Docendo Discimus ( While teaching others we teach ourselves)

I live in a house where all things are too familiar to me that I can hardly notice anything new or unusual, especially after nearly eight years of living there.

But as it’s written in the online course: “You don't have to write a novel, you just need to take notes, observe, and write regularly.”

I totally agree with not writing a novel and not against taking notes, observing things and then writing regularly.

“So,” I say, “if you agree with all, what seems to be the problem, then?
Just, do it!”

It is also recommended “When you walk down the street near you home, try looking at it like you're a visitor and have never seen it before.
What things do you notice that has escaped your attention in the past?”
Walking around again and again:”Do this, don’t do that!”
--------
At that moment I somehow clearly saw why teachers are rarely do what they teach.
Teaching how to do and doing are two things that can’t go together!
Funny as it might sound but only a small amount of great players or masters were really able to raise talented followers. If they create and invest their time in doing, they have no time for teaching.

Sometimes I witnessed the scenes when masters could offer their annoying observes to see what they had been doing and try to imitate or repeat them.
Do you think it worked?
No, it didn’t.
Why?
Simple.

Imagine a painter who paints a picture and next to him stands his disciple who ties to do what his maestro is doing.
First, the painters are sensitive to anyone who looks at their labor from behind their shoulders and, God forbid, makes comments.

What is worse, an observer will inevitably start asking questions, or ask for explanations.
Who will ever answer them?
No way! The master needs involvement, concentration full attention.
Even a slight disturbance will tear a chain of his thoughts.

Okay, another example.
A writer.
Can a writer teach anyone how he does that, unless he interrupts his writing?
Interview? Hard, but possible, a short talk on TV, perhaps, but not teaching regularly.
Teaching is a process that is established according to a schedule of classes, seminars and the rest of learners’ curriculum activities.

A writer lives for writing because he cannot live without doing that.
He can live without food, family and most of other essentials. He cannot live without writing.
What if he is in the middle of the chapter and the sentences (as it is with me now), flow easily and naturally on the screen, and suddenly he realizes that in half an hour he’s got to start seminar at the university?

Great thoughts, as we all know, may well not come again…

" How can I start writing?"

 " How can I start writing?"

George Rusky
November 2005

To start writing it is necessary to start doing it. Period.

What do all people love talking, thinking and, of course, writing about?
What is the number ONE subject for everyone?
What is in the centre of attention of every one all the time?
Yes, correct!
She and He.
Every one loves occupy her time with thinking, speaking and writing about HERSELF.

Let's start.

Step One.

Switch off all the phones you have, everything producing any noises, send anyone from your apartment, find a place, where you can concentrate.

Before you start working with the questions, realize the importance of the next stages of the whole process from the first to the last point.

Here's what you do.

You:
-think deeply about each question
-answer the questions honestly before your self
-try to find the essence, the real gist of the notions, without pretending to be better than you are
-formulate your thoughts in your mind
-put your thoughts on the paper, transforming them into the sentences as they appear in your heart. No Grammar/No Spelling.
-critically observe what you have written
-read loudly. Hear how it sounds.
-correct your text, asking yourself if you have been sincere
-finally, edit your text.

That's the way how you start writing. This IS my 'magic' formula.

Please, begin now. Write the answers to the questions below. No clichés, no banalities, no verses, only what you think with your own words.

1.I was brought into this world for which purpose?
-
-
-

2.What was I given that differs me from others?
-
-
-

3.From all that I have described at 2, how much/how many/to what extend I have already used or using or intend to use?
-
-
-

End of Step One.

That's not easy. I understand.

And it will not be much easier.

Writing is about GIVING, investing, devoting, serving.

Reading is about getting, but

Writing is about GIVING.

That's why people don't write messages/e-mails/let alone, letters.
Not because they are lazy. No!

They love getting. That's why.

And the last. If you feel like sharing with me what you will write, please do it. Some thoughts may be too private. You decide.

Anyway, I need your thoughts.

The deadline-...day, the ...th of ...ember. Why the dead line?
You will know in my next message.

As soon as you finish with the first step, we'll move forward.

Happy writing!

George

George, I’ve got a question: “Reading English Books For Learning English. Your opinion?”

George Rusky
November 2005

George, I’ve got a question:
“Reading English Books For Learning English. Your opinion?”

In spite of a predicted answer “Yes, it certainly does help and will help…,”
I would rather say: ”It depends....”

Consider the following:

For a school learner where teachers follow the program, where a book for out-off-class reading is an element of the program,
it is good.
In a primary school it’s a book of adapted fairy tales or any other book for children.
In high or higher schools different levels of book for out-of-class reading are listed.
I’m a supporter of this reading.

Now, a university graduate with firm habits of learning various disciplines starts learning a foreign language, transforms her practice onto foreign language learning.
She buys a lot of books, follows a number of theories, among which her own occupies the main position, goes to various courses and changes the teachers, and so on and so forth…

But nothing works as quickly as she wants.

Then she thinks:
”I should learn a bigger vocabulary, I will read a book!”

In a book store she purchases a book or she finds appropriate book in a library, and full of good intentions starts reading carefully finding in a dictionary each unknown word.
After one or two pages she quits, simply stops reading.
A number of new words is overwhelming, writing the words in native language above the words in the text, doesn’t help much…

In fact, this kind of reading may give some information about the text, say for a purpose of general comprehension of the text.

But, I’m strongly against this kind of reading.

George, I've got a question: ”How do you choose a book for reading? Do you use any special methods for reading?”

October 2005

Let’s start with the cover of a book.

I believe, it reflects the author’s attitude towards his work.
Even today when the modern books are enveloped in covers that can hardly survive two or three readers,
there are still some works of the writers who believe that their novels will be read by more than one generation of booklovers.

On the contrary, the look of a tattered book will please the next library shelves’ explorer who may think:”Oh, that one’s been read by lots of folks.
I should read it too”
The first impression may be deceptive!

Here are some suggestions for selecting the reading you look for.

1. Before you come to a library ( not a book-store):

a) Carefully identify the area of your interest. What exactly you want to read.

b) Know your purpose of reading: pleasure, research, etc.

c) Have a list of the authors who wrote or write about your subject. What aspects of the problem they are dealt with in their works. Spend time for the research.

d) Get a general orientation of the authors and/or their works you think may suit your interest.

e) Choose a day and hours when there are fewer visitors in the library.

f) Prepare some change for Xerox-copying.

2. In the library:

a) Find a librarian who works in the section where you suppose to find the materials you need.

b) In details explain to her what you need. Show her the list you have prepared (see 1c above)

c) Let her know how important these materials are for you.

d) Get all you are advised plus anything you may find on the shelves.

e) Sit at a quiet place, get ready to work. (Don’t forget to switch off a mobile phone :-)

3. How to work with the book/books you have on a library table.

a) Place a book in front of you. Feel it, touch it, guess what the book is about.

b) Read the title, think if the title matches your subject.

c) Open it and read all the information on the first page esp. where and when it was published/republished.

d) Read the back cover of the book where there’s information about the writer and the resume.

e) Go through the dedications and acknowledgements: you will know how the writer himself values his labor. (The same and deeper information you may get from a foreword) Try not to skip it.

f) Read the contents and make a general impression of the manual.

4. How to read the book.

Reading is a very serious process. Depending on the type of literature, you must vary the approach and attitude to the whole process of reading.

Some general observations before we get to the a, b, c points.

A book, any book, is an act of an individual or group men’s creative activity that may be compared to, say, delivering a baby, building a house, tailoring a suit or anything else that a human being may produce.It’s an act of passion, hard labor, doubts, long chain of successes and failures, physical and mental efforts, sleepless nights, nerves breakdowns and so on and so forth.

It’s, after all, an act of a high responsibility of the writer before the readers of today and the readers of tomorrow.
Nearly all authors rewrite their sentences, paragraphs, even whole chapters several times, before their final versions are ready to meet the first readers.

After these comments, you may look at a book with more respect.

So, back to the reading.

a) Start with what directly related to your topic: go to the topic that is the closest to your theme.

b) Always read with a pensile in your hand and tick the phrases, thoughts, ideas that attract your attention, shed the light on the subject from another POV and so on.

c) On the sheet of paper fix accurately your thoughts that come into your head while you are reading.

d) Pay a special attention to the author’s ideas you may use in your work. Put them in brackets and write down a page on your sheet with notes: you will easily find them later.

e) Compare your own thoughts with the writer’s. Place exclamation/question marks next to the writer’s text. You’ll come back to them later.

George, I've got a question: "Nobody wants to hear my opinion. Why?"

I guess, it may happen.

Here are some of my observations, why.

First.
People just don’t need anybody’s opinion.
Second.
They’ve already formed their own outlook.
Third.
They are afraid to hear an opinion, different from theirs.
Fourth.
They don’t wish to change the opinion they already have.
Fifth.
They had spent years to create their ‘small world’, it may be destroyed by another, even a better built theory. That scares them.
Sixth.
They aren’t able to defend their way of seeing the things and can be easily suppressed by a more skillful orator.
Seventh.
They like living with the thought (illusion?) that their ideas are correct.

Some Observations About the Thoughts that Come to Us.

Observations about the ideas and thoughts visiting us.
(Some Thoughts from the Time of My Forced Break.)

George Rusky
September 2005

When a thought comes to us we have a choice: to accept it for further contemplation or to reject.
One should know, however, that all the thoughts are sent to us with a specific purpose, we are in charge for taking them as the ones worth our attention or the ones to neglect.

Consider also that the thought left without notice may never come again and, therefore lost forever.

Hundreds of times we’ve heard about lost wonderful opportunities in different areas of our lives that could have changed our lives if only we were clever enough to take them seriously.

Does it sound familiar?

The same with the thoughts: they come according to the caprice of the Sender who doesn’t care weather we are tuned to receive these thoughts or not.

Should we then be surprised that all philosophers, art folks, writers and the like, daily and nightly, wherever they are and whatever they do have something to write on?

Recommendations:

-Keep you ‘antenna’ ready for any thoughts you may receive. Carefully listen to the signal from the ‘transmitter’.
-Always, even at night, have something to write on and to write with. You never know when the thoughts may come.
-While making notes, try to fix the thought as fully as possible: your frame of mind at the moment the thought had come, the place, the time, other details.
-Never divide the thoughts, when they come, onto important or time-wasting. Trust and respect the Sender.
-During the day when you are involved in other things, try to concentrate on what you do, block the access to any thoughts unrelated directly to what you are busy with at the moment.
-If the thought visits you when you are busy with something else, come back to it later when you can spend more/enough time for the thoughts.

A Draft for the Website on Copywriting

A Draft for the Website on Copywriting

George Rusky
February 2005

"All great endeavors would inevitably sink into oblivion, if no one opened our eyes on these wonders to satisfy human desires and needs."
G.Rusky

This Site is about Copywriting. Copywriting as the trade, the science, the advertising, the marketing, the selling, the writing, the education, the earning money…

But most of all, this site is about the people in copywriting, a special breed of folks who take us into the world of unknown, telling us about new products entering the market today, or, as the Dictionary puts it: “A Copywriter is a person who writes or prepares a copy (especially for advertising material) for publication.”

Let’s think for a moment. Is that the main role of copywriter to inform her readers or listeners of a new vacuum cleaner or a better medication?

Do we agree with some career advisers who claim that: “…to become a copywriter, it’s enough, just to be able to write.?

I believe, a copywriter, first of all, is a person of high moral responsibility for the society she lives in. Consider the following, please.

Only a copywriter is able to persuade her audience to start using a new washing powder or to stay in the N. hotel. True?

Imagine: you read a leaflet which sends you to a hotel where there’s no hot water and yet, in his copy the author describes the whole range of pleasantries there?

Or, you’re invited to a new store, where, according to a letter found in your mailbox, something will be given away. You rush there, and soon learn this is just not true!

O.K. The last example.
A website designer promotes his website building program thru the most eye-catching sales copy. You click the link, then another, then another and finally, you leave his website with no intention of ever again clicking his link. Sounds familiar?

Isn’t a copywriter the one ho must be ready to declare, that she ‘stands to death’ for every word she has written, fully realizing that her readers may become buyers, and then users of the product she has once written highly about?

Being aware of that, I have worked out a Copywriter’s Oath, something similar to a well-known Hippocratic Oath, still traditionally taken by doctors at their graduation,
and invite you to read carefully the following and think if you are ready to put your name under it.


The Copywriter’s Oath.

I make the Lord my witness, that I will fulfill according to my ability and judgment this oath and this covenant:
To hold him who has taught me this art as equal to my parents and to live my life in partnership with him, and to regard as equal to my brothers who have signed the covenant and have taken an oath according to the copywriting law, and to teach them this art—if they desire to learn it.

I will apply my knowledge and writing skills for the benefit of the readers according to my ability and judgment; I will keep them from harm and injustice.

I will neither give the wrong information about any subject of my writing if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect.

I will guard my reputation and my art.

I will not use my pen for writing anything harmful for my audience, even if I am offered all the treasures of the world, but will withdraw in favor of such men as are engaged in this work.

Whatever house I may visit, I will come for the benefit of the clients, remaining free of all intentional injustice, of all mischief and in particular of charging extra reward for the writing done.

What I may see or hear in the course of the writing or even outside of the writing in regard to the interests of the client, which on no account one must spread abroad, I will keep to myself, holding such things shameful to be spoken about.

If I fulfill this oath and do not violate it, may it be granted to me to enjoy life and art, being honored with fame among all men for all time to come; if I transgress it and swear falsely, may the opposite of all this be my lot.

Where To Make Friends
Part Two


How To Make Friends On The Internet?

Yesterday I forwarded the problem of making friends for middle-aged folks who had found themselves living in a new country, new city, in short, far from their birth nest.
Having traveled through a number of places of evident candidates for finding potential friends, I have peacefully arrived at the Internet.

Now, after having spent five years on the Internet, I may say that all Internet visitors are roughly divided onto two categories: those who show their faces names and addresses and the bigger part –who don’t do either of above mentioned.

They even don’t have names, just codes.

Anyway, to make friends at forums and newsgroups is real, provided you follow the rules. Some of them are:
1. Joint a discussion group, a forum or a newsletter.

2. In most of them you’ll be asked to tell about yourself. Do it.

3. Read carefully your fellow – writers’ mails.

4. Discover the writers working in the same or similar areas and contact them.

5. For a considerate reader, the character of their reply will display a lot. If you get a polite respond, bordering with the answer of auto responder, most probably this person just tries to be polite.

6. Important is also, if your new correspondent uses her Christian name or a nickname, weather communicates openly or strives to avoid naming herself.

7. Try to guess on the tone of a message weather the author is a man or a woman. The English tongue is sexless, so use your intuition, chiefly if you want to meet with a man-writer. A scarce, though.

8. Develop your relations very unhurriedly, stay away from bombarding your new acquaintance with more than one mail at a time.

9. Tell about yourself only when asked. Show your likes and dislikes cautiously.

10. You’ll be asked to criticize your friend’s stories. DON’T. Forestall this kind invitation saying that critiques are something you have never been good at.

11. You will also be asked personal questions. Answer shortly, avoid details. Respect you new friend time and patience.

12. Try to know something about your correspondent. We all love being asked about us. Ask only about something directly connected to the subject of her writings or trade.

13. Analyze the development of contacts, experiment with new subjects of your on-line friend’s possible interests. If you feel, that your relations do not have a tendency for progress, it might be wise to eliminate them and see how they will go.

14. The word of warning, if I may. Never use one text of message for a bunch of folks. You will most probably lose them all!

Well, I could have continued with the list of dos and don’ts, but try to find your way in it.

Instead of the Resume.
From my personal experience, I must confess that the Internet has been quite merciful to me, sending interesting, full of positive emotions people.
With them we exchange regularly e-mails, usual letters with photos and souvenirs.
One German guy with his family even came to me in Prague last year.

Keeping and developing good relations on the Internet demands your time, the most valuable we all have.
Invest yourself in your invisible Internet friendship and your life will always be full of joy and gladness.

Where To Make Friends

Where To Make Friends
Part One

By George Rusky
December 2004

Making friends today is getting more difficult than ever before.
I’ve asked tens of my clients how and especially when they had made friends. From all my respondents about 70 % found their classmates at a basic school
About 11% agreed and added high schoolmates and university mates.
The next making friend institution was work, clubs, common trips, recreation activities, and the like.

This quick and amateurish survey won’t hold any serious critic, but even done un-professionally, it gives a general overview of making friends.
Indeed, as we come back to the days of our childhood, we can agree, that the whole process of forming our buddies, even though based on likeness, was not at all complex.
Try to remember your first day at school. Wasn’t that the same?

I went to school at times when learners had to share a desk. I, for one, wanted to sit next to a boy and all I did, just asked him to join me at a desk. That simple.
Even then, we boys of six had their childish preferences.
After a while, some of the initial making friend’s steps had been remained and strengthened, while others went through some changes.

The end of the process of forming and developing close relations can be considered the graduation from the school. I believe that this period is the one that really makes friendship strong and long- living.
I’ve even met a couple of former classmates who then got married.

My respondents agreed that university studies didn’t bring a lot of chances to make new friends.
Why?
Most probably, there’s not much to draw students together.
Lectures? Hardly so. Big auditorium, voluntarily attendance, individual tests.
Students have few chances to meet and become friends. Agree?

Work. Nice place to make friends. Right?
Well, yes and no. First of all, who with?
The one who occupies the same position as you? Possible.
Don’t forget, however, that in this competitive world everyone has an chance for a promotion, which might destroy good terms.
Your superior? Good, if only she doesn’t thing you want to ‘dig a hole for her’
and overtake her position.
Your subordinate? If you don’t yourself think of losing your chair.
Someone from another company, operating on the market in the same industry?
Forget it! You’ll be immediately calculated as a potential commercial secrets deliverer.

So, what?
If someone had to move to explore new territories, and left all his ‘old guard’ at home, is she doomed?
Almost so. Yet, there’s a slight ray of hope.
Consider these places where it is still possible to gain some acquaintances with the hope that they may become your friends.

1. Clubs.
This is where birds of the feather rub shoulders. Membership gives you, sort of guarantee that you may meet the one you’ve been looking for.

2. Education centers for learning new skills: language courses, writing courses, mountain climbing training, playing games and other activities where folks of similar interests go.

3. Church is another great place to meet nice people. In many congregations church-goers dine together, organize trips, visit exhibitions, discuss various life problems.

4. Dating agencies. I, personally, dislike this way of meeting new people and have no experience of that kind, but it looks these businesses are getting quite popular.

5. If you live abroad, cafés, restaurants run by your compatriots where English is spoken. Places full of potential, with lots of openings to meet someone.

6. Our list of making friends ‘establishments’ will definitely not be complete, if we pay no attention to the Internet, this ‘Monster’ of knowing all.

But, this is a topic of our next talk. Let’s call it:”How To Make Friends On The Internet?”
So, till tomorrow!
Oh, I‘ve nearly forgotten. Think of your experience with making friends on the Internet, prepare notes, and tomorrow, while reading my article, just tick the same or similar points and add mine, if you like them, O.K.?