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Creative writing ideas can hit you anytime. It can hit you while you are nonchalantly doing your everyday household chores or while you’re doing your normal tasks. But there are also times that creative writing ideas, no matter how hard you try, just won’t seem to form in your head. When this happens to you, you can count on the methods and techniques below to help your mind easily come up with great ideas to write about. Pick Out A Scene This is one of the simplest techniques to come up with creative writing ideas. You start out by thinking of a scene. If you still can’t think of a specific scene on your own, then stick your head out your window and observe the people around you. Pick any of the activities they are doing and stick with it. Now that you have your first scene, you need to explain it. For example, a scene you have chosen is an average looking guy briskly walking down the street and suspiciously scanning the area around him. You then explain why this certain person was walking this way. It is possible that this person was part of a gang who just robbed a store and was acting as a decoy for the police to follow. Then you just explain further and add random scenes as you continue the story. From the scenes you have created, you can then build a creative story from it. A Combination Of Different Stories Another effective way of coming up with creative writing ideas is through a combination of different stories - the more absurd the combination, the better. A good example would be combining the story of Noah and the Arc and the story of Star Trek. You can come up with a story featuring one whole family who survived the demise of their planet by escaping through the spaceship that they built. When will they be able to go back to their home planet? Another good example would be combining the story of Romeo and Juliet and the story of King Kong. A human has fallen in love with an ape who has the ability to speak. Unfortunately, the norms of society wouldn’t allow their love to flourish. There are a lot of innovative writing ideas you can come up with by combining different stories. It’s All About You You can use yourself as the source of creative writing ideas. Be aware of your interests and preferences. Get to know yourself better and know what truly are your opinions about different subjects and topics. You can use your emotions to stir up your writing juices. Whatever you can think of, write about it. Pick a topic say, politics. Write what your opinions are and the emotions about the current issues in politics. List everything you can think about it and make a list. You can then pick a topic from this list to come up with your creative writing ideas. Want to earn a 5-figure monthly income through freelance writing jobs? Go to .20daypersuasion.com/5figurewriter.htm and discover how to earn massive amounts of money by becoming a freelance writer.

Do you aspire to know extra in this area making money online with articles using the Mass Article Control method? This is a traffic generation strategy that has been used for a prolonged moment in time and has proven to still be successful until now. It could not yield the fastest results, but it is certainly able to turn out inexpensive and prolonged period traffic without difficulty. It is highly recommended with the intention of Internet marketers firstly start with reduced or uninhibited traffic generation methods preferably than paid methods such as pay per click advertising. 1. What Are the Advantages of Using Mass Article Control to Create an revenue Stream Online? Opening an online company would require the vendor to establish up their own websites and buying all the learning resources to educate themselves on the various strategies inhabitants operate to manufacture money from their sites. All these processes can cost quite a quantity of money, and all these occur even prior to the principal deal is yet generated. Largely brand new marketers waste a fortune of money to apply the incorrect strategies, eventually forcing them to confer up as they finish up thinking that trying to manufacture money online is solely not worth the time and effort. 2. Functions of the Software in Mass Article Control The software inside this package will help you generate hundreds of unique articles as sustained as you control fed it with the primary version. It allows you to select the various expressions you desire to modify and at that time it consequentially changes the whole part for you, spiraling them into hundreds of unique and highly readable articles. An extra terrific element is that it can help you log inside to all your article marketing membership sites much more quickly. It additionally allows its users to save all the general synonyms and as well break down the articles into various niche categories. 3. So What Are the Drawbacks of Mass Article Control? There will still remain times as a minute part of the articles generated are not straightforwardly readable. This is why it is a helpful conception to proof-read them at least formerly prior to submitting. Would You Like To Have The #1 Article And Link Building Software Out Their? Make $8,198 In 30 Days With:Mass Article Control Or Get Free 2009 Edition Of:Article Marketing

This year, UGG Australia has just announced its new line of boots for the coming season. These boots are ready to protect your feet from the season’s wet and chilly weather. Why wait until winter to wear UGG boots when you can start wearing them in the fall? New arrivals deliver the same quality and comfort that the UGG brand has always been known to have. Fall boot styles often suit the varied tastes of women, men, and children. The following are a few great choices of UGG boots for women. If you would like boots made of merino wool to match your best sweater, this is the perfect style for you. If you examine these boots, you should see prominent and very colorful stripes that say in fashion. Like most of the pairs in UGGs classic collection, this pair has insoles built with foam surrounded by true ugg sheepskin. The outsole has a molded EVA light and offers comfort every step of the way. The merino strips are a combination of wool and polyester; nylon binds these materials together-Classic Tall Stripe Cable Knit This pair comes up to your calf, and is made of what UGG calls twin-face sheepskin. The company took this style one notch higher by adding a wooden logo button and a flexible band. You can wear it stretched upwards or folded (cuffed down), depending on your dress or pant length, or your mood. The Bailey Button is made with comfortable insoles that make walking in them a breeze- Women’s Bailey Button This style satisfies the need for ultimate comfort, without sacrificing style. The heel is reinforced and the seams are natural. This is UGG Australians answer to luxury. The heels are only an inch high and come with heel guards. Unfortunately, only whole sizes are available. The women’s classic mini can easily absorb moisture since it is made with real sheepskin. The outsole is lightweight and there is no restrictions-UGG Australia Women’s Classic Mini - Sand Sheepskin UGG Australia designed boots with comfort and style as the main features. These boots allow women to feel more freedom in their movements, and they may enjoy its versatility as well. Women need treat own better, buy comfortable ugg boots for yourself! Internet reference: .articlesnatch.com/Article/Ugg-Boots-For-The-Fall-Season/741170 Editor: Lily

Author Vaughn Alaine-Marshall is not an author by training. In fact, Alaine-Marshall is a chiropractor. He was running a thriving chiropractic business, so why on earth would he leave his business to write about reality TV? Alaine-Marshall left his practice behind for four and a half years in order to focus his energies on writing the compelling new book, Uberstar. Uberstar is a spellbinding novel about the world’s biggest reality TV show. Alaine-Marshall could have written an expose with all the firsthand accounts he had access to, but instead he decided to write a fictional piece to protect the identities of everyone with which he spoke. Alaine-Marshall had the opportunity to hear the stories of everyone from the hot shot producers behind the scenes to reality TV show contestants on big shows like Indian Idol, American Idol, and X Factor. It all started when Alaine-Marshall received a call from a close family friend. She was a contestant on a major Australian reality TV show, and she begged for him to listen to her story. However, Alaine-Marshall was initially reluctant to hear her out. After all, he was busy running his chiropractic business and didn’t have time to hear the saga. However, after listening for a bit, Alaine-Marshall grew shocked and appalled. His friend revealed to him inside information about what really goes on behind the scenes of reality TV shows. After speaking with his friend, Alaine-Marshall was approached by several other people involved in the reality TV industry. Many of them broke their confidentiality agreements in order to reveal the truth behind reality TV. Alaine-Marshall knew he was onto something. He locked himself up for hours on end in order to put these people’s stories on paper without disruption, putting his chiropractic business on hold so he could focus on his novel. What Alaine-Marshall learned through all of these interviews and conversations is that reality TV shows are essentially a franchise of nastiness. The bullying, teasing, and taunting that happens on stage is only a small sample of what takes place backstage. Furthermore, the act of bullying as a form of entertainment is very damaging, both emotionally and psychologically. As such, many of the contestants on reality TV shows end up traumatized after their experiences. However, they are so hungry for their fifteen minutes of fame that they do anything possible in order to reach the top. For them, even if reaching the top means insulting their peers and bringing them down in any way possible in the process, they do it willingly. Alaine-Marshall is well aware that those who are bullied typically have problems such as depression and anxiety. These problems can affect all facets of their lives. Reality TV only serves to make bullying worse because it makes it a form of family entertainment. The judges insult people on stage and publicists search for scandals in order to humiliate contestants. Ultimately, reality TV magnifies the taunting and teasing that takes place on school playgrounds around the world. Alaine-Marshall realized after speaking to so many people who were involved in the business that it was necessary to get the truth out. As of now, few people realize how damaging reality TV actually is on our society and our children. Children emulate the behavior they see on reality TV shows , which in turn contributes to an endless, vicious cycle. Uberstar is a fascinating novel based on truth that is hard to put down. Alaine-Marshall put the perspectives and experiences of everyone he has spoken with into the book, so you come to understand the inner workings of reality TV and the entertainment industry at large. Many powerful people would have prevented this book from coming out if it were in the form of an expose. To avoid such troubles, Alaine-Marshall wrote a novel. As a result, Alaine-Marshall was able to protect people’s identities while getting away with publishing something that could have amounted to a scandal otherwise. If you love a good book and you want to know more about what takes place behind the scenes of reality TV shows, look no further than Uberstar. Alaine-Marshall’s debut novel provides an in-depth look into the psychology of reality TV. Read this book and you’ll think twice about watching reality TV. Whether you’re a fan of reality TV shows or not, you’ll be fascinated, if not disturbed, by this book’s observations about humanity, society, and entertainment. Author Bio: Australian author Vaughn Alaine-Marshall releases Uberstar from Hendlin Books, an explosive look at the reality television. Based largely on reality shows such as American Idol, India has Talent and other successful reality shows. The author’s research included interviews with participants, producers and insiders from the world’s largest reality television shows. for more: .uberstarthebook.com.au/

Are you searching for a method to promote your website or business? If so, read on to discover a website promotion method that costs virtually nothing to implement. Article writing provides you with an excellent method of increasing the PR (page rank) of your website. The only expense to you is a little time to write short, informative articles that have value to others. The articles you have written can then be submitted to some of the best article directories such as Articledashboard.com, ezinearticles.com, goarticles.com, isnare.com, and articlealley.com Article marketing is a great way to increase the flow of traffic and visitors to your website. If you are a business person and have a website, you may have heard the term SEO or search engine optimization. Article marketing is a very effective way to promote your business or website. In simple terms SEO uses tactics such as keyword optimization to achieve a better placing in the search engines, resulting in more visitors and hopefully more sales for your business. Google operates a site ranking system commonly known as page rank. Page rank is partially based on the quality of your website content but also looks at how many other sites are “back linking” to your website. A website with more back links should hold a better search engine placement and in turn receive more visitors. Once you have written your articles, make a list of article directories where you wish to submit your articles. Most directories will ask you to create a free account before articles can be submitted. Once you have your accounts in place, you can begin your article submission. Article directories must approve your submitted articles before adding them to the article directory. Try to make your article interesting, factual and useful to others. Do not just write a 300 word advert for your company or service as it will most likely be declined. Make sure the title of your article accurately describes the content of the article and contains keywords associated with your subject. Layout the article in short paragraphs, do not bunch all the text together as it looks terrible and web users will rarely read large sections of text. It is a known fact that web users have a very short attention span and tend to skim over large sections of text, so make it easy on the eye and easy to read. Most article directories provide a resource box into which you can place your name, a little information about you or your business and - this is the important bit - a hyperlink to your own website. This link creates the back link to your site and will help to improve both visitor numbers and search engine placement. The more back links you have, the more traffic you will receive. Do not link directly to affiliate sites as they will usually be declined, instead link to your own site and include your affiliate links there. For more useful tips & hints, please browse for more information at our website :- .instant-marketing-articles.com .articlemarketing.reprintarticlesite.com

What I really like about the United States of America is the chances one has to go to school and learn many things. Where I come from -a country in Central America that I won’t name, but you can guess- most people are illiterate, but I went all the way through the third grade and I know how to read and add and subtract in both Spanish and English. But this story is about Mrs. Poumier -not I- and I want to put it in paper right quick while I still have this sadness that is gnawing at my guts and heart. If I write it out I feel I will get it out of my guts, heart, and mind. And get some peace. It is not that I want to cure myself from this melancholy, nor that I want to lessen my guilt, or much less lay blame on someone-no sir, or madam; not at all. It is that I want to pay my respects to Mrs. Poumier, the only Anglo friend I had in this great country that I love as much as I love my own. In one bit you’ll see why I am so sad: Mrs. Poumier -my sweet dear friend- died a day after Thanksgiving. For those who might be wondering how a person like me -with low education and low wits- would dare attempt to write a story, I will say that I read a lot. I’ve read somewhere that Cervantes, the author of Don Quijote -the novel I would rescue from a burning building- also went only to the third grade; but he read every piece of paper that came into his hands. So, that is what I do: read everything! Not only I read at Barnes and Noble, Borders, and other bookstores, but I am familiar with every public library in Manhattan. Reading is my passion. And so was Mrs. Poumier’s. In fact that is how we met. In the summer, during my lunch break, as I sat on the stoop of the building where she lived and read One Hundred Years of Solitude, she floored me when she looked at the title, exclaiming with great relish: “The best novel of the 20th century!” And that was the beginning of our friendship. Later in our developing friendship, Mrs. Poumier revised my stories, corrected them, and gave me advice: “Watch how you begin your sentences. Sentence openers will clue the reader. Too many words ending in ‘ly,’ too many adjectives go on a ‘which’ hunt.” Being an orphan I was raised by an aunt and my grandmother. Despite the fact that a number of years have gone by since my grandmother-’abuelita’ Guadalupe- died, her image is so fixed in my brains that I can say she is very much alive in my mind and heart. When my gramma died she left me a medallion with the image of the ‘Virgencita de Guadalupe.’ Superstitious as I am, I feel that as long as I have this sacred token, nothing bad could happen to me. Because Mrs. Poumier resembled -in looks and spirit- my grandmother, I made it a point of befriending her. For almost two years I’ve been employed in this catering service on 1st Avenue, near Sutton Place. But just because one mentions Sutton Place doesn’t mean that everyone around here is wealthy. No Sir. In fact, Mrs. Poumier, who lived half a block away from One Sutton Place, was poor-poorer than me! To be blunt, her social security check and a small annuity is all she had left, after her son -a big shot stockbroker- lost her portfolio which he had loaded with Internet stocks. That is what she tells me, but I suspect something more sinister-a dishonest son. Yet in spite of her poverty she never said anything bad about her children. When her portfolio of stocks, bonds, and mutual funds was managed by Smith Barney, she did well and was able to send her son to Harvard Business School, and her daughter to Columbia Law School. Joy and pride would spark in her eyes when she spoke of her children. One day she intimated to me that most of her income went to pay for her rent and that she had very little left for other things, including food. “Not that I am a miser,” she said to me. “It is just that I have to watch every penny.” Yet, she would go meal-less for a day or two so that she could buy the NY Sunday Times. “That’s something I cannot do without-onerous as it might be!” she told me once. I loved to listen to her. I loved the cadence in her voice; in her voice I found a refined diction; in the diction elegance, an elegance that revealed nobility, and in that nobility the milk of human kindness that more than kindness was love for neighbor. “We girls had to practice good diction and write well,” she told me once. “I went to Mount Holyoke College, you know,” she mentioned once as if I would know what she was talking about. And I could see in her bright eyes that those might have been the best years of her life. Of course I did a little research later and found out that Mount Holyoke College is an all-women college reputed for producing excellent writers. To reciprocate her goodwill one fine day I gave her my ‘Virgencita de Guadalupe’ medallion. “Nothing bad will happen to you as long as you keep this,” I explained to her. Knowing about Mrs. Poumier’s thin budget, I spoke to Sadeek, the attendant in the candy store two doors down from where I work, and he agreed to sell me the blessed newspaper at half-price. When I told him it was for Mrs. Poumier, he reduced the price to one dollar. And we cooked up a plausible story to tell her. That Sunday when she came to buy the paper Sadeek told her that if she came back at 12 noon, she could buy the paper for only $1, since by then all the customers had picked up their copies and the leftovers could be sold at a lower price. He would set it aside for her. Of course Sadeek asked her to keep mum about that or he would be in trouble with other customers. Where I work we prepare gourmet food, which we sell for the most outrageous prices. Emiliano, the first cook, fixes this ‘arroz con pollo” -listed in the menu as ‘poulet de la maison du roi’- which we sell for $29 a meal. Go figure. And people from Park Avenue to Sutton place call us for the delicacy which to tell the truth costs less than a dollar to prepare. And if you throw in the labor (minimum wage, no benefits), rent, and overhead, you can add another dollar. Nice business. Nifty profits. The owner of the store, an immigrant from Romania, is a good man; very strict, a little humorless, but kind-hearted. Because I speak English better than he does, he lets me handle the customers, the fax, e-mail, and telephone orders. And in the afternoon and evenings I deliver the orders of Emiliano’s exquisite dishes. I don’t want to digress but I must say that Emiliano was born to cook. Our wealthy customers -many of them celebrities I recognize- can’t get enough of his creations. Yet, the man can barely read and write and never uses written recipes! When any of the machines -ovens, freezers, refrigerators, cash register, coffee and espresso machines, and other objects- breaks down, I fix it. No machine has been invented that I cannot fix. So, the man is happy with me. As a result he only comes a few hours a day, but mainly to balance the receipts for the day and to do some bookkeeping. During my lunch hour I would bring Mrs. Poumier a full meal of the special of the day. Nothing -that is absolutely nothing- in my life gave me more pleasure than to see Mrs. Poumier enjoy her meals-all for free. For her birthday (late August) I swiped a bottle from the cellar of a $40 white wine, and we all -I brought Emiliano and Sadeek with me- had a few glasses. How glorious she looked that day: her delicate features glowed with happiness when we sang the ‘happy birthday’ song. Once in a while a pang of morals would jolt me and tell me that I might be stealing from my employer; but I would quickly counter the pang with the thought that just fixing one freezer I save the establishment two or three hundred dollars, and if you multiply this for six to eight times a month, you can well see that $2 (cost of the meal) will not set my patron back that much. Ah, humanity and inhumanity! One sad day, Mrs. Poumier told me that I should not bring her any more meals because her daughter -a partner in a premier law firm- had come to visit her and told her to stop spending her money in extravagant meals. “I know the prices these people charge,” she had yelled at her. Not only had she yelled at her, but she had threatened to sue us - my catering place- for taking advantage of a poor senile defenseless old woman. The nerve of those people! Furthermore, she had threatened to put her in a home. Fearful that I might lose my job I told Emiliano not to fix the meals for Mrs. Poumier anymore. For many days I felt despondent and hard as I tried to understand where I had gone wrong-I could not. During the month of October and November I saw Mrs. Poumier around the neighborhood a few times; she looked unkempt, the spark of vivacity in her eyes gone; gone also was the lilt and sweetness of her voice. Knowing how much I cared for the sweet lady, that Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, my friend Plutarco -the doorman- came running to tell me that my good friend had collapsed in the lobby; that the paramedics had pronounced her dead. “This lady is way undernourished-skin and bones!” the paramedic had exclaimed. As Plutarco gave me the sad news, he also gave me my “Virgencita the Guadalupe’ medallion, which Mrs. Poumier had dropped when she collapsed. Plutarco knows I am a man not given to tears, but that day he saw me cry my eyes out; even Sadeek came out of the store and sat next to me and tried to console me. More than tears for the loss of my good friend, I raged at my suspicion that Mrs. Poumier had not wished to die the day before and spoil Thanksgiving Day for her son and daughter and grandchildren; the two families own houses in Long Island. Uncared and unloved by both son and daughter, she’s now with my Virgencita de Guadalupe who will give her all the love that she didn’t have here on this harsh concrete and asphalt shore that is Manhattan. Nothing bad will happen to her there-really. Before I close let me put into practice her advice by removing the adverbs ending in ‘ly,’ go on a ‘which hun,’ and watch my sentence openers. Retired. Former investment banker, Columbia University-educated, Vietnam Vet (67-68). For the writing techniques I use, see Mary Duffy’s e-book: Sentence Openers. To read my book reviews of the Classics visit my blog: Writing To Live

I have always been bright and intelligent, but I am also one of those who simply have to work flat out to get the best results academically. Some people sail through school, college and university with flying colours, having barely broken sweat on an essay. But I have to work at it, and although I knew this when I started university, I was not really prepared for the amount of work I would get all at once. Don’t think for a minute that I am lazy, or want to do things with the least possible effort all the time. The problem is for me to get a 2:1 or a first I knew I would have to work flat out on every assignment. Something that would take the next person a couple of days and gain them an easy 2:1 would mean four or five days work for me and even then only a chance of getting a 2:1. I would leave something out, not explain my point well enough or be unable to back what I said up with credible evidence. I found I was getting quite down about it. One day, after another long session in the library, I was chatting with a friend about our upcoming assignment, when she handed me an essay she had bought online. She had finished with it and had used the reference lists and noted some of the points to guide her own work. So this was her secret, I thought, this is how she gets great marks. I read the essay and it was if a light bulb had switched on in my head. I knew exactly what I wanted to say and how. The essay was perfectly written, and gave me ideas I didn’t even know I had. I couldn’t believe it when I got a first for that paper. It was my first one, although I hoped it would not be the last. After that, I checked papers4you.com regularly. Sometimes I didn’t need to get one of their papers, but found their free advice and free articles really helpful. Other times, when I felt I needed more direction, I would buy a paper. Each time I was really happy with the quality of the work. Their reference lists were invaluable, and meant I could find the books or journals I needed in minutes. The papers simply pop in your inbox after you have paid. It’s so easy and the price is really student-friendly. When it came to my dissertation, I knew exactly what I wanted to look at. I scanned papersforyou.com and found one that was similar to mine. I bought it and it helped me on a number of levels. I was able to see how to structure my dissertation and learnt a bit more about the subject I was tackling. I used the reference list time and time again, and probably found information I would easily have missed otherwise. Of course, my tutor was on hand to help, but you can’t go running to them every two minutes. I got a 2:1 for my dissertation and a 2:1 overall in my degree. I still put the hard work in, but the papers I used for some of my assignments undoubtedly saved me time and helped me reach my full potential. Over 60,000 top quality essays, reports and dissertations are available for immediate download. Advance your knowledge, improve your grades and save time by using model papers from Papers4You.com.

Article writing may sound easy. This is especially true if one has mastered the language used. For the use of words together as a group with the objective of having a specific message is among the basics in writing. Along side with this are the clarity of the construction and the accuracy of the spelling. However, a good article writer does not survive on language alone. Success must come with style and precision as well. For beginner article writer, the flow of ideas may be a little too overwhelming. In most cases, the ideas come in large quantities. It becomes hard to understand the writer’s point. In order to facilitate the construction of the writing piece, here are a few pointers: • Remember the Title Keeping in mind the title will make the ideas flow in a more systematic manner. Focus on the title first. Include only the ideas that may seem closely related to your message. For internet marketing, the titles that are used often contain the keywords. If the reader is interested with the essay because the keyword is present in the title, make sure that there are sufficient and related facts in the body of the article. If facts are lacking, the reader will most probably click away from the page. • Limit the idea Incorporating too many ideas in a single article will only end up confusing the reader. The number of ideas to be included can be based on the length of the article. For example, limiting three to five key points in a 500-word article will keep the ideas organized and easier to understand. • Elaborate the points Once the ideas are defined, it’s now time to elaborate them. Always keep in mind that the first reason the reader would go over the article is probably because he wants to learn more about it. This is why it is best to have an eye focused on the details and information that are placed on each point in the article. • Develop coherence Though the ideas are identified, it is still best to develop them in a coherent manner. Do not place the ideas randomly in your article. As much as possible, have a specific flow which will make the article easier to understand. These are just few of the pointers when it comes to article writing. Developing the eye and the style for words and details will make a huge difference in the end. Do not let technicality get in the way as you start your article writer tasks. Think creatively first and when all ideas have been determined, use technicality to polish the article in the end. To your success as an article writer! Do you want to learn more about how to use articles to generate targeted traffic to your website? I have just completed a brand new free guide. Download it free here: ArticlePower.net

As many job seekers are aware, unfortunately, there is no easy trick to effective resume writing. Effective resume writing takes patience, research and attention to detail. Good language skills are also important to ensure proper grammar, sentence structure and spelling to ensure an error free resume. Most job seekers do not have the energy or the patience to sit and write their resume, the most important job document in their job search. When writing their resume, most people usually focus on the information that is important to them; rather that writing about what is important to the potential employer. Job seekers spend a lot of time describing their job responsibilities when writing their resumes, sometimes using jargon and terminology specific to their industries. Unfortunately this approach serves to weaken their ability to convey how their transferrable skills relates to the jobs or careers they are targeting. Write a great resume that Maximizes Your Job Search Success The first step in writing your resume is to conduct a thorough personal skills assessment to identify the core competences that have developed through your working experiences and academic studies. The next step in effective resume writing is to describe those skills using keywords that the employers will understand so no jargon and are relevant to the job you are targeting. To ensure maximum job search success, you must first develop an understanding of how to identify the skills an employer wants. To do that you must review the job description carefully. Most job descriptions are writing with the most important qualifications and job responsibilities are written from most important to least important. Reviewed posted job descriptions starting with the skills listed at the top to identify the skills that are most important to an employer. To view sample job descriptions visit Hire Impact job board to view jobs from all sectors. You can also visit Resume Solutions Writing Centre to review resume writing articles and tips or you can click this link to visit Resume Solutions home page to review our resume writing services.

by Philip Yaffe Part 16 of an occasional series I am a collector of quotations. I have been ever since I learned how to write, I mean professionally, not in primary school. I am particularly fond of what I like to call “pithy prose”. These short quotations can cover an unlimited variety of subjects: love, religion, politics, human nature, etc. What unites them is their ability to say more in one or two sentences than could be expressed in a thousand-word treatise. It’s like being able to pour a liter of liquid into a half-liter bottle. They are superb examples of Mark Twain’s famous dictum, “The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.” In principle, all writers and public speakers are capable of producing pithy prose, but clearly some are better at it than others. Any collection of pithy prose must necessarily be biased in terms of what it includes and excludes. I make no apologies for my selections, only for the hundreds of other meritorious quotations I had to leave out. No one will agree with all these quotations; this was not their intention. You may even find some of them repugnant or outrageous. This was their intention. We seldom learn anything of value from what we already agree with. Only those ideas that grate on our nerves can open our minds. As with oysters, irritation can produce pearls. So if anything you are about to read annoys or shocks you, try to think clearly and dispassionately about what it is saying. You will either be confirmed in your current belief or shaken into re-examining it. Either way, you win! This article is part of an occasional series. In each article, I will be offering more amusing, educating, and exasperating quotations to your judgment. But just to be certain that we agree on what we are talking about, here it is in a nutshell. Pithy Prose: A quotation where at first you may not be quite certain what it means. But when you become certain, you become equally certain that it couldn’t have been said better any other way. In short, big ideas in small packages. If you have a better definition of pithy prose, please contact me. I would love to hear it. Who Is Simone Veil? Simone Veil (born July 13, 1927) is a French lawyer and politician who has served in a number of high offices, including French Minister of Health and President of the European Parliament. She is a survivor of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, where she lost part of her family. She was elected to the prestigious French Academy (Académie française) in November 2008. 1. A hurtful act is the transference to others of the degradation which we bear in ourselves. 2. A mind enclosed in language is in prison. 3. A science which does not bring us nearer to God is worthless. 4. All sins are attempts to fill voids. 5. An atheist may be simply one whose faith and love are concentrated on the impersonal aspects of God. 6. As soon as men know that they can kill without fear of punishment or blame, they kill; or at least they encourage killers with approving smiles. 7. Attachment is the great fabricator of illusions; reality can be attained only by someone who is detached. 8. Culture is an instrument wielded by teachers to manufacture teachers, who, in their turn, will manufacture still more teachers. 9. Difficult as it is really to listen to someone in affliction, it is just as difficult for him to know that compassion is listening to him. 10. Every time that I think of the crucifixion of Christ, I commit the sin of envy. 11. Evil being the root of mystery, pain is the root of knowledge. 12. Evil, when we are in its power, is not felt as evil, but as a necessity, even a duty. 13. Human beings are so made that the ones who do the crushing feel nothing; it is the person crushed who feels what is happening. Unless one has placed oneself on the side of the oppressed, to feel with them, one cannot understand. 14. Humility is attentive patience. 15. I can, therefore I am. 16. I suffer more from the humiliations inflicted by my country than from those inflicted on her. 17. I would suggest that barbarism be considered as a permanent and universal human characteristic that becomes more or less pronounced according to the play of circumstances. 18. Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life. 19. In struggling against anguish, one never produces serenity. The struggle against anguish only produces new forms of anguish. 20. In Switzerland they had brotherly love, five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did they produce? The cuckoo clock! 21. In the Church, considered as a social organism, the mysteries inevitably degenerate into beliefs. 22. In the intellectual order, the virtue of humility is nothing more or less than the power of attention. 23. It is an eternal obligation toward the human being not to let him suffer from hunger when one has a chance of coming to his assistance. 24. It is not the cause for which men took up arms that makes a victory more or less just. It is the order that is established when arms have been laid down. 25. Life does not need to mutilate itself in order to be pure. 26. Most works of art, like most wines, ought to be consumed in the district of their fabrication. 27. Nothing can have as its destination anything other than its origin. The contrary idea, the idea of progress, is poison. 28. The contemporary form of true greatness lies in a civilization founded on the spirituality of work. 29. The danger is not that the soul should doubt whether there is any bread, but that, by a lie, it should persuade itself that it is not hungry. 30. The destruction of the past is perhaps the greatest of all crimes. 31. The future is made of the same stuff as the present. 32. The highest ecstasy is attention at its fullest. 33. The intelligent man who is proud of his intelligence is like the condemned man who is proud of his large cell. 34. The most important part of teaching is to teach what it is to know. 35. The only way into truth is through one’s own annihilation, through dwelling a long time in a state of extreme and total humiliation. 36. The role of intelligence — that part of us which affirms and denies and formulates opinions — is merely to submit. 37. There can be a true grandeur in any degree of submissiveness, because it springs from loyalty to the laws and to an oath, and not from baseness of soul. 38. There is one, and only one, thing in modern society more hideous than crime, namely repressive justice. 39. To be a hero or a heroine, one must give an order to oneself. 40. To set up as a standard of public morality a notion which can be neither defined nor conceived is to open the door to every kind of tyranny. 41. We can only know one thing about God — that He is what we are not. Our wretchedness alone is an image of this. The more we contemplate it, the more we contemplate Him. 42. We must prefer real hell to an imaginary paradise. 43. What a country calls its vital interests are not things that help its people live, but things that help it make war. 44. Whatever debases intelligence degrades the entire human being. 45. When a contradiction is impossible to resolve except by a lie, then we know that it is really a door. Part 1: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Mark Twain Part 2: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Oscar Wilde Part 3: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of People Named “W” Part 4: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Anatole France Part 5: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Ambrose Bierce Part 6: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Friedrich Nietzsche Part 7: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Anon Part 8: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of People Named “H” Part 9: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Johann Goethe Part 10: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Eric Hoffer Part 11: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Blaise Pascal Part 12: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Robert Frost Part 13: Pithy Prose: More Wit & Wisdom of Anon Part 14: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Elbert Hubbard Part 15: Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Friedrich Schiller Philip Yaffe is a former reporter/feature writer with The Wall Street Journal and a marketing communication consultant. He currently teaches a course in good writing and good speaking in Brussels, Belgium. His recently published book In the “I” of the Storm: the Simple Secrets of Writing & Speaking (Almost) like a Professional is available from Story Publishers in Ghent, Belgium (storypublishers.be) and Amazon (amazon.com). For further information, contact: Philip Yaffe Brussels, Belgium Tel: +32 (0)2 660 0405 Email: phil.yaffeyahoo.com,phil.yaffegmail.com