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Recommended Summer Reads To Pick Up Now

I don’t know about you, but I have not had much down time to do a lot of reading.

But summer is coming and I’m looking forward to reclining on a chaise lounge with all of my gardening efforts around me and reading (or rereading) the following books.

The Moon Sisters by Therese Walsh LINK

The Theory of Opposites by Alison Winn Scotch LINK

Love Life by Rob Lowe LINK

Stories I Only Tell My Friends by Rob Lowe LINK

Let’s Just Say It Wasn’t Pretty by Diane Keaton LINK

View From A Broad by Bette Midler (with color images) LINK

Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers by Anne Lamott LINK

Stitches: A Handbook on Meaning, Hope & Repair by Anne Lamott LINK

BBXX: Baby Blues Decades 1 & 2 by Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott LINK

Reading and relaxing refill our creative wells and refuel our minds.

What are you looking forward to reading this summer? Join me in lounging and reading.

Christina Katz writes year-round but takes extra down time for fun and family during July and December. She is a hard-working writer most of the time but she also promotes life balance and creative renewal. You can work with her January – June and August – November. Check out her classes, dream teams, and writing & platform challenges.

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1. Put most of your energy into becoming a better writer.

2. Put the next most amount of energy into getting comfortable selling your work.

3. Once you get comfortable selling your work, start getting used to selling yourself.

4. Build a body of work over time that you can be proud of and display it all with pride.

5. When you are ready to take your career public, invest in professional quality headshots.

6. Avoid seeking short-cuts because they will only undermine your confidence in the long-run. Slow and steady wins the race.

7. Associate with the most-professional people possible. Avoid drains, negative nellies, and piggy-backers.

8. Grow into your career. As you begin to excel at things, make sure others know it.

9. Always be aiming for targets you know you can hit.

10. Always be aiming for targets just past your last greatest success.

11. Keep hitting all the targets in the middle too.

12. Don’t look for others to appreciate your work if you don’t appreciate it yourself.

13. Make sure what you end up doing every day is what you enjoy doing most.

I am a veteran journalist, author and coach with over a decade and a half of experience and a wealth of techniques to share. I am focused on making the world a saner, more expressive place. I help folks become more creative for personal enjoyment, professional development and transformational growth. Whether you are a professional creative or hope to become one some day, I can help you embrace your personal strengths, explore your creative possibilities, and evolve incrementally into your most inspiring self. If you are ready to achieve creative consistency in your life and career, email me about monthly coaching calls. To learn more about increasing your creative confidence, please check out my online school. Stay tuned for ways to save money by becoming a Beta User for my next new course by subscribing to The Prosperous Creative. And don’t forget to get these blog posts delivered to your inbox, so you never miss a post. If you appreciate my work—school, products, blog and social media posts—you are welcome to make a contribution of any size at any time. Thank you for your support!

 

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Top Seven Gifts For Moms From Christina Katz

The Art Of Making Time For Yourself, A Collection Of Advice For Moms By Christina KatzYou deserve any one of these gifts moms. Not just any day of the year, but every day of the year!

Creative Knowing, 50 Self-reflection Questions For Women

Written expressly for busy women, this work-booklet is meant to be fun and expansive journey, like a mini-vacation. Learn more.

The Art of Making Time for Yourself, A Collection Of Advice For Moms

If you are struggling to juggle all of your responsibilities and identities as a mom, this collection of helpful inspiration will help you factor yourself back into the happy family equation. Learn more.

Writer Mama, How To Raise A Writing Career Alongside Your Kids

If you want to get started writing for publication, let writer mama Christina Katz help. If she and countless other moms can do it, so can you! Learn more.

Write For Regional Parenting Publications For Fun & Profit, A Beginner’s Guide

Readers who follow the advice in this e-book will find themselves successfully writing and submitting articles to regional parenting publication editors in a professional manner. Learn more.

The Writer’s Workout, 366 Tips, Tasks & Techniques From Your Writing Career Coach

The Writer’s Workout gives you substantial suggestions every day to help you build a robust, unique writing career. Learn more.

Writing Challenges

May includes Freelance Writing Challenges, Platform Bingo, and 21 Moments

Freelance Writing Challenges

Platform Bingo

21 Moments

A Writing Class

May includes Writing & Publishing The Short Stuff, Discover Your Specialty & Launch Your Platform, and 60 Ways To Flex Your Writing & Prosper In Your Niche

WPSS

DYS-LYP

60 Ways

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The Art Of Making Time For Yourself, A Collection Of Advice For Moms By Christina KatzHello, moms of the world and those who love them!

I am happy to announce that I have finished the Alpha version of The Art Of Making Time For Yourself, A Collection Of Advice For Moms.

Everyone who purchased a Beta version of the e-book over the last year has received the updated Alpha version and an extra copy of the book in PDF to share with a friend.

The reason I gave them all an extra book is because I am doing a Buy-One, Get-One offer all week until midnight on Mother’s Day.

So if you purchase a PDF copy of The Art Of Making Time For Yourself for yourself this week, you will get another copy delivered to you to share with a friend, absolutely free!

It was fourteen years ago that I first tackled this topic for Bluesuitmom.com. Then four years later,  I appeared on Good Morning America to discuss the article with Diane Sawyer. And I have been dying to write a book on the topic ever since!

But the book just wouldn’t come together. Until now…

I launched the Beta version last year, thinking I was finally ready to go all the way with the book, but it just wasn’t quite there yet. And I am not stupid. I could tell. And after all of these years of creating things, I know better than to just push through something that does not want to happen.

So I stepped away and worked on other things. You guys know me, I’m always working on other things. And then I was delighted this spring, when I started to realize that it might be time to take another whack at it.

Once I had this idea, I could not resist the feeling of, “Yes. I can do this now!”

And so I did it. And it was pretty much effortless. I mean it was still a lot of work, of course. There is no such thing as a book that isn’t a lot of work and juggling a million little details.

But this time the book just fell into place. All the old work fit with all the new work, and I had even started working on ideas I had no idea were for the book and then, voila, they just popped right in like that’s where them were meant to go all along.

Maybe I am a little slow, but I’ll tell you what. This creativity stuff is cool! And clearly this book wanted to get finished.

So The Art Of Making Time For Yourself is finally finished. And it feels really good!

And thanks to all the folks who participated in the development of the book in any way.

In fact, I am so happy that I just want to give the book away.

So I had to kind of reign myself in on that one. I was like, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, you can’t just give the book away after all that work!”

And then I thought of the BOGO idea. And I thought, “Well, that’s just perfect because I want moms to share this book with other moms, and buy-one, get-one, just makes it easier and more fun.

So, if you want to help me launch this book, I would love to sell you not just one, but two copies, all for the price of one.

To sweeten the deal, I lowered the price from $9.99 to $7.99. This just feels like the right price, so I’m going to go with it.

Hope you can play along and get a copy for yourself and another copy for a busy mom friend or family member! You are welcome to participate, but no pressure, of course.

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May Day! Important Announcements From Christina Katz

Well, here it is May Day, and instead of rallying everyone to dance around a pole, I have a few announcements to share. Thanks for tuning in. This will only take a second.

June 2014 will be your last chance to take The 21 Moments Writing Challenge!

Already? Yes, it’s true! I’m retiring the 21 Moments Writing Challenge after the June session to make room to debut more new challenges in the fall. Fact is, I can only juggle so many challenges at once. Thanks for understanding and please sign up now for any challenges in June you don’t want to miss! Learn More Here

Sunday, May 4th is the last day to apply for The Writer Mama Scholarship!

Last call! I’ve extended the deadline one final time to make sure everyone gets a chance to apply. After six and a half years, I am finally retiring this scholarship for my Writing & Publishing The Short Stuff class. The class will continue, of course, and you can learn all about it here. But this is it for the scholarship. To apply for the last schoarship, click here.

I have retired The Writer Mama Every Day In May Book Giveaway!

Three cheers for mom writers! I have so enjoyed connecting with mom authors and promoting their books over the years. But it’s time for me to use the month of May for other pursuits. Thank you to all of those folks who made the book giveaway so special all of these years. Special thanks to our generous authors (view them here and here) and our enthusiastic participants. I wish you all the best and I hope we can stay in touch!

But don’t worry, I’m not done working with mom writers. No chance of that happening any time soon! In fact, I have big news coming up. Please stay tuned by subscribing to my e-zine, The Prosperous Writer, and/or subscribing to this blog’s feed.

Look forward to staying connected to you and helping you grow your writing career!

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Why Write? Because It Feels Good!

The other day, I read a poem that landed in my inbox from The Writer’s Almanac and just had to write a poem of my own.

This made me sorry that I did not try to write a poem every day during poetry month in April.

I love the sensation of writing just for the sake of writing. I love forgetting about the rules or who, if anyone, is ever going to read it.

I always enjoy just starting with an image or a sensation and then just going for it with words.

Few things in life are as freeing and as inspiring as writing, although it has taken me years of practice to feel this way.

Feeling the freedom and the joy of writing just for the sake of writing is a practice I hope to pass on to my readers and students. One of the most effective ways I have found to do pass it on is through my daily writing and platform prompts.

As far as swapping platform prompts for writing prompts, as I do with my Platform Bingo Challenge, sure, it’s a different muscle. But so what? As I’ve said before, platform is not divorced from our creativity. And when we start treating it as though it’s disconnected from us, that’s when the performance anxiety and self-consciousness begin.

So just work steadily on your writing and your platform.

Try not to be tense about either one.

And try to keep a certain amount of detachment. Practicing and writing for publication are not the same things, but one does lead to the other and vice-versa.

So, I say, go ahead and let yourself have fun writing. Let yourself have fun platform-building.

Writers write. That’s how we get better.

And platform builder’s build. That’s how we build a business with our words.

Don’t let anyone take the inherent pleasure of writing and platform building away from you with all of their pressuring and posturing.

Just blow that off and get back to having fun writing and platform building. You will accomplish your goals more joyfully if you can always remember two rules.

Always be writing.

Always enjoy the process.

When life gets complex, writing can become your refuge.

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I know you are used to me having offerings for writers, especially women and mom writers.

But today I have something that you can share with all your women friends, assuming they have a desire to connect with their creative selves.

I am proud to announce the launch of Creative Knowing, 50 Self-reflection Questions For Women.

I’m calling this PDF download a “work-booklet,” meaning it’s a short workbook full of questions you can respond to in whatever ways you like.

This work-booklet can be used by individuals or groups and the low price tag of $1.99 makes it affordable for anyone to purchase and use.

This short, yet powerful workbook of questions can help you connect quickly and happily with your most creative, expressive self.

I often feel like we are still living in a world that does not value individual potential. And yet my work with women over the past decade plus has shown me again and again that creative women have so much to offer themselves, their families, and the world.

Why not do yourself a favor and spend just five minutes with yourself today? I have created this inexpensive, 50+ page work-booklet to help you quickly connect with and enjoy some time with your most creative self.

I feel like the world needs more creative women, and not just so we can execute the visions conceived by others, but so we can connect with and carry out our own dreams and visions in the world, as an antidote to everything that is not working, and is falling apart, and is no longer sustainable in our world.

I know it freaks some folks out to think that women have the power to change the world in dramatic ways. So just for today, how about starting with simply connecting with your most creative self…and then see what happens from there?

You have absolutely nothing to lose, and more than likely, you will become positively hooked on the process. At least I hope you will.

Thank you, as always for your support. Now how about taking five minutes to connect with your most creative self?

Learn more about Creative Knowing here

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Are you a mom, and you would love to take the Writing and Publishing the Short Stuff Class that starts Wednesday, May 14th, but you would not otherwise be able to afford it?

Then you qualify for The Writer Mama Scholarship!

And please note, this is the last time I will be offering a full scholarship to this class. After six and half years of allowing participants to take the class for free, only one more mama will be this lucky!

The application process for the next available scholarship for Writing & Publishing The Short Stuff Class begins today! I am accepting applications until Sunday, May 4th at midnight.

One full scholarship is granted each time the class is held, five times per year. Please read this post completely and double-check your application before submitting. The recipient will be announced on Monday, May 5th in this blog.

Please feel free to spread the word about the scholarship, even if you do not intend to apply. This is a full scholarship. The recipient commits to participating fully in the class and delivering all six assignments on time.

Please do not apply if you cannot make the commitment to participate in the class, which involves reading the weekly workbook, completing your assignments, and learning from your classmates work. (To learn about what you will get out of the class, please read the full class description.)

No additional time or special coaching is offered with the scholarship. It’s up to the scholarship recipient to make the most of the class.

Please note that this is a scholarship, not a giveaway. This scholarship is only for moms and is offered by class instructor, Christina Katz (that’s me).

One scholarship is available per WPSS class. The scholarship is not transferable if you fail to complete the class. The scholarship is also not transferable in the case of illness, family emergencies, a move, etc. If you have already paid for the class, you do not qualify for the scholarship. If you have already taken the class, you also do not qualify.

What is written in your application is private and your personal information will never be shared or sold beyond announcing the name of the recipient. The only way to qualify is to apply each time. No one else will view your application.

The application questions are below. Copy and paste them into a Microsoft Word document (to take the class you must be able to create and read Microsoft Word documents—no exceptions). Attach your application as a Word doc to your e-mail. Please answer each question concisely and completely.

Send your application to: “christina at christinakatz dot com” – this is the only email address for the scholarship. If you do not receive the scholarship, save your application for future scholarships and re-apply. Always add in your most current publication credits, since they are important. Put “WPSS Scholarship Application” in the subject line.

The scholarship recipient will be chosen based on the following criteria: demonstrated effort, need, and enthusiasm. The most important consideration is demonstrated past effort, so please don’t skimp on details of your past writing efforts. Applications accepted from U.S. residents only at this time.

To register for the class as a non-scholarship candidate, please visit the registration page. Space in the class is limited.

Please Note: The Writer Mama Scholarship is only for moms who legitimately cannot afford class tuition for whatever reason. So if you work at home, earn money, receive money, or your spouse or partner earns enough money for you to afford the class, please expect to regular pay price. My classes are kept affordable, specifically so moms can take them!

Here’s the application:

[Copy and paste the following application form into a Word doc, then simply fill it in:]

Name

Address

Email

Phone

Have you read the book, Writer Mama? How about my other books?

How long have you been reading my blog(s)?

What version of Microsoft Word software are you currently using?

Have you applied for The Writer Mama Scholarship before?

Write a short response to each of the following questions:

Please write one short paragraph about why you want to take the class, Writing and Publishing the Short Stuff.

Please list by publication name and date only, any publication credits you’ve accumulated thus far. Briefly list any other experience you think is relevant.

Please briefly state why you are unable to afford the tuition for the class at this time.

[End application.]

Thanks for applying for The Writer Mama Scholarship!

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Nothing inspires me more than working with writers and watching their potential turning into accomplishments. I have been teaching writers since 2001 and I never tire of it.

On any given day, good things happen for my students and for myself.

One writer receives a touching message from a reader about the positive impact of something she wrote.

Another writer breaks into a national parenting publication she has long admired.

I recover a late payment from a publication because I don’t believe in not getting paid for my work, which is why I always get paid.

A Dream Team member finds her writing and publication rhythm after only her second season of participation.

Another writer is reminded that she is allowed to enjoy writing and love her career even if it is work.

Another writer discovers that trying a new essay form can unlock the perfect telling for a story that needed to be told.

A freelancer finds that my article challenge gives her ample ideas for new articles she can write and submit.

An novelist gets her chapters drafted using my 21 Moments challenge.

An emerging author updates her platform and crafts a more compelling bio after taking my Platform Bingo challenge.

Here at my online writing and publishing studio, there are always classes, dream teams, and month-long challenges going on year-round to suit suit writers of every stripe.

I have offerings coming up for May and June to fit every budget and level of experience. Here’s how you can work with me:

Classes Begin In The Middle Of May: Register Now To Participate

Writing & Publishing The Short Stuff: A Six-week Class

  • Starts Wednesday, May 14

60 Ways To Flex Your Content & Prosper In Your Niche: A Six-week Class

  • Starts Thursday, May 15

Discover Your Specialty & Launch Your Platform: A Six-week Class

  • Starts Wednesday, May 14

Challenges Begin May 1st at 12:05 am: Register Now To Participate

The Christina Katz Essay Writing Challenge

The Christina Katz Article Writing Challenge

The Christina Katz Grammar & Punctuation Challenge

The 21 Moments Writing Challenges, Rounds 1 – 5

Platform Bingo, Levels 1 – 3

The only times of year you won’t find teaching and training is during the months of July and December.

I don’t take those months off per se, but I use those times each year to regroup and plan.

If I didn’t, I am not sure I would be able to keep up with myself. And I take a little time off too, of course.

I work hard so my students can get the kinds of results they want, and I work steadily on my own career at the same time.

If I have learned anything over the past 13 years, it’s that success breeds success. If you want to be a solid success, learn from those who have solid success.

Hope to work with you in May!

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