s a quote from the book!

Whenever Picasso learned how to do something, he abandoned it. – Milton Glaser

Thank you!

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