productivity

Here’s What You Should Be Doing Instead Of Setting Goals

/ Stuart Danker / 65 Comments
Goals spread in a journal

Photo: Alexa Williams

We’re halfway through the year already. How are your New Year’s goals doing?

It seems about the right time to check in now, isn’t it? You get to take stock of how you’ve done, and you still have time to re-steer the ship if things haven’t gone according to plan.

If you find that you haven’t even started on goals however, just know that you’re not alone. According to a random study I pulled up (and we know the internet never lies), less than eight percent of people actually meet their New Year’s goals.

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Do You Have What It Takes To Be A Freelance Writer?

/ Stuart Danker / 64 Comments
Man working on laptop

Photo: Austin Distel

Freelance writing is the dream, isn’t it?

If you’re anything like me, you’ve probably fantasised about combining your wordsmithery with the nomad lifestyle. What an image that’d be, occasionally taking your eyes off the mountainous horizon of Costa Rica to reply to a work e-mail, one that’d celebrate your great work and promise your payment before the day’s end.

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Craft Better Stories With These Seven Values

/ Stuart Danker / 43 Comments
Man staring at a bunch of newspapers

Photo: Filip Mishevski

The only qualification I had when I first started writing for a living was an accounting diploma. That, and some six years of hairdressing experience.

So I was surprised to get a call from a local NGO about my mentorship application I had sent in just the day before. Apparently, someone like me—who’d blundered from one writing niche to another—did have something to offer the next generation.

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How To Get An Editor’s Attention

/ Stuart Danker / 28 Comments
Woman on phone in office

Photo: Dane Deaner

I remember reading a travel magazine and browsing the list of editors and writers, wondering how I could secure such a sweet gig. I used to picture these writers as a team of handpicked talents, each so sure of their craft, writers who could fly to Myanmar and find themselves a story behind every temple.

I would later land one such job and learn that things weren’t so mystical behind the scenes. The writers had trouble coming up with story ideas, their work often met the chopping block, and the editorial team didn’t function as smoothly as I had thought it would.

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How I Overcame Procrastination

/ Stuart Danker / 54 Comments
Woman doing sit ups

Photo: Jonathan Borba

Okay, let’s get this out of the way: I stopped procrastinating by turning tasks into habits. 

There, that’s the entire article summed up in one sentence. Now you can close the window if you’re the TLDR type, because you won’t be finding that one magic tip here.

But while I don’t have the magic solution, I think I’ve experimented enough to safely say that we’re all quite capable of rewiring ourselves.

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