Today I have the immense pleasure to present you with an interview of a great writer, Carol Lynn Rivera. I certainly can recognize a good writer when I see one, and this lady can write.
I met Carol a few months ago through a Facebook group and I am sure glad I did. I am sure you will enjoy her high quality answers to my questions and get something from it. So, here we go…
Sylviane: Carol, first of all I do want to thank you for taking the time to answer my questions today. I am honored that you accepted my invitation for an interview and I hope it will give some wonderful insights to the readers of this blog. I’ve been reading your blog for a few months now and I could tell right away that you were a very good writer. So, my first question to you is, did you always love to write?
Carol: First of all, thanks for inviting me to share my thoughts with your readers, Sylviane. I appreciate that because I know you’ve got some pretty great people over here!
And thanks for the compliment. That’s nice to hear coming from someone like you, whose writing I always enjoy.
Yes, I have always loved to write. I was one of those kids who kept her teachers awake at night grading papers because mine was always so long.
But I think my true passion for writing took root when I was in the 8th grade as a result of a tragedy. I remember very clearly learning that one of my neighborhood friends had drowned. Everyone in the neighborhood and at school was shocked and sad. It was right before summer vacation, and we left school so downhearted that year. I didn’t know what to do with all that pain so I started writing about it in a leftover spiral notebook.
And I just kept writing. About school and boys (I wrote lots about boys in those days) and friends and whatever else was going on. It has always helped me think and get perspective and solve problems and stay sane. It was also a lot cheaper than therapy all those years!
Sylviane: Where do you look for ideas to write about?
Carol: I think the question is where don’t I look for ideas. If you go through your day with your eyes, ears and mind open, anything can be an inspiration. I run a marketing business and my blog is a business blog about marketing, so a lot of my ideas come from experience. I pay attention to the things my clients and prospects say, the things that confuse or frustrate them, all the ways that they drive me crazy and even the funny things that happen.
I literally make notes about these things. It helps to jot things down even if you don’t think they’ll amount to anything because you never know when something will strike you. If you collect enough thoughts, something is bound to be inspiring on any given day.
I also listen to what people say and do. You’d be surprised how everyday things can become blogs if you put your own spin on them. If I’m standing on line at the grocery checkout and someone in front of me is being a complete jerk I can spin that into a lesson in customer service. If I see someone texting on their cell phone and walking blindly into a wall, I can spin that into a metaphor for paying attention to your marketing so you don’t hit a wall! It doesn’t have to be literal, it just has to be enough to get the gears spinning.
It doesn’t matter what you blog about, you can take inspiration from everything around you. Listen to what people say and find a way to own that idea. Listen to what makes people angry and figure out how to address it. Pay attention to what annoys or frustrates you and make your blog about solving those problems because chances are someone else out there is having those problems, too.
Sylviane: I read that you used to be a teacher, does that skill ever help you in your writing?
Carol: The teacher in me definitely comes out when I write. I love to teach and my blog is a way for me to do the two things I love most in the same place. When you teach, you have to be clear, concrete and make sure you’re speaking in a way that people will understand. It’s not about sounding smart or using big words. It’s about how can I make this as real and relevant as possible to the people I’m talking to?
Here’s another thing I learned while teaching: stories calm the savage beasts. Stories speak to us. Even the biggest, scariest ideas become manageable if they’re explained in a story. That’s something I also try to do when I write, which is use real stories and examples to explain ideas instead of leaving them in the abstract. Nothing drives me crazier than people who constantly talk in abstracts so you never really know how to take anything they said and use it.
Sylviane: I noticed that bloggers who are writers tend to write longer posts. It seems that anything less 800 words won’t do for us. I know I can’t write short posts anymore, myself, what do you think is a good balance, and do you worry at all about this or not?
Carol: I do worry about this because you hear a lot that people have short attention spans and all they do is skim your content then move on. But obviously worrying about it hasn’t changed anything!
Here’s my take on it: if people don’t want to read what I write, they don’t have to. So the proof is in the fact that people DO read it, long or not.
If you check your analytics and the time on page is four or five minutes, that’s a pretty good indication that someone is reading your long post, right?
And if your readers stick with you to the end of a post, then obviously your post has value. I stick with your posts all the way through… because I enjoy them and they’re telling me good things. If they were dry and boring then they’d be too long. But they’re interesting, they have good information and there is always a bit of a story or personal insight to pull me in.
I don’t think that there should be some arbitrary rule about how long a post has to be just to fit something we heard about short attention spans. I want to know who said that, anyway. It was probably someone who doesn’t know how to write.
Here’s how long a post should be: exactly as long as it needs to be so you can say what you want. There are people like Seth Godin who can do that brilliantly in one paragraph. And there are people like us who like to write!
So even on those days when I worry, I remind myself that people will read. I just have to give them something worth reading.
Sylviane: When did you start blogging and why?
Carol: Technically, I started blogging in a spiral notebook when I was 13.
Actually, I started blogging for business about 2 years ago. I had a personal blog for a couple of years before that but it was geared mostly toward politics and current events and that was exhausting! That blog is long gone.
My business blog originally started as an offshoot of my marketing company. We wanted to write helpful tips for our customers and wanted to be the “experts” they could rely on for the good stuff that nobody else was telling them.
We saw people making the same mistakes over and over and we got so many of the same questions from day to day so we used our blog as a way to steer people in the right direction and teach them a bit about the web before they made the same mistakes or asked the same questions.
Then last year we had this mini-revelation and we thought why the heck don’t we write for other people in business, too? So we rebranded the blog from “our company blog” which is kind of boring when you think about it, and turned it into a “magazine” with a focus on web, search and social marketing.
Why am I doing it? It lends a ton of credibility to my business. My customers read it and they get ideas for things they can do and it starts a conversation. We’ve gotten clients through the blog who have read it, asked us questions and eventually asked us to help them with their marketing.
We also plan to monetize it down the road so it’s a source of income, too, but right now it’s all about the education.
Sylviane: What tip or tips would you give to anyone saying that they have a hard time to write and more so on a regular basis?
Carol: First of all, shut up with the negative talk… I can’t write. I don’t have time to write. I don’t know what to write about. Eliminate the word “not” from your vocabulary entirely.
Here’s a great exercise I learned while teaching, too, which you can apply to your business, blog and life in general. Try to spend an entire day without using a single negative word. It’s not as easy as you’d think. See? I broke my own rule. So here’s a perfect teaching opportunity. Instead of saying “it’s not easy” you can say “it’s a challenge”. It’s definitely a challenge to eliminate the negatives because we sling them around so often but if you consciously make an effort to do it, you’ll start to revise the way you speak and think about things.
“It’s a challenge” implies you can overcome it.
“I can’t” is just a dead end.
So first change that inner dialogue.
Second, give yourself a schedule. You’re not a tortured artist. You’re a blogger. You don’t have the luxury of sitting around waiting for inspiration to strike if you want to have a successful blog. You just have to write. And if you commit to a time then you’re more likely to do it. Don’t make it hard on yourself and commit to writing seven days a week. Start small and grow as you can. But pick a schedule, say every Monday, and come hell or high water you’d better post something on that day.
Finally, stop writing and start having conversations. I bet the same people who say they can’t write could sit down and spend an hour chatting about something with a friend. Think about your blog like a chat with a friend and “tell” your blog (and your readers) all that good stuff you would have said out loud. If it helps, speak it into a recorder first and translate it later. Whatever you do, just talk… but do it on the page!
Sylviane: What is your online business? Do you mind telling us what you do?
Carol: The core of my business is marketing. My company Rahvalor Interactive designs brands, logos and printed materials, we design and build websites, we manage search and social marketing campaigns and even write for our clients’ blogs.
We tell our customers we do “as much or as little” as they want us to do. Some people are very hands on and they want to learn how to do things themselves, so we teach them and off they go. Other people don’t have the time and don’t want to get involved so we take care of all their online marketing.
Then there’s Web.Search.Social, the blog we’ve been talking about, which is an extension of our business but really a business all its own. We started it as a completely free resource so we could build up an audience first. We supplement it now with a bit of advertising and affiliate marketing but eventually we’ll roll out ebooks and consulting sessions and things like that.
Sylviane: Do you always try to build relationships with your readers, and why?
Carol: Always! If it wasn’t for the readers there would be no blog. The whole purpose of the blog is to help people, teach them something new, inspire them – and I can only do that if I know what they want. I ask people all the time to let me know what they found helpful and what they didn’t and of course I want people to share their opinions. Just because I write about something doesn’t mean I’m the final authority! If someone has a different approach or a different idea then I want to hear it.
I just added a form to the bottom of every page on my blog called “Ask Anything”. My hope is that I can turn questions that people ask into blog posts that are written very specifically for someone in my audience. I’d like to be able to mention them in the post, offer a link back to their site and have a really good circle of communication. Your readers are more than welcome to ask me their most baffling, burning questions!
Sylviane: Could you give three quick pieces of advice to anyone reading this who would like to start a blog?
Carol: Quick, you said? Ok, I’ll try…
1 – Figure out who YOU are before you worry about who your audience is. A lot of good marketing advice tells us to “know our audience”. But I think you have to know yourself first. What’s your style? What’s your passion? How do YOU want to be known and recognized?
Figure out what makes you unique and completely you. The people you write for will naturally be people who can appreciate and enjoy your spin on things. Once you know who you want to be on your blog then you can envision the audience that will totally get what you’re saying. Whenever you write, imagine that new “friend” you’re writing for.
2 – Always carry a pen! It could just as easily be an app but if you want to start a blog you need a pool of ideas to keep you going. You don’t want to sit down and pound out that first post then wonder, “Now what?” You have to become observant. Write everything down.
On any given day I’ll have notes about what my cats did, what my mother said, something that occurred to me as I was reading a news story, how a project went wrong, what made me happy or pissed me off… like I said before, you never know when a snippet of an idea will come in handy so just write everything down. Be in “blog mode” all the time so you’re consciously on the lookout for ideas.
Write down clichés. Write down words that sound cool. Write things that irk you. Borrow quotes from books or other blogs especially if you strongly agree or strongly disagree. Have a very, very long list of things that inspire you or make you feel anything at all. If you do this for a while it’ll become second nature and you won’t even realize you’re mining your own life for ideas!
3 – Ignore people who tell you how to blog. It’s only natural that we want to know the best way and the right way to do things. There is plenty of advice out there about how to write, what to write, when to write. I’ve given some of it! But ultimately writing is personal and it should be joyful.
If you get too bogged down in waiting for the perfect answer or perfect time and place to start (trust me, it doesn’t exist) then you’ll never get off the ground and you won’t enjoy it when you do. Decide who you are, choose your audience, get yourself on a schedule and write. Don’t wait!
Sylviane: What would you like people reading this know about you?
Carol: That I firmly believe that the only way to truly succeed in anything is to understand our connectedness with other people. You don’t do anything in a void. There are a billion people out there who just contributed to the successful launch of this post today, from us to your readers to the IT guy sitting in a room somewhere making sure this site works. I believe in being part of something bigger than myself and that includes helping others.
Oh, and that I’m Italian but I like Cuban food better, that I still have nightmares I’ve forgotten my locker combination, and that one of the coolest moments of my life was the day this year that I ran 5 miles in 50 minutes for the first time ever (if you knew anything about my track record you’d fall out of your chair with amazement on that one).
Sylviane: What is the best way to reach you if anyone would be interested in your services?
Carol: You can reach me either through my blog at www.websearchsocial.com or my company site at www.rahvalor.com. I’m also everywhere online. On Facebook (facebook.com/carollynnrivera), on Twitter (twitter.com/carollynnrivera), and on G+ (https://plus.google.com/u/0/106689333356257365541/).
Sylviane: Is there anything you’d like to add that I didn’t ask you?
Carol: Sylviane, we’re already up to 3,000 words so I’d better not answer that! I’ll leave your readers with this thought: you can. So much of what we do and much of our success relies on how we think about it.
Change your thinking, change the world. It starts with every step every day so all you have to do is take one. And then the next one. Don’t worry about that big road block up ahead because you’re not there yet. Keep going! And know that it’s a big, wide world and there is always – always! – someone who can offer help and support if you ask.
Sylviane: I thank you for your excellent answers full of wonderful insight, Carol.
So, your turn now! What did you take home from this interview? Do let us know!
Thank you for inviting me to share my many words with you and your readers, Sylvianne! I had fun doing it and I appreciate your kind introduction 🙂
I hope I can help inspire people. All questions and comments are more than welcome!
Carol Lynn invites you to read..6 Questions To Ask Before Your Business Develops An App
Hey Carol,
I am sure that you are going to encourage and inspire anyone reading this to write. It was fun for me tool Really cool. My longest post so far too!
Great interview Sylviane,
I eliminated the word problem from my vocab a long time ago and I replaced it with the word Challenge… I can get through a challenge, but a problem… seems like it will take a different way to be fixed.
I like the idea of going through a whole day by only saying positive words… only challenge there is when I speak to prospects. I have to say negative words to make them feel pain in order to move them to action 🙂
Thank you for your thoughts, Gavin. That’s a good point – you definitely don’t want to make everything sound rosy when you’re talking to clients and you want to push the pain buttons! There is a time and place to be a negative Nancy but when it comes to your own endeavors, it helps to stay away from things like “I can’t” and frame it in a different light. I wonder if we could talk to clients without the word ‘not’? it would be an interesting challenge!
Carol Lynn invites you to read..6 Questions To Ask Before Your Business Develops An App
Hi Gavin,
Great thing to do, replacing negative words by upbuilding ones. Makes all the difference in our mind and actions.
Thanks for coming, Gavin 🙂
I see favorites on favorite’s blogs these days. Is this spring? Not summer? 😉
Interview post 😉 It’s really nice to see different kind of posts you were talking earlier Sylviane. You are setting yourself as an example. I like it. I’d love to see an infographic post too.
I like this question Sylviane ~ “Where do you look for ideas to write about?” 🙂 I agree with Carol about how ideas turned into posts. Mostly it’s what I’ve been through lately or else it’s a question from my readers. However Carol does more than that. Writing all and carrying a pen? :O I’m lazy enough to do ’em all. I do take notes on notepad on my PC or mobile when I find interesting pieces online or offline, but not that much. My hands glued to keyboard 😉
Alright Carol, next question from me. Let me shoot ~ What if someone writing in particular niche where not easy to find ideas? For example think of a blog about Extraterrestrial activities. (It’s not easy, right? I think so. Correct me if I’m wrong ;)) Does taking down notes will help it? Or do you have any other methodology you would think that work out?
I’ve seen “Ask Anything” form at the bottom 🙂 That’s a nice approach. Also I did implemented support community for my readers and that’s where I help ’em mostly and get ideas too.
Oops… Another question popping out. I think I need both of you to contribute as inspirational writers. Here it goes ~ When is the best time to write a post? I think you both will have good answers for that 🙂 Just curious. Am I too curious?
Glad to know more about you Carol 🙂 Sylviane did it well with line up and questions, no? I didn’t know that much about you, even I through your about page. However with the help of Sylviane’s interview, I get to know more. In addition to your personal life, she grasp out interesting facts and blend your knowledge throughout the interview. Learning through life experiences is always fascinating for me as I get to know their own techniques. Sometimes I wonder how do they do it all. But they do it. That’s the key 🙂 And as I see different people has their own techniques for them.
Thanks for interviewing Carol and sharing here Sylviane 🙂 I’ve enjoyed it. Have a super duper week for both of you…
Cheers…
Mayura invites you to read..How to Add Follow Buttons to Your Website with AddThis
Hi Mayura, nice to see you here, too! I think it’s great that you “write” your ideas on your computer. The important thing is that you’re recording them and if that’s what works for you, then that’s great.
So let’s see if I can answer your questions…
What if you’re writing for a difficult niche? Well… I honestly don’t think there is any such thing! If there is truly a niche for something (and that means other people are interested) then those people are interested for a reason. What do they want to know? What do they like to discuss? What gets them excited or angry? I’ll take your example of extra terrestrials because there is plenty you can say about that. It depends on your angle, but you can include scientific activities and studies, personal stories, facts vs. myths, even “what if” imaginary stories. A blog isn’t always about teaching facts – it’s about entertaining the people who read.
If people like to read about ETs then give them a story! Ask “What would happen if we found another planet with life tomorrow?” Or using one of my examples, what would an ET think of a grocery store, a gas station, a movie theater? What if an ET saw a movie about ETs!
In the case of a difficult niche, I would start by talking with the people who are in it with you and finding out what they want to hear. Then you can start to grow your library of ideas.
Now your second question… there is no “right” answer to that. You should write whenever you feel the most productive. I didn’t say the most “inspired”. You can’t sit around and wait for that. But if you set a schedule and promise that you’ll post once per week, then you have a whole week to decide when is the best time for you to write. Are you a morning person? A night person? Do you like to concentrate on one thing at a time or can you write 3 or 4 posts at once then have them ready to go when you need them?
I work better in the afternoon and evening so that’s when I write the most. But it’s up to you!
You can ask questions any time, Mayura! I’m glad you stopped by today.
Carol Lynn invites you to read..6 Questions To Ask Before Your Business Develops An App
Wow, I love this! I guess a 3,000 word post does generate 250-300 word comment. So, how cool is that?
Mayura, I love your comments. You are so interested and so genuine, who doesn’t like to have readers like you. You are inspiring me a post right now!
OK, I see that Carol has done a good job, but I am going to try answering your two questions as well, so you can have 2 different perspectives.
Mayura, you can write about anything, really. There is not really a theme that is harder than another, what it all comes down to is if your are interested in it or not. It’s easier to write about what you like.
However, I have written about dozen of topics, some I know well and some I know nothing about. When I don’t know the topic I need to write about, I get informed and than I bring my own input and ideas and try to tell a story. The secret is this. Tell a story. True, untrue, it doesn’t matter.
Start telling people what you think, what it is, who are the experts in it, what you like about it, and what you don’t, etc…
The best time to write?
It’s like asking what’s the best time to eat? The best time to write is the time YOU feel more alert and awake. I’m a morning person and I tend to write better in the morning, but sometimes, for some reasons I would be inspired in the evening. It’s all about when you feel it! For me sometimes, walking does bring me inspiration to write as well.
I hope these answers, between me and Carol will help you 🙂 Thanks for coming, Mayura 🙂
Thank you very much Carol and Sylviane 🙂 As I believed, I’ve got pretty good answers from both of you. You both SMART, eh? 😉
Actually, they were some doubts I had and sometimes some authors name “Morning” is the best and else not effective. I was wondering ’cause I do write posts on midnight too. Here I’ve got genuine answers. Niche was another BIG one for me. Not to try out, but was curious about finding ideas. Your suggestions are greatly appreciated 🙂 I mean it.
Thanks again for answers and yet making them descriptive enough 🙂 I’d say teachers. Yeah, absolutely…
Cheers…
Mayura invites you to read..How to Add Follow Buttons to Your Website with AddThis
You’re very welcome, Mayura,
You can ask questions to me or Lynn any time. You are such a good fellow who loves to learn. And speaking for myself, I love people who ask genuine questions and try apply the help they are getting like you do.
Hey Miss Carol, great to see you over here at Sylviane’s place. What a wonderful interview and I would expect nothing less from you.
I know that your posts are very very long but they keep my attention all the way through. You just have a way about you that keeps that reader wanting to know everything.
Sylviane, Carol and I have actually had some chats so I have had the pleasure to learn some of this from her as well. I didn’t know about you starting your writing around the early age of 13 and I’m so sorry your friend lost their life in that drowning accident. But I guess the writer in you was definitely born because of that so we’re all very pleased about that.
I love the advice you gave us here, just be ourselves and don’t let anyone else tell you how to write. I believe that as long as you’re sharing what’s on your mind and in your heart and you’re here to help people, everything else will fall into place.
Thanks for sharing more about you with all of us Carol. I enjoyed reading every word. I have a feeling you’ve got a new post over at your place too so you know I’ll be by soon.
Appreciate you interviewing Carol Sylvaine. I always love learning more about my blogging friends.
You ladies have a wonderful week.
~Adrienne
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I was so excited to do this interview, Adrienne! So I thank Sylviane for thinking of me. It was fun and of course when you ask someone who likes to write about writing, the words just flow… 🙂
I do agree that you have to write for yourself first. Blogging shouldn’t be a chore. So if you write about something you don’t really, really love then it’s going to show, and it’s going to be hard. But if you love it, if you learn to relax and enjoy the ride and be yourself, then people will gravitate to you. You know it! You’ve done it!
Thanks for stopping by, I appreciate it! Maybe next time I’ll practice writing a shorter post… hm… let’s see what happens!
Carol Lynn invites you to read..6 Questions To Ask Before Your Business Develops An App
Hi Adrienne,
I’m glad you came and read this great interview. I must have the interview bug these days, One on my traveling blog, one here and one coming soon (actually two) on my personal development blog.
I know that you’ve known Carol before I did, because I met her in the facebook group you invited me in 🙂 We are just a big family 🙂 That’s true, I really feel that I have a blogging family. It’s just great!
It was very easy to interview Carol because the questions were so obvious to me and I knew she was going to fill all the blanks big time 🙂 the result is this huge post of over 3,000 words. My longest ever! And one of the best too 🙂
Thanks for coming, Adrienne, and have a great week 🙂
WOW, great interview.
One of the things that caught my attention the most is when you said – Where DON’T I look for ideas. As a freelance writing and blogger I am always looking for inspiration and the world is where I get it all. Everything can be tied to something else, so why not use your everyday life to come up with great new ideas.
On top of that – Every idea that you have will be different, so there is no worrying about somebody else already talking about it on their site.
Adam
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Hi Adam and welcome here!
I really love that answer from Carol as well. Where don’t I look for ideas! It’s true that anything, really anything can inspire us writers. It can be fun, sad or indifferent, it doesn’t matter. Everything is talking to us.
Thanks for coming and hope to see you back here again soon 🙂
You said something very true, Adam – no matter what idea you have it will be different than someone else’s. The fact is that we all have our unique perspectives so even if we write about similar topics, it will be unique because of who you are, how you think and what you have to say. Thanks for stopping by!
Carol Lynn invites you to read..6 Questions To Ask Before Your Business Develops An App
Very inspiring. Every step we take changes the world. If every people do one step at a time, tomorrow can be something new.
Hi Alvin,
Thanks for coming by and leaving your thoughts with us. Glad you enjoyed it!
Great interview with the writer Sylviane! You really caught my attention on this. I hope i can also try to interview.
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Hi Mika,
Glad you enjoyed it!
Hi Carol and Sylviane,
thanks for this wonderful though lengthy interview.
I think, Carol, you’re right: If people don’t want to read a long post, they don’t have to. The problem with people who have a short attention is that they can’t focus either. That means, if you tried to write for them, it would kill you because you wouldn’t know what to write about., they are a very rapidly moving target, aren’t they ?
And there are still more than enough people in the world who have a long enough attention span and who are able to appreciate a thoughtful and carefully drafted, even longer, post.
Well, there are so many nuggets in this interview, I could write a very long comment too, lol.
I like the idea of not listening to people who want to tell you how to blog…it may have worked for them, even that is uncertain, but will it work for you if you follow a canned recipe ?
I also second you on your advice not to search for ideas. I keep my eyes and ears open and the ideas come to me, there’s so much input, even too much, right ?
Thanks for sharing your insights.
Take care
Oliver
Hi Oliver and thank you for your great input.
It seems that Carol and I aren’t able to write short stuff 🙂 but regardless of what we write as bloggers is NOT for everyone, so whoever is reading our blogs have to be OK with longer posts 🙂
I am glad you enjoyed this very rich interview with Carol as she surely gave some awesome advice.
See you around soon 🙂
Hi Oliver, glad you stopped by! I read your interview on Sylviane’s travel blog just recently and it was also great and a lot of fun to read.
I agree with you that it would be impossible to try to write for the people who are unfocused. Perhaps a better approach for people who can’t focus is something like video, if you really want to catch their attention.
There are plenty of people who will read if there is something interesting to read. Of course, it does help, especially on the internet, to break things up with nice headings, short sentences, etc. That makes it easier on the eyes and easier to focus on.
Glad you enjoyed this!
Carol Lynn invites you to read..6 Questions To Ask Before Your Business Develops An App
What a wonderful insight into a new blogging friend Carol – I’m glad I read this Sylviane as I thought I knew what Carol did through reading her blog, but to find there are so many more facets to her business is great (and I might need some of them!).
It was lengthy, but very interesting, so I didn’t mind as I like to find out more about people whose work I admire.
Thanks!
Nicky
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Hi Nicky,
I’m glad you came and enjoyed the interview. There’s always more we can learn about the people we kind of already know online. I’m glad you learned more about Carol through my questions 🙂 Cool!
Thanks for coming, as always, Nicky 🙂
What a beautiful interview. Just like having coffee together! I teach marketing writing to non-writers, and I\’ve noticed they wear the label of \”non-writer\” like a shield. But, when I have them write about themselves, their own experiences and challenges, that breaks down the wall and the words just pour out of them. Love that! \”Know yourself first\” in action. But… I like to think of myself as a tortured artist, so I\’m afraid I can\’t follow that bit of advice. 🙂 Great getting to know you!
Hi Evelyn,
Nice to meet you and thanks for coming. Sorry for the late response, but I’m trying to keep up with all the comments, which is a good thing.
Some people feel like they can’t write because they are telling themselves they can’t, but as you mentioned this problem can goes away with the right mind set.
Thank you for your feedbacks, Evelyn 🙂
Hey hi amazing interview. I love reading and writing. Writing is an art. I like your way of presenting interview. I am not good with writing, but I enjoy reading always. Thanks you for sharing your experience. This post is encouraging. I have never seen this type of interview. Keep posting dear…
Hello there,
Welcome here I am glad you made it and I am very happy you enjoyed this interview. Interviews are great, because they are fun to read and can teach a whole lot.
You think that you are not good at writing, but it’s only what you think. With practice anyone can become at least a decent writer. Try it and let me know how it goes 🙂
Great interview Sylviane. I like what Carol said when she mentioned, making you know who “you” are. When I started, I was all over the place and wasn’t sure what to do. It was more envy than anything else and at the end of the day you can only be YOU anyway. That’s tough for people because they want to be like another blog or have that same popularity. I think most times, popularity isn’t what it’s cracked up to be either, so I just tread lightly and have fun. I don’t want to get caught up spending too much time worrying about someone else anyway.
Now, the negative word part is something I will have to try because I find myself saying some of that too Carol and “It’s a challenge” sounds so much better anyway. That’s a post idea Carol…and a great lesson we all need to cover. And you’re a runner too? Go girl! I would be the person at the end huffing and panting cursing you for getting me to try it because long distance was never for me, but anyone else up for the challenge has my vote.
Sonia invites you to read..Blogger Spotlight: Mitch Mitchell, I’mJustSharing.com
Hi Sonia,
I’m glad you found Carol’s interview. There a lot of goodies in there, isn’t it?
Of course we all want a popular blog, but in the end what makes a popular blog is being ourselves and telling our stories through our own eyes, knowledge and experiences and using it all to help others. This will make your blog popular, sooner or later 🙂
Thanks for your feedbacks, Sonia 🙂
Great insights into Carol, Sylviane.. and she used to be a teacher, so we have something in common -)
Thanks!
Isaac
Isaac H. invites you to read..Interview With Hugh Howey, Author Of Wool
Hi Isaac,
I’m glad you came by to check out that interview. Great stuff from this very talent blogger ans writer that she is. Yes, she used to be a teacher, that why she is so good at explaining things 🙂