A professional editor can do wonders for a piece of writing – but they aren’t miracle workers. While all editors have different areas of specialism and their skill sets vary, most editors worth their salt should be able to help you with the following six tasks. If on the other hand you’re hoping for help with items on the second list, you might have to ... keep reading
Five minutes with: Danielle Dzioba
Danielle Dzioba is a Communications Studies student at Vancouver’s Capilano University and recently joined the LifeTree Media team as our intern extraordinaire. We love her infectious enthusiasm, warm smile and can-do attitude. Watch for her on our Facebook page, Twitter account, and here on the LifeTree Media blog.
Hi Danielle, great to have you on
board! What’s the first thing we need to know about you?
I’m fascinated with culture and the community that shapes it. I believe everyone has a story that we can learn from, and am constantly on my own jou... keep reading
Big dreams begin with baby steps
When your dreams are huge (as the best dreams are), it can be hard to clearly see the path you need to follow to reach them.
They might seem far away and out of reach, like a mountain peak from which you are separated by a deep and twisting valley. You know exactly where you are going and you know you need to navigate through the valley in order to get there.
It’s easy to feel on top of our plans when the sky is clear and we are enjoying a birds eye view o... keep reading
Traditional vs. self-publishing – and an alternative to both
Last week, my favourite book industry blogger Jane Friedman posted an update to her popular infographic breaking down the major routes to publishing. It is shared with permission here, but you might also want to check out her original post at janefriedman.com.
She names those four routes as traditional publishing, fully assisted ... keep reading
Help for anxious kids: How to contain your child’s ‘worry time’
The following post by LifeTree Media author Michele Kambolis first appeared at michelekambolis.com.
Anxious children can spend an inordinate amount of time worrying – time that could be better used for optimistic and resilient thinking. Contain upsetting thoughts by dedicating a specific time of day to worry; it’ll go a long way towards interrupting its harmful effects.
Step 1keep reading
Mastering moment to moment mindfulness
The great thing about doing yoga at home is that it’s always available. If you can get away from dogs and kids and clear a strip on the floor, you can do yoga, even in your underwear.
But the downside to doing solo yoga, of course, is the absence of a teacher to lead you through the poses and – critically – to remind you to breathe.
I was doing yoga at home the other day when I realized that when I’m practicing alone, I have a tendency to cut myself short every time I transition from one pose to another. And I realized that tendency carries over into my... keep reading
How to get media coverage for your non-fiction book
So you’ve written a marvellous book. Maybe you’ve self-published it; maybe you’ve got a publisher. Either way, the efforts that you as its author make to promote it are critical to its success.
When I was Arts and Life editor at the Vancouver Sun newspaper, I received countless pitches for coverage from book publicists. Most, I ignored. Some leapt out immediately as must-do stories, usually because of the popularity of the author, or the timeliness or local relevance of the subject... keep reading
Three post-turkey yoga poses to aid digestion
It’s Thanksgiving Day in Canada, and for many of us, that means turkey – lots of it, accompanied by lots of other stuff, and followed by lots of something else. There’s a reason that side dish is called stuffing.
When you emerge from your turkey coma, give thanks that it’s ten whole weeks before you have to eat that meal again, then try these cleansing pro-digestion yoga poses, courtesy of Dan Lindsay at Vancouver’s Semperviva Yoga.
You don’t want to do these on a full ... keep reading
Best places to write
If you’re having difficulty applying your bum to the chair and sitting still long enough to get the words flowing, the problem might lie in the location of that chair.
Some places lend themselves especially well to productive writing sessions (and no, we’re not talking about Cuba or Paris.) Many writers find that they work better in certain settings than in others. Are you a creature of habit? Easily distracted? Whatever your temperament, there’s an ideal writing place for you, and it might not be the one you’re using now.
Go beyond the kitchen table an... keep reading
Six ways to crank up your “happystat”
My father used to say that everyone has their own “happystat”; kind of a mood-regulating thermostat that returns us to our habitual baseline level of contentment regardless of what’s happening around us.
... keep reading