I used to talk people out of their dreams. They would tell me about their dreams of doing jiu-jitsu full time, and I would reply with downers like “Who’s gonna pay your cancer bills?”
Quite hypocritical, seeing how I once flew to Thailand to stay and train in a Muay Thai gym for a month. Other random goals include joining a regional MMA competition alone and quitting my cushy job to a write a novel.
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The Men’s Folio Malaysia and Singapore teams
So… remember this post when I shat on the editor’s role? Well, this happened. Here’s the TLDR if you want to save the click—I am now the managing editor of Men’s Folio Malaysia.
Since it’s been three months since taking on the new role, I can’t think of a better time to discuss the flip side of the coin. Because today, we’re going to explore all the good things about being an editor for a lifestyle magazine.
Continue readingEver since I joined the publishing industry, I aspired to be an editor. I just needed the writing skills, and I had a decent serving of that.
I pictured myself catching typos and lecturing writers on how they could improve their style. I’d be perched at my desk, approving or rejecting pitches like I was swiping on Tinder. Every once in a while, I’d throw out words like ‘pagination’ or ‘masthead’.
Turns out, I had totally misjudged that role. As a deputy editor for a lifestyle magazine, I get a first-hand look at what my boss does, and I’m quickly learning the many reasons why I might not want to be an editor, ever.
The first reason? I’m bad at dealing with people. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Here are some of the other ‘interesting’ things an editor needs to do.
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Photo: Jukan Tateisi
You’re reading this, so that means you’re most likely on WordPress. And if that’s the case, then you’re probably spending too much time reading other people’s posts instead of writing your own.
Wow, you might think, this guy has such an astute observation!
Elementary, my dear Watson. Most people are already born procrastinators, what more those who choose words as their form of expression.
Because if you can describe procrastination in five different ways, then you’re five times more likely to doing said procrastinating. Boom, quick maths.
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Photo: Josh Rakower
First off, use clickbait titles. Because if nothing else works, at least you’ll have gotten one extra click to show off to your prospective clients.
But perhaps I’m jumping the gun here. Do forgive me.
So you wanna be a writer wannabe. Not just a writer, no. You actually want to live the writer’s life without actually putting in the work. I totally get it. After all, I was a wannabe for most of my writing life, because for most of my career, my days only consisted of business articles and fluff pieces.
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Your Friendly Malaysian Writer 