The Digital Catalog

So you want to write but don’t know where to start? The journey to becoming a published author is a bumpy ride with lots of ups and downs along the way.  As a new writer learning the ropes you will inevitably make some mistakes. That’s okay, but here’s a list of common mistakes (in no particular order) that will help you avoid them. 1. A Weak Introduction First impressions are everything. Often, writers will start with a long description of the setting, or a mundane event like waking up from a dream or talking to themselves in a mirror. Not only are these clichés, but we don’t learn anything about the story or the character.   Readers will keep reading when you make them care about a character and their motivations.  Who are they and what do they want? That’s why the first paragraph – no, the first sentence – is important to hook your readers right away.  For more tips on writing introductions, see here. 2. An excess of Backstory  Some history is a great idea to present your personalit

Billionaire entrepreneur Warren Rustand believes it takes the average person until the age of 45 to figure out what they want to do with their life. Then, according to Warren, most people won’t grow the guts to live their why until after they’ve had their first heart attack. Whether you agree with Warren’s thoughts or not, it’s hard to argue with the idea that figuring out what you want to do with your life is a massive question, and it’s not an easy one to answer.But the good news is if you can identify the path you want to take before you’ve started your second mountain, and you’ve actually begun to do something about it before your doctor makes her way into your holiday card rotation, you’re ahead of the game. I was once informed that we each need two sorts of instructors in our lives: ones who dive in with us to assist us with discovering our direction and other people who guide us to amplify our direction. As a mentor, I make a decent piece of my living as the principal sort of ed

Tips to Flawlessly Manage Your Instagram Followers It’s nice to see those Instagram alerts saying your business has a new follower. While the feeling might not get old, the thought of knowing how to easily manage your Instagram followers might be daunting. Don’t let that love for a new follower grow stale. As a business, you want to continually see new customers interacting and engaging with your Instagram account. Whether it’s an awesome visual theme, great videos, or like-worthy images, something drove the user to your account. Now your job is to effectively manage and engage with your new audience to keep them coming back for more content.  Whether you’re already up and running or just getting started, follow these nine tips to manage Instagram followers effectively: 1. Only Post Your Best Instagram Content You don’t need to post every picture or video you take on Instagram. In order to build a reputation as a brand people want to follow, try to only post your best content. So if yo

Eliminating extra information from emails can help you reclaim a large portion of your workday, increase your productivity, and improve your chances of getting a reply. The average worker spends 28 percent of their day reading and answering email, according to a 2012 study by New York City-based management consulting firm McKinsey and Company. Keeping emails brief and to the point can help you reclaim some of this time. "Proper email is a balance between politeness and succinctness," says successful serial entrepreneur Guy Kawasaki, author of APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur (Nononina Press, 2013). "Less than five sentences is often abrupt and rude, more than five sentences wastes time," he says. As managing director of the venture capital firm Garage Technology Ventures, Kawasaki's inbox is often full, but the emails he sends are almost always five sentences or less. He shares four guidelines for how entrepreneurs can get to the point. 1. Your email should

Electronically sharing documents between users may be necessary for office workflow, but searching for the correct version of a file can drain productivity and cause frustration. According to a 2012 study by Harris Interactive, a Rochester, N.Y.-based market research firm, 83 percent of employees say they waste time everyday tracking, sharing, or finding the correct version of a file. "Documents are like rumors -- once they're shared, you don't know what they'll look like when they come back," says Christopher Seiwald, CEO of Perforce, an Alameda, Calif.-based productivity software company. Working from the wrong version of a file can lead to missed business opportunities, damaged reputations, and poor impressions on colleagues and customers. 1. Adopt a smart naming scheme Don't label documents "new" or "final," says Seiwald, as they are never really new or final for long."You'll end up with file names like: 'sales_presentation

Bill Gates has offered a lot of guidance regarding how to carry on with a fruitful life or lead an effective business. The high bar that the Microsoft fellow benefactor sets day by day isn't difficult to reach.  It will be that as it may require creating and pursuing some new routines. Clearing your own street to progress implies dreaming less and accomplishing a greater amount of what Gates himself has done while turning into the world's fourth-most extravagant individual.  Here are four things that plainly isolated the practitioners from the visionaries:  1. Doers cultivate their curiosity. In 2019, Gates spoke to students, parents, and alumni at his high school alma mater in Seattle. One question posed to Gates is especially noteworthy for the next working generation: “What are the skills today’s students need to know to thrive in the world of 2030 and 2040?” Gates answered: “For the curious learner, these are the best of times because your ability to constantly refresh your

Fitness Myths Busted What you don't know about fitness can hurt you—and interfere with your fitness goals. For a safer workout with awesome results, forget everything you think you know about exercise and read on to get your fitness facts straight." Some myths are just harmless half-truths, but many others can actually be harmful," says professional triathlete and personal coach Eric Harr, author of The Portable Personal Trainer. "They can cause frustration in working out and sometimes even lead to injury,"  Keep in mind these following things for a safer happier workout. 1. I only need to do cardio to burn fat FALSE! Weight loss is achieved by having a caloric deficit each day and whilst endurance-type training is helpful to burn calories, it isn’t the only way. Resistance training helps shed unwanted body fat by elevating your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) which is the number of calories you require to maintain normal bodily function at rest. An increased BMR mea

It’s often said that laughter is the best medicine – and there’s hard science behind the expression. When we laugh, endorphins – known as our happy hormones – are released into the bloodstream, lifting our mood in a similar way to the kind of feelings we might experience after exercise.  In 1995, intrigued by the research on the benefits of laughter, Mumbai-based medic Dr. Madan Kataria created his own Laughter Club. He gathered his small laughter therapy group together in one of the city’s public parks to exchange jokes and funny stories. Passers-by were intrigued by all the laughter and soon the group grew from five to 50 people.  Eventually, they ran out of stories to tell, but Kataria theorized that the act of laughing alone might be enough for patients to reap the benefits. He started encouraging the group to act out the laughing sounds until the laughter became real and contagious. This developed into a technique called laughter yoga, which is now practiced in groups all over the

Five reasons to play GTA Vice City today GTA III had 100% completion, but there was no reward for doing so. Hence, it was largely pointless. By comparison, GTA Vice City has 100% completion as well, but it also offers an incentive to do so. This type of gameplay doesn't appeal to most casual players, but it does make the game seem more interesting to hardcore fans. If they bother to 100% GTA Vice City, they will unlock: Maximum health of 200 Maximum armor of 200 Refreshing ammunition Can recruit a bodyguard at the Vercetti Estate for $2000 (up to three times) Makes vehicles twice as durable when Tommy Vercetti is driving them The Frankie Outfit 4) It's still a GTA game If a person loves the classic GTA formula, chances are, they'll love GTA Vice City too. It follows all of the core principles of what makes the GTA franchise so great, and it adds its own extra flavor to make it more unique. However, this extra oomph isn't cumbersome. Instead, it makes GTA Vice City a uni