Successful Blog

What William Tully Said … About Great Writers and Great Bloggers

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A community isn’t built or befriended,
it’s connected by offering and accepting.
Community is affinity, identity, and kinship
that make room for ideas, thoughts, and solutions.
Wherever a community gathers, we aspire and inspire each other intentionally . . . And our words shine with authenticity.

Who Influences the Way that You Write?

We study writing. We can read the work of great writers we admire. We ask for the advice and help of those who’ve mastered some skill, but in the end, all of that advice and input is influence not a handbook. Every blogger and writer finds his or her voice without much help. We practice until we discover which rules work for us. A great writer, a great blogger, gets to be one by doing to it.

Here’s what William said . . .

1. why are ‘great writers’ typically associated with fictional stories?
2. is writing not a form of art left to the eye of the beholder?

I’m told that Hemingway is a great writer… What about Orson Scott Card, Bill Bryson, or even the one writing this blog or this comment?

I agree that we (as writers) should be reading great writers, yet I completely disagree at the same time. For example, I have a very unique style of writing… The style is simply a reflection of how I speak and teach. Same pauses, inflections, and YELLING… sometimes.. Yet the last thing on my list is to sit down and read some Shakespeare, simply because the style is absolutely nothing I can relate to.

Douglas Adams (Last Chance To See) is perhaps the single book with a writing style that I can COMPLETELY relate to and respect. Now, is he a great writer? Certain circles, he is a respected author. This book? Relatively unknown. Bill Bryson is another author, who in my opinion, is absolutely brilliant!

I guess I’m not entirely sold on reading great writers helps with great writing. I think having a grasp of your chosen language is key, and just simply reading is key. I would sooner read something by a great THINKER than a great writer…

William Tully from a comment on April 5, 2007

A successful and outstanding blogger said that.
–ME “Liz” Strauss

William Tully Shows Us How in Canadian Living Magazine

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One of the Best on Blog Basics

Successful and Outstanding Blogger, William Tully, is featured today in Canadian LIving Magazine. His article on How-to Blog is one of the finest written on the web. It’s informative, entertaining, and best, it makes (what can be) confusing topics clear in a minimum of words. I’ve not seen a better short segment on comments and trackbacks written for nonbloggers. The whole article shows his expertise. Click the logo to go there.

If you’re trying to explain blogging to someone, after you share your metaphor. This article is a great next step. It has just the right amount of information and links to give a helpful start without overwhelming the reader.

YEA, Bill!

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
The Metaphor Project: What’s Your Blogging Metaphor?

One Question, One Answer

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You Might Recall

Tully said on the phone last night that people do things and then sort of hold their breath waiting to see whether Liz would let this one go through . . . Oh no!!! I did it again!

You might recall that last week, it was Tuesday. Tully posted a meme that was astoundingly clever and stunningly well-thought. He had found a way to get bloggers to ask relevant questions in such a way that the question would be answered by a blogger who knew the answer, and the answer would be written on a blog where such an answer belonged. That’s no small feat if you think about it.

Without planning, some guy might ask a question, the blogger who answers would write the answer on his or her blog. How likely is it that the blog will be about the same topic as the question? Not very likely considering how much bloggers like to help.

Ah, but Tully figured how, in the construction of his meme to avoid questions being asked of a blogger who had a blog where an answer didn’t belong. Voila!

I only had one problem. I needed the directions called out. So I sent a question back to Tully in answer to his question. I know, you’re not supposed to answer a question with a question. Sorry. It was called the One Question, One Question blog. Tully answered with the One Question, One Answer – How To

And now that I know how to . . .

I move the One Question, One Answer meme further along.

My Question, My Answer

The question that Tully passed me is a good question, I think. You’ll understand why I say “I think,” and not “I know” when you read my answer, well sort of.

Tully’s question:

Liz, as a full-time/professional blogger, a great deal of your day is spent reading other blogs (direct or via RSS feed), commenting, and blogging – you no doubt have a system that you have been developing for some time now that works well for you.

What ADVICE would you give to relatively new bloggers who are feeling swamped yet only have limited time to read, comment, and blog?

My answer:

Wow! There’s a hidden assumption in that question. It’s that the bulk of my day is spent reading other blogs. I don’t know for sure that I can say that is true, It’s certainly not true every day. Some days the bulk of my day is spent talking to bloggers via voice. Hmmmmm.

Where do we get this notion that we have to read every good blog? I can’t read every great book ever written. I can’t listen to every wonderful piece of music ever composed. I can’t watch every play, see every sunrise, enjoy every movie, attend every concert, taste every wonderful wine, or meet every person I might want to meet before my time is up. I’m only one person and to try to do more than one person can do is silly at best and leaning toward downright disastrous if I tried.

Writing is my work. I build my day around that. I pick the times during the day that I write most effectively and that’s when I write. I keep a list of a limited number of bloggers that I find inspire me. I read them in between the articles that I write. On Thursdays and Fridays, I read all of the posts of the week from many bloggers — it’s more efficient than switching from blog to blog every day. I often read late at night when all of the bloggers have long since gone to sleep.

I only comment when an important thought comes to me or when I have something I want to communicate. Sometimes what I might have commented turns into a post that I link back.

There you go, Tully. Not the answer that you’d expect, but then you expected that by now, I suppose. 🙂

My turn to pass on a question and the How to rules to the next blogger.

Roger von Oech You are Tagged

Here’s what you do.
Read Tully’s how to rules for the One Question, One Answer Meme and then if they work for you link to them when you answer this question for me.

How do you feel when you are in a place where you cannot be creative? What do you do to keep your spirit going at times like that?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Related
One Question, One Question, 1/2 Meme . . . Overly Started, But Not Begun

One Question, One Question, 1/2 Meme . . . Overly Started, But Not Begun

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A Great Question Deserves

. . . a question?

Once upon a time . . . well, actually it was yesterday . . . Tully designed and suggested a new sort of meme. . . .

This meme, called, “One Question, One Answer,” is brilliant. . .

. . . It’s meant to get the right questions to the right people and the right answers on the right blogs. . . .

It covers every contingency, except for one — Tully chose to start the meme,

. . . with me.

You Should Have Known, Tully

You see, I’m the sort who . . . likes to have fun with these things.

I always change memes from what they were to something else.

Tully, I don’t mean to be a pain. . . though I don’t mind worrying and wheezling though a loophole . . . for some fun.

I’m a global thinker. Details overwhelm me. They overtake me with feeling that I might overlook something that I should be overseeing, and that makes me overly careful about things I shouldn’t be fretting over at all or ever. I probably should just get over it.

You see?

That’s why I have to ask my question.

Could you go over that again?

Um . . . er. . . What I mean to say is,

. . . Could you, would you, write the simple how-to steps

so I know exactly what to do?

I’ll link to them as the how-to do this meme.

I’ll answer question, pass the meme on, and be smiling, just as I am now.

After all, I am the nice one. 🙂

–ME “Liz” Strauss

About that Road . . .

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The Roads Not Traveled

It started with William Tully’s post, New meme? (likely not), in which he considers the “5 Goals He Never Took Seriously.” William gently tapped Robert Hruzek on the shoulder, asking what his answer to the same question would be. Robert wrote a post called The Roads Not Traveled in which he describes goals that “didn’t make the cut.” At the end of his post, Robert passes the question to David Armano, Matthew Stibbe, and me. It appears those two are like the boys in the neighborhood where I grew up — they’re waiting for me to go first. So here I go.

A Road Through a Mountain Forest

As soon as I saw Robert’s post I was reminded of a silly psychological test that asks for four descriptions. (You might want to read that test, to find out about your road and my road, before you read on. Go ahead, I’ll wait here.)

I bring up that test and my road, because my road has been such good one. It has wound and turned and let me try to so many things. It has been a windy road indeed. I’ve been a teacher since I was 10, a wholesale shirt sales rep, a writer, editor, and publisher, and a corporate strategist.

Yeah, my road is a windy one. My friend, Peg says she’s never seen me walk in a straight line. So thinking up goals that I never followed is nigh on to impossible. I’ve been thinking for days about Robert’s challenge and here’s what I found.

Five Goals I Never, Ever Wanted to Pursue

It seems as if I tried most things that I thought I might want to be part of my life. But there were some side roads that I was happy to walk right by. Those roads might be just as worthy an answer, at least I hope so, because here they are.

  1. I never, ever wanted to be a doctor, nurse, dentist, or any other sort of healthcare professional. Even when I was short and still in grade school, I didn’t want to give people injections or have to make them hurt to help them get better.
  2. I never, ever wanted to be a skydiver, a moutain climber, bungee jumper, or a wingwalker. Falling from high places wasn’t my idea of a good time.
  3. I never, ever wanted to be a astronaut, live on a spaceship, or be an astronomer. I like to keep my relationship with the universe on a romantic and magical plane of wonder.
  4. I never, ever wanted to be a roadie, a groupie, or a raging fan. I’m not good a racing after, lugging stuff, or in general being part of groups that follow blindly. I get bored too easily.
  5. I never, ever wanted to be a clueless, dorky, invisible teenager, but I managed to be one anyway. Go figure.

Life has so much to offer and I’ve always found that each new step is one that perfectly followed the step that was before it. I never spent too much time thinking about where I had to get, I always knew I’d be getting somewhere outstanding, if I followed what I do well and what I love.

There was the day I realized that I was too old to be a major league baseball player . . . but that was so long ago I can’t remember how that felt.

They say turnabout is fair play. I’m not sure this is what they meant. What are the things on your list of never, ever wanted to do?

–ME “Lia” Strauss

Related
The Road: A Simple 4 Part Psycholocial Survey of Attitudes

William Tully Is a B.A.D. Blogger!

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Blogger A Day Call: Hello is Bill there?

BAD Blogger Button

It was Chicago calling Toronto when I got Bill Tully on the line and any conversation between those two cities almost always requires a discussion of the weather — even when one of the participants is woefully lame at small talk — that would be me. It went fine. It went fine because weather talk isn’t small talk when you’re discussing winter in Chicago and Toronto, and we both knew that.

Almost immediately I was telling Bill, about my affection for Toronto, about how it reminds me of Chicago. He mentioned what he knew of Chicago. And next I was off on a story high up, in an elegant Toronto restaurant. I described the head waiter dressed in a Prince Charming uniform who delivered handrolled chocolate truffles on a porcelian plate that was set on red velvet pillow. I explained how I reached up to take the plate and was told that one truffle was what I was being offered.

How could I not love Toronto? I had my first genuine chocolate truffle there.

Our conversation turned from chocolate to writing and then to why we write. We spent some time discussing and dissecting that condition folks call “Writer’s Block.” I said that since I write for a living, I can’t give credence to it or i might go broke. Bill said that blogging was his plan to take him out of his comfort zone to write for everyone. He talked of a plan to write his blog into a book. We talked about the best ways of doing that. His plan is solid and well-structured. His premise is compelling — it’s about how people interact with the world.

Among the ideas that Bill is writing about is the fact that the Golden Rule really doesn’t work. He pointed out that we really don’t want someone with a bad self-concept to treat us as they might want to be treated. I told him I thought so too. He’s a philospher. Mr. Tully is. He said, “We draw on what we know and get to know other people that way.”

Our conversation went deep and wide. It followed no particular straight or narrow pathway. It had it’s own logic to it — sort of like a blogging thought highway. I keep thinking of the guy in Toronto who is writing about logical emotions. It makes sense if you read it, if you get to know him.

The tagline on Bill’s blog says, It isn’t about what I have — it’s about where I’m going. That’s a glimpse into how the man thinks.

B.A.D. Blogger Quote

People by the millions trying to be part of a community . . . It gives people a chance where they can actively participate. Somehow, somewhere, at some point . . . — William Tully

Stop by William’s Blog, Logical Emotions and say hi!

Thanks, William, you B.A.D. Blogger!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Want to be a B.A.D. Blogger see the. . . a B.A.D. Blogger? page in the sidebar.