There’s this new commercial featuring a group of actors pretending to suffer from COPD. Fake coughs. Dark lighting. Isolated lifestyle. The voiceover drones about the difficulty of living with this disease. No freedom. No movement. No friends. And then - like magic! - they take the drug, light floods in through the windows, friends and family invite them to BBQs, and everyone is kicking the soccer ball around.
Todd, over the past 20 years of speaking at writers' conferences and teaching ways to improve writing, I've come across several "writers" who never read a book on writing, never attended a conference.
But the worst example ever was an elderly woman who didn't attend my 6-week conference. She just showed up with 3 pages in hand for a critique.
Every sentence was the same.
"Come back," she said angrily.
"Why?" he asked coldly.
"You forgot your tie," she told him hastily.
I showed her how to improve, knowing she wouldn't listen. She didn't.
Todd, over the past 20 years of speaking at writers' conferences and teaching ways to improve writing, I've come across several "writers" who never read a book on writing, never attended a conference.
But the worst example ever was an elderly woman who didn't attend my 6-week conference. She just showed up with 3 pages in hand for a critique.
Every sentence was the same.
"Come back," she said angrily.
"Why?" he asked coldly.
"You forgot your tie," she told him hastily.
I showed her how to improve, knowing she wouldn't listen. She didn't.
She left...angrily.