#I do feel bad for the pros that would try to push the creative envelope and then get verbally eviscerated for it.

[frigidlyauthorial]

fascinating okay so i'm watching season 17 of dancing with the stars and it's like. you can literally tell that derek was taking a very deliberate gamble between relying on points from the judges vs doing what would be most impressive for the audience.

In Week 3 for Most Memorable Year, Amber and Derek danced a foxtrot. It was an absolutely gorgeous dance, because with those two there is no way it could not be, but the routine departed from foxtrot standards (namely, the amount of time spent in hold).

The scores they got were extremely across the board (9, 7, 10), but I'm so curious about how derek offhandedly mentioned that he'd prepared Amber for Len to rip into them for the choreography. Both of them seemed shocked that Len went so far as to give it a 7 (their lowest score on the show thus far), but it is very telling that derek knew that his choreo was pushing the envelope far beyond what would be allowed, and decided to go down that path anyway because he knew that it would be shortsighted to focus on appeasing one judge when he could instead be using that dance as a way to build up his partner in the eyes of the audience.

[bunnyywritings]

Can I request Shinsou doing a hero-work study with a young popular female hero? But during the study he starts to gain feelings for them due to their energetic personality and how loving she was to him. How they understand his struggle with his quirk and such, in general just makes him feel more confident. But she doesn’t only sees him as a little brother kinda thing? I hope this makes sense 💕 thank you!

misunderstood and unheard

hitoshi shinso x fem!reader

[a/n: this is such a creative prompt, thank you for the request anon!!! enjoy some sad shinso, -yours truly, bunnyy -`ღ´- ps. for the sake of a hero theme, (y/n) is kinda like an alt girl...that’s how she dresses, her ideals, how her hero costume is designed and how her agency is decorated]

To say he was shocked is a bit of an understatement. He never thought that his work-study application to your agency would be accepted.

You were someone he looked up to, someone he admired. You were a young hero, no more than a couple years older than him and you were already in the Top 5 and had your own agency. You were known because of your quirk. It was very powerful but also seen as villainous. You had a history of never accepting any students for the work-study program, only accepting office interns. So imagine the disbelief on his face when Aizawa had given him the letter. He took it to his room and got comfortable. With fluttering fingers, he shakily ripped open the envelope and tossed it aside. He took a deep breath before carefully unfolding the paper. It was handwritten. You had taken the time to personally hand write him a letter.

‘Dear Hitoshi, I usually don’t take on any students for the work-study program, so I was a little surprised to see your application in my inbox. I decided to take the chance and look it over. Once I saw that you’re currently enrolled at UA, I requested to see footage from your practice matches and the sports festival. You show a lot of promise to become a top hero one day, you’re very talented. As you probably know, I have experience with a quirk like yours and seeing as there’s a lot of very unkind people and unwilling heroes, I would like to inform you that I will gladly accept your application for a work-study. I’m very excited to meet you and help you develop the kind of experience you need to grow as a young hero. I hope you’re ready, your first day starts this Friday at 7am. You’ve already been cleared from class if you decide you want to accept.’

You...you accepted his application...

He hugged his pillow to his chest and buried is red face into it. His heart was racing and adrenaline pumping. He had never been happier in his life. He 100% framed the letter and put it on his wall.

He woke up extra early on the morning of, he just couldn’t contain himself. He had decided to forgo the school uniform and dress in casual clothes, carrying his hero costume in the metal briefcase given by the school. It had definitely improved since his first year, it was simple but it worked. His heartbeat became more erratic as his legs carried him all the way to your agency building. All he could do was stand there, in absolute awe.

“Looks like we were both excited and got here early.” He jumped at the sudden voice beside him, eyes widening as his eyes landed on you. You were dressed in civilian clothes and it took everything in him to not drool. You definitely had style. He blushed when you tilted your head in a confused manner, realizing that he hadn’t responded.

“Y-yeah, sorry. I just c-couldn’t wait s-so...yeah.” He sheepishly scratched the back of his neck.

“Well then, come on in.” You giggled as you unlocked the door and held it open for him, he nervously walked. You followed behind him as he looked around in awe. You never really thought that your agency was anything special but he was looking around like he was in disneyland. People had described your office as very homey. There was an exposed brick interior, all the furniture was vintage looking, a turntable in the corner with a shelf of various different vinyl discs beside it. He felt like he was in his dream bedroom.

“Alright then, Hitoshi.” He turned to you, cheeks still pink. “Time to suit up.” The wink you gave him made his face burn. It was going to be a long day.

Going on patrol with you just made his adoration and pride for you grow. You had posed for pictures, did countless autographs, and even went out of your way to make a tik tok or two with some kids. There was no wonder why your social ranking was so high. Other than that, it was pretty uneventful. There was some guy trying to rob a convenience store while the both of you made your way back to the agency.

“Why don’t you take this one Hitoshi-kun.” You patted his shoulder encouragingly.

“Are you sure?” He cocked an eyebrow at you.

“Yeah, I fully believe in you.” Your smile is what filled him with courage. 

He calmly approached the robber, “Sir are you sure you want to be doing that?”

“Of course! Now leave me alone you wannabe hero!” The second that shout left the man’s mouth, he froze. Eyes going blank.

You watched with your arms crossed, a small smile on your lips.

“Now why don’t you drop the weapon and put your arms around your back.” The man moved stiffly as he did what he was told. Shinso turned to you, eyes asking what he should do next. You unhooked a pair of handcuffs from your belt and tossed them to him. He caught them with ease and slapped them onto the man’s wrist.

After handing the robber off to the proper authorities, you both made your way to your agency. Ordering some lunch and eating it in your office.

“It must’ve been difficult for you.” His eyebrows furrowed slightly. “Growing up with a quirk like that.” After your clarification, he nodded somberly. Unpleasant memories resurfacing.

“All my life, I had been told my quirk was villainous. People were scared that I would take advantage of them, no one would talk to me...and sure things are a little different now but I still feel like no one truly gets it.” He didn’t know why he was being so honest but he felt like he could be honest with you.

“I truly understand how you feel. My own parents disowned me, they were disgusted by my quirk. My classmates were always terrified of me. They’d tell me that, even if I ever got to be a hero that I’d give the person I’m trying to save a heart attack. Even now as a pro, I get slandered in the press or while on patrols. I get called a demon, heroes like Endeavor are trying to kick me from the hero association.” His eyes widened as he listened to you talk, he could hear the tinge of pain in your voice.“Trying to navigate life alone is hard, I’ve been alone all of my life. When I saw you in the sports festival, the way people reacted to your quirk, I felt for you. I know what it feels like so I thought I’d-” Before you finished, a siren went off in your office. 

“Well, looks like lunch time is over.” You smiled sympathetically at him. “Let’s go.“

After helping fend off a villain and having you throw yourself in front of him to protect him, the two of you made your way back.

“Uhm there’s a locker room down the hall. You can shower before heading back to your dorm.” You smiled but he could see you were tired. Right before you guys could leave, Endeavor had some interesting choice words for you and him. You were quick to defend him from the current number 1 hero instead of defending yourself. He felt bad. It was only his first day and you had to protect him from a villain and defend him from the sharp tongue of Endeavor. He nodded and grabbed his bag, making his way to the locker room.

“What do you want Enji? Didn’t you already get enough earlier?”

“Don’t run your mouth brat. I’m here to drop off paperwork for the damage you caused.” The stack of papers he tossed thumped against your desk and you got up and crossed your arms, scoffing.

“The damage I caused? I think you’re confused Enji because last time I checked, my quirk didn’t cause someone’s house to catch fire.” You went to reach for the stack of paper but he caught your wrist in a vice grip and pulled you closer to him.

“Don’t think that you’ll ever get to the top (y/n), I’ll always be there to kick you down.” 

You chuckled, although it came off as more of a grimace. “That’s not very plus ultra of you Enji...you forget. Not everyone’s goal is to get to the top to try and revive any broken ego we have. Some of us are here to actually help people.” That didn’t please him as he shoved you away.

“I’ll be seeing you around (y/n).” He threatened. Shinso frowned as he watched Endeavor stomp out of the building, turning to you and seeing you rub our red wrist.

“Is everything okay?”

“Hmm? Oh yeah, he just dropped off some paper work.” He approached you and softly took you wrist in his hand, thumb gently running over the slight hand print he left behind.

“Did he-?”

“It’s okay Toshi-kun, it’s nothing.” The smile on your lips was convincing enough for him to drop the topic. “Now, why don’t you head back and get some rest. I’ve got some paper work to do.”

“I can help you with that.”

“Oh no, Toshi you should really go and get some rest.” You shook your head.

“Please, let me help you out. If I’m gonna be a hero, I should learn how to properly do paperwork, right?” He smiled, trying to convince you.

“Okay fine. Go put on a record and I’ll order us some more food.” 

Over the next couple of hours, the two of you ate, did paperwork, danced around to whatever record was playing and just goofed around. After a bit, he had fallen asleep while resting his head on the desk.

“I told you to go home and rest.” You whispered, shaking your head. Picking up your phone, you sandwiched it against your cheek and shoulder as you placed your jacket over his shoulder.

“Hey Aizawa, your kid fell asleep while doing paperwork...yeah, I know...well I don’t mind keeping him here. I wasn’t really planning on heading home anyways...of course...thanks Shota.” After you hung up, you pushed Shinso’s hair back. “Sweet dreams Toshi.” You placed a soft kiss against his forehead. He tried hard to fend off the smile threatening to stretch his lips.

After that, the work-study lasted for 3 more months.

“Let’s go out.”

“H-Huh?” He stuttered, looking up from the paper work the both of you were doing.

“To commemorate your last day. Let’s go eat, it’s almost time to clock out anyways.“ He agreed and the both of you decided to go get some ramen. He couldn’t help but feel like this was a date. He knew it wasn’t but a boy could dream. As the both of you ate, he reminisced about spending so much time with you.

“I’m gonna miss you Toshi-kun.” Your sudden confession made his heart skip a beat. “I like having you around.” He paused, standing under a sakura tree that the two of you walked under.

“Is everything okay?” You asked as you turned around, standing in front of him.

“I-I need to be h-honest with you (y-y/n).”

“Oh okay, go ahead.” You smiled sweetly at him, trying to ease his worry.

“I think-I think I’m in l-love with you. You make me feel like I’m not alone and the things I experienced are valid. Y-Your smile makes my heart skip a beat and-”

“Oh Toshi-kun.” You gently cut him off. The sad smile on your face made his stomach drop. “I’m sorry Toshi, I’m going to have to cut you off right there. I can’t reciprocate those feelings that you have.” He was expecting that but that didn’t make it hurt any less.

“Why? Is-Is it because I’m too young? Am I not your type?” The slight desperation in his voice broke your heart as his eyes glistened with unshed tears.

“That’s not it at all Toshi but I can’t return the feelings because I see you kinda like a little brother. I care about you and want to see you grow...I’m sorry.” You didn’t really know what to do.

“Oh...no. I-I’ve probably made you uncomfortable. I’m so sorry, I-” He sighed, running a hand down his face, hanging his head in embarrassment.

“That’s okay Toshi, no need to apologize at all.” You gently patted his head. He looked up and wiped his eyes.

“Can I give you a hug?” The question made him bite his lip in contemplation. He decided to divulge and nodded. The feeling of being in your arms made him instantly feel better. The warmth radiating from you was comforting.

“I really am sorry Hitoshi. This doesn’t change anything though. If you want to apply to my agency once you graduate. There’s always room for you.” You leaned down and planted a kiss on the crown of his head. “You can rely on me if you ever need me.” You muttered, you could feel his shoulders shake, there was something wet seeping through your shirt. You went to pull away but he gripped onto you.

“Please...just a little bit longer.” He whispered brokenly. You held him closer to you, guilty for making him feel so upset.

Sometimes, things just aren’t meant to be.

Or are they?? (Alternate ending)

[searchingwardrobes]

Natural Opposite: 9/16

The dance I invented for this chapter is probably my favorite. One, because it’s to a Nirvana song, and as a nineties teen, I LOVE Nirvana. And second, my dance background is more in this style (contemporary) than in ballroom. I hope you enjoy reading it and the way it brings Emma and Killian closer together!

Thanks to my beta @distant-rose who loved this Nirvana dance almost as much as I did. Ro, our music chats were such a fun part of doing this with you! I’m glad we have similar tastes. And my artist, @optomisticgirl girl, is so talented and perfectly captured a dance that was only in my head beautifully for this chapter. Thank you, B! She also made that gorgeous banner you see every Monday!

Chapter art:

Ch 2

Ch 4

Ch 5

Ch 6

Ch 7

Summary: Dance is more than Emma Swan’s career; it’s practically saved her life on more than one occasion. But when it comes to reality TV shows, she’s always danced in the shadows of her twin brother David and her sister Elsa. Her first season as a pro on Dancing With the Stars was a disaster, and she enters her second season determined to prove herself. All she needs is a good partner. Hollywood bad boy and ladies’ man Killian Jones isn’t what she had in mind.

Rating: M for mature themes, steamy dance routines, and sexy times (But NOT smut)

Trigger warnings: discussions of online solicitation of a minor, bullying, statutory rape, and emotionally abusive/controlling relationships; stalking; anti-Rumbelle, anti-Neal

Can also be read on

Ao3

Tagging: @bethacaciakay @kmomof4 @teamhook @kmomof4 @snowbellewells @whimsicallyenchantedrose @kday426 @snidgetsafan @delirious-latenight-laughs @jennjenn615 @followbatb @onceuponaprincessworld @hollyethecurious @ohmakemeahercules

Chapter Nine: Heart Shaped Box

Killian grinned widely at Emma when he arrived for their rehearsal the next day. She returned it and gave him a small hug in greeting, and she couldn’t say it was just for the cameras. As much as she hated to admit it, she found herself looking forward to their rehearsals. They actually had fun together. Yeah, he still drove her crazy sometimes, but he also made her laugh. Last week, Killian had summed it up in a teasing remark.

“You know, Swan, I quite fancy you from time to time. When you’re not yelling at me.”

Henry’s observation about him “liking” her rose to mind, but she quickly pressed that down. Flirting, she had come to find out, was his autopilot. And like her sarcasm, it was largely a defense mechanism.

“Sorry we have to rehearse so early,” Killian told her, “but . . . I brought a peace offering.” He extended a styrofoam to-go cup.

“Coffee?” she asked, with a tilt of her head as she accepted the offering.

“Please, Swan, are you trying to test me? It’s hot chocolate,” he said, tapping the plastic lid teasingly, “with whipped cream and cinnamon.”

“I must say, I’m impressed,” she told him as she took a sip, “and I like the early rehearsal. It means I get to pick up Henry from school this afternoon.”

“I’m glad,” Killian replied, but then he blinked and rubbed his eyes, “although I hope the coffee I consumed on the way here kicks in soon. Filming went into the wee hours this morning.”

Emma frowned. “Be sure you’re taking care of yourself. I know this show is grueling, especially when you have other commitments.”

“I’ll try,” he promised with a weary smile, “though I go straight from six hours with you back to the studio for four more hours on green screen. I’ll be glad when the hiatus begins. If I haven’t gotten voted off by then.”

Emma waved her hand dismissively as she set her hot chocolate down beside her dance bag. “Please. We’re making it to the finale, Jones, I’m telling you.”

“Okay,” Killian said with a smile, “let’s get to work then. It’s decades week, so what decade did we get?”

“The 90s.”

Killian’s brow furrowed. “The 90s.”

“Why? You don’t like the nineties?”

Killian shrugged. “Well, that depends. Are we talking flannel, angst-ridden, grunge nineties? Or boy bands, bubblegum pop, dark lipstick nineties?”

Emma laughed. “Well, don’t you know the decade well! What if I said we were dancing to ‘Heart Shaped Box’ by Nirvana?”

Killian’s eyes lit up like a kid at Christmas. “Yes!” he enthused, pumping both fists.

“So Killian Jones likes angst,” she teased, “good to know.”

“Well, if you were going to make me dance to ‘MmBop,’ you may have had a mutiny on your hands.”

“Well, the cool thing about this dance is also that it’s contemporary. And believe me, angst works well with contemporary.”

Killian nodded, his face suddenly determined. “You can get really creative with this, Swan, that’s exciting.”

Emma put her hands on her hips and studied him silently for a few moments. The corner of her mouth quirked up when he almost started to squirm under her gaze.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” he finally asked.

“How would you like to choreograph this dance with me?”

Killian’s eyes grew wide. “Are you serious?”

“Sure. You’re a performer and a musician.” She winked. “And you like angst.”

He gave her a smile she had yet to see on his face. It was genuine, as if he were truly touched by her offer. “I’d be honored, Swan.”

She cleared her throat, slightly unnerved at how much she liked this new smile on him. “Well, let’s figure out the story we’re trying to tell first.”

“Well, the lyrics are pretty dark.”

“Of course they are,” Emma said with a roll of her eyes, “it’s Nirvana.”

“Aye,” Killian chuckled, “and it’s also about a relationship. One that isn’t making either person happy, yet they stay together anyway.”

Emma swallowed hard. She knew the feeling.

“The man says he has complaints, yet then he turns around and says he’s in debt to her,” Killian continued.

Emma nodded. She had already listened to the song multiple times. “He talks about her having a cord around his neck, yet he climbs right back.”

“An umbilical noose, to be precise.”

Emma wrinkled her nose, “I know, but ew! Why did grunge bands use such sick and twisted images? He talks about eating her cancer, too.”

“They were pushing the envelope. It’s what every revolutionary period in music has done.”

Emma shook her head and smiled. “I better watch out. I’m treading into your area of expertise.”

Killian scratched the spot behind his ear. “Well, this is the genre of music I first learned to play on my guitar. I told you I was a bit morose.”

Her face softened at that. She remembered too well the lonely years before Ingrid. She could see why dark music would appeal to a lonely kid.

“So we’ve got a man who feels trapped in a relationship,” Emma replied, switching topics back to brainstorming for the routine.

“Hence the heart shaped box.”

“But I like what you said,” Emma continued, “about neither of them being happy. I think that should be our story. We’re a couple who aren’t good for each other, but we stay together anyway –“

“ – because we’re afraid of being alone,” Killian finished for her.

Emma smiled and then gave him a gentle slap on the shoulder. “You were right, Jones, we do make quite the team.”

“Or maybe,” he said softly, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, “this topic strikes a little too close to home for both of us. Loneliness.”

Emma blinked and took a step back. Her heart pounded rapidly in her chest. Her hands clenched and unclenched as her mind tried to come up with a response.

Killian gave her his trademark crooked grin and quirked brow. “I mean, who wouldn’t crave loneliness when you’ve got cameras recording your every move?”

A slow smile spread across Emma’s face. “Right. Okay, Jones, let’s figure out the first eight counts.”

**********************************************************

It was the day of the show, and Emma and Killian sat on a dingy sofa set up on the dance floor hand in hand, waiting to be announced. Around them, the set department had created a living room in a rundown apartment circa 1995. Killian was dressed in faded jeans and a Nirvana t-shirt (of course). Emma wore black leggings and a plaid shirt, unbuttoned and tied at her waist. Underneath it she wore a black sequined bra top.

“You know,” Killian teased, fingering the tied ends of her shirt, “I don’t recall black sequined bras being a fashion statement in the nineties.”

“Well, not all of us are old enough to remember the nineties, old man,” Emma teased back.

“You wound me, Swan! I’m only thirty-five!”

Emma just laughed and rolled her eyes at his mock-offended expression. Behind them, the video package played of their rehearsal week. Just as she had expected, it opened with Killian finding her backstage last week after their Tangled routine. The expression on his face, which she hadn’t seen for herself at the time, was tender as he put his arms around her. It also showed their hug when he brought her coffee, and Killian tucking her hair behind her ear. They also played up the emotional portions of their choreography, showing embraces in super slow-motion. Emma rolled her eyes. It was ridiculous the way they were playing it all up like some sort of romantic comedy.

“Dancing a contemporary routine,” boomed the announcer, “Killian Jones and his partner Emma.”

She wished there were a commercial break so she would have a little more time to put the video package out of her mind. Killian gave her hand a squeeze, and she nodded, pressing her lips together. He relinquished her hand, and they both stared blankly forward as the lights came up and the music started.

The music producers were using a recording of the actual song performed by Nirvana. The live band just couldn’t capture the dissonance or the gravely sound of Kurt Cobain’s voice. She eyes me like a Pisces when I am weak. Cobain’s broody voice filled the room as Emma and Killian slid off the couch and onto the floor. For the remainder of the dance, they pushed and pulled on one another, neither of them able to stray very far from the couch, which of course symbolized their toxic relationship. They used the couch often, beating it with their fists, jumping on and off it, falling and sliding from it. Then the dance ended as it had begun, both of them sitting, staring blankly forward. The overhead lights dimmed as other lights flickered in front of them, meant to look like a television playing.

When the music faded out and all the lights came up, Killian leapt up in excitement. Emma, however, felt herself suddenly drained of emotion. If Killian hadn’t pulled her to her feet and embraced her, she may have kept right on sitting there. She felt as if her heart had just been exposed. She blinked as Killian cupped her head, whispering in her ear how “brilliant, bloody amazing,” she was. Somehow, that snapped her out of her daze. She thought about the woman in the song and her heart shaped box. She took a deep breath, and stuffed her own heart back inside of hers.

As Killian led her over to Marco so they could face the judges, her limbs once again cooperated, and she plastered her “performance smile” on her face. She really was proud of Killian. Not only the way he just danced that, but his creativity in helping her with the choreography. She put her arm around him and squeezed him around the waist. They both struggled to breath; the routine had been intense and the movement had never really stopped.

So it took them a minute to register that all three judges were on their feet, clapping. Emma blinked; even Blue seemed moved almost to tears. They all sat and Emma gnawed nervously on her lower lip as Teach began.

“That was artistry, pure and simple. I’ll be straight with you Jones, I didn’t think you would cut it on this show. I wanted to hate you. But that? That was dancing. Amazing dancing. Well done!”

Emma gave Killian a happy little shove, and he beamed down at her with a huge smile on his sweaty face.

Tiana was literally crying and struggled to begin her critique. “That is what dance is supposed to be. I can’t believe you’re the same dancer you were three weeks ago. Remember when I said you weren’t opening up? Well, you took what I said to heart, and you have grown remarkably. And Emma? That choreography was genius. You deserve an Emmy for that.”

Emma was shocked when Killian pressed a kiss to her cheek, nodding vigorously in agreement. Emma grabbed Marco’s microphone.

“I do want to remind everyone that Killian helped me with the choreography, so thank you Tiana, but I have to give this guy credit too.”

Killian pulled her closer and pressed another kiss to the top of her head as the audience cheered. Once it died down a little, Blue gave her review.

“Look, I’m a traditionalist. I like to see ballroom and strictly ballroom. However, you danced that full out, and you were completely in sync with your partner throughout. Not my cup of tea, but I’m impressed.”

Since the decade week dances were performed in chronological order, and they had been assigned the nineties, their routine was the last one of the night. That meant no time for an interview with Ashley, and the judges gave them their scores right there on the dance floor.

“Tiana Sabine,” the announcer intoned dramatically.

Tiana seemed to pause an inordinately long amount of time before revealing her paddle. But when she did, she did so with flourish. “TEN!”

The studio audience went wild with excitement! The first ten of the season! Killian whooped and picked Emma up off her feet in a tight hug. Once everyone settled down, Blue gave her score of nine and Teach, amazingly, also gave them a perfect ten. It was the highest score of the season so far.

There was no time for an interview with either Marco or Ashley. Emma was relieved, worried she may have had to field questions about the very misleading implications of their video package. The couples all lined up, and for the first time, Emma was nervous about the double elimination. However, she didn’t have to worry. Gold and Ruby were voted off, to no one’s surprise, and then David and his Disney channel star Violet. The second one was a surprise, and the fifteen year old sobbed with disappointment. Emma was glad for the distraction as everyone surrounded the poor girl to console her. She still felt a little emotionally raw after that dance. And maybe it was the way the video package had been edited, but was Killian giving her an awful lot of casual affection recently?

According to social media, he was. By the next morning the two of them were the number one trending “couple” on both twitter and tumblr. Emma blushed as she read through the comments.

“Anyone else out there shipping Killian Jones with his dancing partner?” - @killianjonesandfairydust

“OMG! I ship it so hard!” - @neverland4evr

“Did you see the PDA last night? That was a lot of hugs and kisses!” - @hookNtink4life

They even had a shipping name: Captain Swan. And surprisingly, there were no longer any threats upon her life. She wasn’t sure where the Killer Rose shippers had gone, but there was only one remotely threatening theme among Killian’s “hookers.”

“She better not break his heart.” - @yeahiamahooker

But the only heart Emma was worried about was her own.

[bern33chaser]

Don’t Overload Your Readers With Your Message

Great writing is not only enjoyable, it has something to say – there is greatness in the theme. It may not be primarily a moral or a lesson, but something about the story appeals deeply to the heart. I believe that your skill as a writer determines the weight of the message you can communicate. The more skilled you are in handling the basic elements of plot, character, setting, conflict, and point of view, the more ambitious your theme can be, and the deeper the message your reader can take away from it.

But as a writer, you may be starting from the other end. Maybe it’s the theme that motivated you to write in the first place. Maybe you have a message that you want to get across, and you’re more sure of it than you are of the plot, character, or setting. It’s a message that everyone needs to hear. Do you go ahead with it?

Some would say yes, “the message is always first.” That was the slogan of Ken Anderson Films, an evangelical movie company best known for its 1978 film Pilgrim’s Progress featuring Liam Neeson in his first starring role. Even as a college student, majoring in theater at the time, I thought something didn’t seem right about that slogan.

Your message cannot be first

Whether you make movies or write books, it’s not true that the message is always first. When you make a movie, first and foremost, it’s a movie. When you write a story, first and foremost, it’s a story. Your grand message will never get across if nobody can stand to read what you wrote. If it’s too long to finish, if the vocabulary is too complex for ordinary readers, then ordinary readers won’t read it. When you compromise your story, you compromise your message.

Authors may claim they’re standing up for truth, and that truth sometimes offends. First, they should make sure that what’s offensive is the truth and not their writing style. Ultimately, writers only keep the readers whom they don’t offend. As a writer, you are responsible for deciding how far to push your readers, deciding how much to say that they may not like. A disturbing theme sometimes makes a book more interesting. But no theme, no matter how great, can compensate for intolerable writing or make it tolerable.

Ken Anderson wasn’t the first communicator to believe “the message is always first.” Under a dictatorship, the dictator’s message is always first. From the 1930s to the 1960s, the approved artistic style in the Soviet Union was called “socialist realism,” and those who experimented with a different style could have their careers ruined. Any creative people who dealt with forbidden themes or subjects could find themselves in trouble with the police, not just with the critics. Socialist realism was supposed to depict the everyday life of the working people, to promote Soviet ideals. Except that Soviet officials saw morality as either black or white, while real people are complex – not all good, not all bad. In the end, socialist realism didn’t succeed in showing real people living Communist lives, because its characters were not real people.

Sometimes when a writer is willing to put his message ahead of good craftsmanship, he writes an allegory, in which each character represents a different character quality and each event teaches a lesson. Ironically, the most successful allegory in Western literature is John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress (the 1678 original, not Ken Anderson’s version). Bunyan was a preacher – he did have something he wanted to say – but his book has endured because his characters seem like real people with particular character qualities, rather than character qualities masquerading as real people.

Years ago, I thought of an illustration to describe the challenge that everybody faces, particularly a writer, who wants to communicate a message that’s important to them.

Loading up the truck and driving

Suppose you’re a military commander who wants to move something to another location. The problem: a ravine, a dry riverbed, between where you are and where you want the material to be. Before you can move your material, you need to prepare the way. How much work will that take? That depends on what you want to move. If you simply want to move an envelope, you can hand it to a messenger who puts the envelope in his pocket, hikes down to the bottom of the ravine and then hikes back up. But if you want to move a ton of armor, you need to spend more time, effort, and resources in preparation. You’ll probably need to build the bridge across the ravine. How strong a bridge? That depends on how heavy the load is. Once the bridge is built, the truck is loaded and it begins to drive across that bridge, you will find out if your bridge is strong enough.

Writers with important things to say, with a heavy load they want to put on the truck, will need to spend more time preparing the road for their readers. All too often, I’ve read books by idealistic writers who haven’t done the work needed to communicate their message. They try to drive their heavily loaded truck through the ravine before they build a bridge across it. “But everyone needs to hear this message!” they protest. Then they need to take the time to make sure everyone can hear it.

There’s no shame in loading up your truck with no more weight than your abilities as a writer can sustain. If your writing abilities are not yet what they will be, there is no shame in remembering that bridges break. Neil Gaiman had the idea for The Graveyard Book in 1985, but he felt he was “not yet a good enough writer.” As the years passed, he won Harvey Awards, Locus Awards, Eisner Awards, and Hugo Awards, but he still didn’t feel ready to write The Graveyard Book until 2004 (when he decided he might as well get on with it anyway).

As a writer, I’m learning not to overload my truck without considering whether the bridge I’m sending my readers over is strong enough to support such a weighty message. Otherwise my writing can end up like medieval religious art, beautiful perhaps, but literally without perspective.

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Original post: Don’t Overload Your Readers With Your Message from Daily Writing Tips https://www.dailywritingtips.com/dont-overload-your-readers/

[amtushinfosolutionspage]

Chris Jericho Will Never Stop Reinventing Himself

On the morning of Nov. 5, Chris Jericho awoke in Newcastle, England, waiting for his phone to blow up. Around 9 AM, in the middle of the night across North America, it happened.

Following a successful defense of his IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship at New Japan Pro Wrestling’s Power Struggle event, Kenny Omega had the lights go out on him. Omega was seeking a challenger for his title at Wrestle Kingdom 12 on Jan. 4, New Japan’s biggest event of the year, laughing between English and Japanese that there was nobody left who had the guts to take him on.

A screen lit up with a countdown clock, and in an instant, internet speculation and tongue-in-cheek, this-could-never-happen fantasy booking was revealed to be a reality. Through smoke and heavy guitar, Jericho appeared on screen. Smirk breaking through his goateed face, leather collar popped behind him, Jericho tore a photo of the champion lengthwise and laid the challenge down: Jericho vs. Kenny, wrestling’s ultimate Alpha against the man they call Omega.

“Dude,” Jericho says with excitement, feigning keyboard noises to mimic the online reaction that followed, “it was great. Most people woke up to it, and they were like, ‘What?’ And then they’re like, ‘We knew this was gonna be something.’

“You didn’t fucking know shit. You didn’t know a thing. Nobody knew.”

There were hints along the way, seeds that were being planted. Jericho and Omega had been going at each other on social media since June, stoking the flames of a potential rivalry that, to most, seemed possible only if contained within the online world. Jericho is a WWE lifer, after all, a Vince McMahon loyalist who hasn’t wrestled in Japan since 1997 or outside of WWE since 1999.

McMahon, it turns out, was one of only a very small handful of people who knew what was coming, a professional courtesy Jericho extended out of respect. The plan had been in the works for months, though, and it was kept entirely under wraps, to the point that New Japan’s ace, top champion, and Wrestle Kingdom main-eventer, Kazuchika Okada, found out at the same time as the rest of the world. Outside of Jericho and Omega, who didn’t even meet during the planning process, the only people on the inside were Gedo (New Japan’s booker and, way back when, a partner of Jericho’s), and three other New Japan execs who met with Jericho in shrouded New York secrecy in August to finalize the story.

“I’ve been following his career. I heard how good he was and I heard all of these great reports, and I was like, that’s great,” Jericho, who had never seen an Omega match to this point, says. “So when it was pitched to me just as a joke, ‘Hey, how about Jericho and Kenny Omega, that’s pretty funny?’ I was like, I don’t know if funny’s the word. I think it’s kind of interesting. Why don’t you kind of see what the reaction was?”

Omega liked it, Jericho liked it, and so started one of the first main-event level feuds borne entirely of a (fake) social media spat, a dream match few would ever actually dare dream about. (Just don’t tell Tetsuya Naito it’s a main-event feud.) It comes at a time when Omega is one of the largest foreign stars in the company’s history, as NJPW continues to expand its North American footprint, and as the tide of the entire wrestling industry shifts more and more toward viability of non-WWE entities as sustainable major players.

Tweets via Kenny Omega’s Twitter

“There are people that can rise above and stand out from kind of what they are, and Jericho has always, no matter where he’s gone, no matter where he’s been, has been one of those guys,” Omega says. “Which is why he has a legit argument for being the best of all time. And that’s why this match means so much.”

For Jericho, this is just the latest arc in a storied career that has always seen him stay one step ahead of where the industry is going. He was a part of ECW’s peak, the breakthrough WCW cruiserweight, and jumped to WWE right as the Monday Night Wars swung for good. In WWE, he teased his first debut with a countdown clock to build speculation and anticipation, returned later with a cryptic code that was early-era message board catnip, and has since entered and exited without warning and, almost always, with great surprise.

It’s an incredible rarity in the wrestling world to keep a match as big as Jericho-Omega a secret (his surprise entry in the 2013 Royal Rumble remains one of the best-kept surprises in the event’s history). It’s even more rare for wrestlers to continuously reinvent themselves, eschewing nostalgia pops to push the envelope with new and fresh ideas.

If there’s a defining characteristic of Jericho’s sure-fire Hall of Fame career, it’s that he’s made more returns than any modern wrestler without it once feeling stale. His absences have been just long and just frequent enough, the tweaks to his character just pronounced enough, for the same Jericho to bring a wholly new experience. His toughest reinvention may have been his “silent return,” when he turned crowds thirsty to hear him once again, but declined to speak and did so in as over-the-top a manner imaginable. It was as subtle and effective a heel turn as they come.

Even in his most recent WWE run, at an age when most wrestlers are working part-time schedules as the character people best know them as, Jericho was reinventing. The plan called for him to eventually turn heel, but the schedule was pushed back, leaving Jericho to try to hint at the change to come, which some took as him finally growing stale. The seeking of immediate storytelling gratification can be frustrating when there’s a longer-term plan in place.

“I started planting seeds that people were getting sick of. Like, the scarf. The scarf, Jericho wearing a scarf, it looks stupid. Now it’s the biggest thing in the world,” he says. “Or I started this chant one time for New Day, “rootie tootie bootie.” I knew it sucked. I knew it was bad. But I was out there giving it my all, trying to get people to say it, and they really weren’t. So [they said] ‘Jericho’s at the end of his rope, he’s got no new ideas, he looks like a fool.’ Exactly. That’s what you’re supposed to think, so that when it finally happens, [you think] oh my gosh, this is the greatest thing I’ve ever seen.

“And it’s hard because you have to sit there and read the online comments, ‘He’s over the hill, he’s past his shelf life, he needs to retire, rootie tootie bootie is embarrassing.’ Like, I know, I know, just hold on and see what happens.”

What happened led to one of Jericho’s greatest accomplishments as a wrestler and a performer in general. After an extended run as Kevin Owens’ supposed best friend, the pairing was set to split. Jericho had a grand idea for WWE’s Festival of Friendship segment on Raw, an elaborate celebration on Jericho’s part that would end with Owens turning on him, to everyone’s surprise. Jericho got push-back from some within the company who thought the idea sounded too comedic, and he was adamant that if done correctly, it would be heartbreaking instead.

It ended up as maybe the most heartbreaking moment in wrestling this year, right up there historically with Seth Rollins as Plan B and Marty Jannetty flying through a barbershop window.

It’s this type of ingenuity that’s kept Jericho at the top of his game and the wrestling world at large for decades, making him one of the most unassailable successes of the modern era. It’s also extended outside of the wrestling world, where Jericho has dabbled in just about everything. He’s written multiple books, hosts a terrific and well-listened to podcast (Talk is Jericho), and is the front man for a successful rock band (Fozzy).

And last week, season two of his (very good) webseries But I’m Chris Jericho premiered on CBC. Since the time he first left WWE in 2005, Jericho has studied acting—improv, most notably—and for eight years tried to sell this fictionalized version of his foray into acting. Several of season one’s storylines come directly from his experience, with Jericho borrowing from Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Fawlty Towers to turn this version of him into an unlikable asshole lacking entirely in self-awareness and heavy on Lead Singer’s Disease.

The first season aired in 2013, winning one Canadian Comedy Award and being nominated for four others. It’s little surprise that Jericho was at the forefront of an industry he was new to, a little early to the game before Netflix and Amazon and others were buying up any original content for streaming purposes. Even with its success, he said it “didn’t count” if it didn’t get a second season. He eventually got that chance, and has the full weight of CBC’s promotional arm behind the series.

In one of Jericho’s books, he lays out 20 principles for success, his favorite of which is the David Bowie Principle: Always reinvent yourself. The gist of it is that it would be silly for people to have asked the late Bowie to go back to his Aladdin Sane days, for example, because Bowie had already moved on to the next thing. There’s an emptiness to the inherent reward of creativity with rehashing the old, and Jericho applies that outlook to all arms of his career.

“I love constantly thinking of new things and new ideas and new ways to present myself to keep people excited,” he says. “That’s what I do: I’m an entertainer. I’m not saying I’m a ray of sunshine in people’s lives, but if I can do stuff that I think is cool that other people happen to think is cool as well, then it becomes exciting.

“That is part of what charges me and helps me continue to stay at the top of my game, is staying ahead of things rather than behind. Because when you’re behind, you’re done. If you don’t move, you die. To me, I constantly have to be moving creatively.”

That means continuing to tour with Fozzy (through Wrestlemania season, no less), growing as an actor in his webseries, and trying something entirely new in wrestling, when it was hard to figure there was anything new left for him to do. He’s earned the cache at this point to do what’s worked in the past, and to do whatever he wants to do. Those things don’t line up, and so he’s opting to try something that really didn’t seem possible until it came about half-jokingly: An all-Winnipeg, Manitoba, showdown worthy of top billing anywhere in the world more than 27 years after he debuted, with the type of build that has kept the wrestling community buzzing with each passing promo or attack.

“That’s why I did it. I knew it was something that nobody expected would ever happen,” he says. “It came completely out of the blue. It’s a story that you tell. And I’m always about the story. I don’t give a shit about good matches, I care about the storyline that gets you to that match. That’s the most important thing. It’s the old-school way of thinking where it’s like this match isn’t very good, I got your money kid. You get those people’s money to get in there. And then you wanna put on a good match, but that’s not as important as the storyline leading to it, for me.

“Those little things, there are enough of those little signposts throughout my career in all these things, season two of this show, that really keep me alive and keep me growing. I don’t ever wanna go backwards, ever. Forwards. I never wanna look back, I just wanna continue to look forward and what cool things can I do to keep people guessing and keep people entertained.”

What’s next for Jericho after the biggest night of Japan’s wrestling calendar is anyone’s guess, but it’s a safe bet it won’t be anything you’ve seen him do before.

Chris Jericho Will Never Stop Reinventing Himself syndicated from http://ift.tt/2ug2Ns6

[flauntpage]

Chris Jericho Will Never Stop Reinventing Himself

On the morning of Nov. 5, Chris Jericho awoke in Newcastle, England, waiting for his phone to blow up. Around 9 AM, in the middle of the night across North America, it happened.

Following a successful defense of his IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship at New Japan Pro Wrestling's Power Struggle event, Kenny Omega had the lights go out on him. Omega was seeking a challenger for his title at Wrestle Kingdom 12 on Jan. 4, New Japan's biggest event of the year, laughing between English and Japanese that there was nobody left who had the guts to take him on.

A screen lit up with a countdown clock, and in an instant, internet speculation and tongue-in-cheek, this-could-never-happen fantasy booking was revealed to be a reality. Through smoke and heavy guitar, Jericho appeared on screen. Smirk breaking through his goateed face, leather collar popped behind him, Jericho tore a photo of the champion lengthwise and laid the challenge down: Jericho vs. Kenny, wrestling's ultimate Alpha against the man they call Omega.

"Dude," Jericho says with excitement, feigning keyboard noises to mimic the online reaction that followed, "it was great. Most people woke up to it, and they were like, 'What?' And then they're like, 'We knew this was gonna be something.'

"You didn't fucking know shit. You didn't know a thing. Nobody knew."

There were hints along the way, seeds that were being planted. Jericho and Omega had been going at each other on social media since June, stoking the flames of a potential rivalry that, to most, seemed possible only if contained within the online world. Jericho is a WWE lifer, after all, a Vince McMahon loyalist who hasn't wrestled in Japan since 1997 or outside of WWE since 1999.

McMahon, it turns out, was one of only a very small handful of people who knew what was coming, a professional courtesy Jericho extended out of respect. The plan had been in the works for months, though, and it was kept entirely under wraps, to the point that New Japan's ace, top champion, and Wrestle Kingdom main-eventer, Kazuchika Okada, found out at the same time as the rest of the world. Outside of Jericho and Omega, who didn't even meet during the planning process, the only people on the inside were Gedo (New Japan's booker and, way back when, a partner of Jericho's), and three other New Japan execs who met with Jericho in shrouded New York secrecy in August to finalize the story.

"I've been following his career. I heard how good he was and I heard all of these great reports, and I was like, that's great," Jericho, who had never seen an Omega match to this point, says. "So when it was pitched to me just as a joke, 'Hey, how about Jericho and Kenny Omega, that's pretty funny?' I was like, I don't know if funny's the word. I think it's kind of interesting. Why don't you kind of see what the reaction was?"

Omega liked it, Jericho liked it, and so started one of the first main-event level feuds borne entirely of a (fake) social media spat, a dream match few would ever actually dare dream about. (Just don’t tell Tetsuya Naito it's a main-event feud.) It comes at a time when Omega is one of the largest foreign stars in the company's history, as NJPW continues to expand its North American footprint, and as the tide of the entire wrestling industry shifts more and more toward viability of non-WWE entities as sustainable major players.

Tweets via Kenny Omega's Twitter

"There are people that can rise above and stand out from kind of what they are, and Jericho has always, no matter where he's gone, no matter where he's been, has been one of those guys," Omega says. "Which is why he has a legit argument for being the best of all time. And that's why this match means so much."

For Jericho, this is just the latest arc in a storied career that has always seen him stay one step ahead of where the industry is going. He was a part of ECW's peak, the breakthrough WCW cruiserweight, and jumped to WWE right as the Monday Night Wars swung for good. In WWE, he teased his first debut with a countdown clock to build speculation and anticipation, returned later with a cryptic code that was early-era message board catnip, and has since entered and exited without warning and, almost always, with great surprise.

It's an incredible rarity in the wrestling world to keep a match as big as Jericho-Omega a secret (his surprise entry in the 2013 Royal Rumble remains one of the best-kept surprises in the event's history). It's even more rare for wrestlers to continuously reinvent themselves, eschewing nostalgia pops to push the envelope with new and fresh ideas.

If there's a defining characteristic of Jericho's sure-fire Hall of Fame career, it's that he's made more returns than any modern wrestler without it once feeling stale. His absences have been just long and just frequent enough, the tweaks to his character just pronounced enough, for the same Jericho to bring a wholly new experience. His toughest reinvention may have been his "silent return," when he turned crowds thirsty to hear him once again, but declined to speak and did so in as over-the-top a manner imaginable. It was as subtle and effective a heel turn as they come.

Even in his most recent WWE run, at an age when most wrestlers are working part-time schedules as the character people best know them as, Jericho was reinventing. The plan called for him to eventually turn heel, but the schedule was pushed back, leaving Jericho to try to hint at the change to come, which some took as him finally growing stale. The seeking of immediate storytelling gratification can be frustrating when there's a longer-term plan in place.

"I started planting seeds that people were getting sick of. Like, the scarf. The scarf, Jericho wearing a scarf, it looks stupid. Now it's the biggest thing in the world," he says. "Or I started this chant one time for New Day, "rootie tootie bootie." I knew it sucked. I knew it was bad. But I was out there giving it my all, trying to get people to say it, and they really weren't. So [they said] 'Jericho's at the end of his rope, he's got no new ideas, he looks like a fool.' Exactly. That's what you're supposed to think, so that when it finally happens, [you think] oh my gosh, this is the greatest thing I've ever seen.

"And it's hard because you have to sit there and read the online comments, 'He's over the hill, he's past his shelf life, he needs to retire, rootie tootie bootie is embarrassing.' Like, I know, I know, just hold on and see what happens."

What happened led to one of Jericho's greatest accomplishments as a wrestler and a performer in general. After an extended run as Kevin Owens' supposed best friend, the pairing was set to split. Jericho had a grand idea for WWE's Festival of Friendship segment on Raw, an elaborate celebration on Jericho's part that would end with Owens turning on him, to everyone’s surprise. Jericho got push-back from some within the company who thought the idea sounded too comedic, and he was adamant that if done correctly, it would be heartbreaking instead.

It ended up as maybe the most heartbreaking moment in wrestling this year, right up there historically with Seth Rollins as Plan B and Marty Jannetty flying through a barbershop window.

It's this type of ingenuity that's kept Jericho at the top of his game and the wrestling world at large for decades, making him one of the most unassailable successes of the modern era. It's also extended outside of the wrestling world, where Jericho has dabbled in just about everything. He's written multiple books, hosts a terrific and well-listened to podcast (Talk is Jericho), and is the front man for a successful rock band (Fozzy).

And last week, season two of his (very good) webseries But I’m Chris Jericho premiered on CBC. Since the time he first left WWE in 2005, Jericho has studied acting—improv, most notably—and for eight years tried to sell this fictionalized version of his foray into acting. Several of season one's storylines come directly from his experience, with Jericho borrowing from Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Fawlty Towers to turn this version of him into an unlikable asshole lacking entirely in self-awareness and heavy on Lead Singer’s Disease.

The first season aired in 2013, winning one Canadian Comedy Award and being nominated for four others. It's little surprise that Jericho was at the forefront of an industry he was new to, a little early to the game before Netflix and Amazon and others were buying up any original content for streaming purposes. Even with its success, he said it "didn’t count" if it didn't get a second season. He eventually got that chance, and has the full weight of CBC's promotional arm behind the series.

In one of Jericho’s books, he lays out 20 principles for success, his favorite of which is the David Bowie Principle: Always reinvent yourself. The gist of it is that it would be silly for people to have asked the late Bowie to go back to his Aladdin Sane days, for example, because Bowie had already moved on to the next thing. There's an emptiness to the inherent reward of creativity with rehashing the old, and Jericho applies that outlook to all arms of his career.

"I love constantly thinking of new things and new ideas and new ways to present myself to keep people excited," he says. "That's what I do: I'm an entertainer. I'm not saying I'm a ray of sunshine in people's lives, but if I can do stuff that I think is cool that other people happen to think is cool as well, then it becomes exciting.

"That is part of what charges me and helps me continue to stay at the top of my game, is staying ahead of things rather than behind. Because when you're behind, you're done. If you don't move, you die. To me, I constantly have to be moving creatively."

That means continuing to tour with Fozzy (through Wrestlemania season, no less), growing as an actor in his webseries, and trying something entirely new in wrestling, when it was hard to figure there was anything new left for him to do. He's earned the cache at this point to do what's worked in the past, and to do whatever he wants to do. Those things don't line up, and so he's opting to try something that really didn't seem possible until it came about half-jokingly: An all-Winnipeg, Manitoba, showdown worthy of top billing anywhere in the world more than 27 years after he debuted, with the type of build that has kept the wrestling community buzzing with each passing promo or attack.

"That's why I did it. I knew it was something that nobody expected would ever happen," he says. "It came completely out of the blue. It's a story that you tell. And I'm always about the story. I don't give a shit about good matches, I care about the storyline that gets you to that match. That's the most important thing. It's the old-school way of thinking where it's like this match isn't very good, I got your money kid. You get those people's money to get in there. And then you wanna put on a good match, but that's not as important as the storyline leading to it, for me.

"Those little things, there are enough of those little signposts throughout my career in all these things, season two of this show, that really keep me alive and keep me growing. I don't ever wanna go backwards, ever. Forwards. I never wanna look back, I just wanna continue to look forward and what cool things can I do to keep people guessing and keep people entertained."

What's next for Jericho after the biggest night of Japan's wrestling calendar is anyone's guess, but it's a safe bet it won't be anything you've seen him do before.

Chris Jericho Will Never Stop Reinventing Himself published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

[adamcairnsorg-blog]

30 Proven Mental Hacks That Will Make You More Successful

Here are 30 mental hacks to nudge your mind into a more positive state, prime yourself for your best work and avoid the next crash from happening.

1 Set Three Goals For The Day

If you set three attainable goals for each day, you build momentum. Ticking things off is an excellent counter-balance to inertia and will halt self-criticism in its tracks. It will reinforce a belief that you’re making progress. Following this practice consistently will develop your self-belief and enable you to push on times when things are more difficult. J.D. Meier has some excellent advice on this topic here.

2 Know Your Best Time of Day

Some of us are larks, and some are owls. Which one are you? Knowing your optimal time of day means you can time your most difficult decisions or most challenging work to coincide with when you are at your peak. You are more likely to be successful at this time than any other.

3 Use a Decision-Making Tool

When you have a big decision to take, use a tool to help counteract your biases. For example, confirmation bias can blind you to critical counter-factual data. So actively seek out contradictory information or intelligence before you decide. You could ask a team member to play this role, so they investigate and present the opposite argument. 

4 Avoid Making Decisions When You’re Emotional Or Tired

Recognise when your emotions are running high. If you make decisions in this state, you may not consider all of the angles. Similarly, you become prone to adopting the line of least resistance when tired.

5 Break A Big Problem Into Smaller Parts

Trollope did this when writing novels. Instead of setting a goal to write a book or even a chapter, his goal was to write 250 words in fifteen minutes. When you break a big problem down into smaller parts, you get a regular reward as you meet each new milestone. Regularly hitting milestones creates a positive flow and boosts your self confidence. James Clear wrote an excellent piece about Trollope’s approach which you can read here.

6 Get Some Sunshine

One of the causes of tiredness can be high levels of melatonin in your system. Make sure your body understands it’s daytime by exposing it to sunlight. Step outside and get a breath of fresh air. Not looking at a blue computer screen before bed (switch to night shift on iPads and iPhones) will avoid your brain thinking you’re still in the daytime — which will also promote better sleep habits too.

7 Drink Water

If you’re feeling sluggish, this might be because you’re dehydrated. Keep yourself topped up with regular doses of water and your brain will perform at it’s best.

8 Take Frequent Breaks

Use a Pomodoro timer to break up your day into segments. Every twenty or thirty minutes, stand up and move around. You'll find your energy levels increase, and you will perform better if you do.

9 Get Out Of Your Head

If you’re feeling anxious, your thoughts might be looping around and around as you focus on the thing that's making you worried. Make an effort to engage with your environment. Look out of the window and see what’s there. Check what your colleagues are doing. Go and get a drink of water. Taking yourself outside of your head will break into the loop and allow a bit of space to emerge for you to develop some new thoughts.

10 Keep A Well-Being Journal

I’ve written before about the benefits of journaling. Keeping a record of your well-being can help you look for correlations and patterns. Understanding what activities or situations can negatively affect you can enable you to make some new choices. I use Exist to collect this information which summarises things for me in a dashboard. Reviewing the associations makes visualising possible correlations very simple to see.

11 Stop Constantly Checking Your Email

Nothing breaks up your focus like dipping in and out of email. Email is someone else’s to-do list aimed at you. The more you look at it, the more jobs you’ll see. Your inbox will distract you from the essential task at hand. Instead, make a time two or three times a day when you will look at email and remove all notifications for every device. You can read my post on email management here.

12 Drink Coffee

In addition to remaining hydrated, 100mg of caffeine has a measurable, positive impact on memory.

13 Keep Photos Of Loved Ones Close By

Keeping photos of your loved ones in happy moments nearby will ensure that you notice these scenes regularly. Research has shown that this will help trick your brain into thinking that the happy scenes displayed in the photos are the norm, priming you to have a more joyful and optimistic disposition.

14 Make A List of What Makes You Happier

In a moment of downtime, compile a list of all the things that you enjoy and make you happy. The next time you are struggling with life, open up this file for some homemade remedies that you can immediately put into action to lift your mood. You could keep a file in your documents folder called Positive Thoughts or make a note in Evernote or other note taking app of choice. I use DevonThink Pro Office which is an amazingly powerful tool.

15 Talk To Yourself

Bizarre though it sounds, verbalising your thoughts can have a significant effect on how you feel. If you can say out loud what is bothering you, it can be easier to understand what you need to do to fix it. Equally, if you have an anxiety nagging away at you, locating it and saying what it is out loud can settle your mind down and allow you to focus on taking the next available action.

16 Face Your Fears

When you are worried about something, it helps if you can identify the worst case scenario. When you’ve faced up to the worst thing that could happen and considered what you might do under these worst-case circumstances, your fear will naturally subside. Equally, it is often the case that the dread you are feeling doesn’t stand up to close examination. So when you’re worried about something, don’t push it away. Allow yourself to identify the specific cause and then examine it.

17 Move Out Of Your Comfort Zone

If you always stay with what’s comfortable, you’re not going to have much confidence in dealing with some unusual event that requires you to step beyond your typical range. The more often you push the envelope, the more familiar this will feel and the less stressful it will be when you are forced to do something beyond your usual self-imposed limitations. By increasing your experience of successfully pushing out of your zone of comfort, you are normalising the sensation and so preparing yourself to cope better with the unexpected.

18 Learn To Breathe

OK so you know how to breathe — but do you know how to focus on your breath? A mindfulness practice often centres on following the breath for a reason. When you focus in this way, you are staying in the present moment, and you will notice all of your thoughts rising and falling as you focus on your breath. Stilling your mind in this way is a very healing activity and will create more room for happiness to develop in the moment as well as opening up your creativity and problem-solving capacity. When you feel gripped by anxiety or stress, it pays to remember to breathe. Stop and take five deep breaths, focusing just on how that feels. You’ll feel immediately calmer and more focused if you do.

19 Overcome Your Negativity Bias

Many people have a default setting that tends to respond to things negatively. ‘I won’t be able to do that’ might be more positively framed as ‘I don’t know if I can do this, but it might be fun/interesting to find out.’ Listen to your internal voice and see what kind of first reaction you’re getting. If it’s there's a negative tendency, consciously try to reframe it positively. To begin with, this will feel awkward but it is possible to retrain your brain so that in future it will start in a positive place. When your starting position is habitually positive, you’ll be happier and more optimistic which will allow you to access opportunities where once there were only problems.

20 Don’t Confuse Memory With Fact

We all tend to ruminate from time to time. When looking back, it’s sometimes easy to believe that things were worse than they were. If you don’t think this is so, it’s easy to run an experiment. The next time you do something that you feel was really bad, ask for feedback from your colleagues. The chances are that you will discover you have been way more critical of yourself than anyone else.

21 Practice Gratitude

I have written before about keeping a gratitude journal. I keep mine in Day One and fill it in each day. Evidence shows that when you habitually look for things to be grateful for, your whole disposition becomes more open and confident. People who do this are far more likely to succeed at work than those who don’t. Each evening, before you go to bed, find three things which you feel deserve some gratitude. Write them down and as you do, experience how it feels to be grateful, even for the small stuff.

22 Increase Your Curiosity

Cultivating curiosity is a path that will lead you to discover more about yourself and the people around you. Edgar H. Schein has detailed the powerful impact of this in his excellent book The Gentle Art of Humble Inquiry. Increasing your curiosity will bring you closer to everyone you work with, reveal insights that you would never have otherwise seen and enrich your day.

Humble Inquiry: The Gentle Art of Asking Instead of Telling

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 23 Learn Something New Every Day

Einstein wrote:

Learning is not a product of schooling but the lifelong attempt to acquire it.

With this mindset, you never stop believing there is more you can learn, and so you nurture a capacity to develop yourself and those around you. Being open to learning something new is the polar opposite of having a closed mind. What kind of person would you rather have as a friend, someone with an open or closed mind?

24 Refuse To Accept Your Self-Limiting Beliefs

When you catch yourself thinking ‘I could never do that’ stop your train of thought and stay there for a while. Why are you thinking this? Maybe you couldn’t do it right now, but is there any reason why you couldn’t do it in time? When something seems very far away and unattainable, a good response would be to see whether there is a plan available that could take you there. One thing is for sure, if you plan to fail, you’ll fail. So don’t close down a possibility with a reflexive thought. If the goal is attractive, why not look at what it would take just to take the first small step?

25 Ask What Would Make Me Happier?

It’s amazing how many times we wake up each day and then continue to do the things which are making us unhappy. If you’re in a rut, one outstanding practice is to clear your desk, get a blank piece of paper and just write down all the things that could make you happier right now. The chances are that you’ll find something you can do that will immediately make you feel better. You could even file the list in your Positive Thoughts document and keep adding to it over time.

26 Ask Yourself What Your Intentions Are

It’s easy to let one day follow the next day in a pattern that feels like an unbreakable routine. Try this instead: once a week review what you’ve accomplished in the week and make a note of how you feel. Look at what you’ve written and challenge yourself to consider: ‘Is that how I intended to spend my time and did I how much of my time did I spend on taking action on my most important goals?’ Critically evaluating how you spend your time each week and comparing that to what you intend can shift you out of acceptance and into taking action. You can make your life better, one small step at a time.

27 Focus On Doing One Thing

When you’re busy, it can feel like things are coming at you from every direction. The evidence shows that switching your attention continuously from one thing to another drains your brain’s resources. Multi-tasking is impossible — what you do is switch your attention very rapidly, so it feels like you are juggling many balls at once. The truth is this constant task-switching drains your brain’s energy store and eventually degrades your cognitive capability. If you want to do your best work, try to order your priorities and manage your time so that in any given moment or allocated period, you are entirely focused on only one thing at a time.

28 Do The Most Important Task First

Often the most important task is an ugly brute of a thing, and you will put it off. When you do this, your mind keeps that loop open — it knows it’s important and the knowledge will keep bothering you until you do it. If you recall when you got round to do something you’ve been putting off, I bet more than often than not, you noticed two things. First, it took a lot less energy to get it done than you were anticipating. Second, boy did it feel good to tick that box! So take aim at that critical task and it get it done first thing.

29 Take Frequent Breaks

The resources at your disposal to complete any task or job are time, your energy and your attention. Your energy is a renewable resource. Time is not. So if you want to make the best of the time you have available, make good choices about what you choose to focus on and do everything you can to preserve and renew your energy. Taking frequent breaks during the day isn’t a sign that you’re slacking. What you’re doing is re-fuelling and priming yourself for peak performance.

30 Tell Yourself That Being Successful Is Only Natural

In your life, you’ve reached the point that you’re now at through years of struggle and hard work. From now on, tell yourself that you’ve earned whatever success you’ve obtained and that you can expect more good things to keep flowing, so long as you maintain good health and a positive outlook. No-one is perfect, that’s what being a human being is all about. In the end, the one person who can define success for you is well, you. You’ve done the things you’ve done, and no-one can take that away from you. With the right context, some self-management (see above) you can expect to keep developing and growing. Success — however you define it, will then surely follow.

I hope you’ll find something on this list that you can use. Our brains are very malleable — the neuroscientists call this plasticity. We can re-wire our brains over time. Why not redesign the way your brain works?

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COMMENT BELOWIn addition to the 30 mental hacks I've described here, what other ones do you use?