Six years ago, I self-diagnosed myself with Reverse Culture Shock, or RCS, an emotional displacement syndrome. I know this because, after 7 years of doing reverse immigration to the States in 2007, I stumbled upon the symptoms of Reverse Culture Shock on an archived U.S. State Department's home page. Suddenly, I felt recognized and validated [...]
50695222 - hand with marker writing: practice leads to perfection Imagine this: 1. You're going through a nasty career transition. You're trying to figure out your next steps. Should you study? Open a business? Learn a new trade or skill? 2. Then there's the dream.... of finally opening your own business or learning that [...]
I'm way beyond excited to share the official news! I'm working on the second book in the Accidental Soldier series. If all goes well, it will be published sometime in 2017. (that doesn't seem a long time away in the grand publishing world of things!) The second book focuses on my displacement as an immigrant [...]
When my writing coach and editor Brooke Warner recently posted about the return of the investment in marketing and publicity, I started getting heart palpitations. It reminded me of a conversation I had with myself. Here's what did me in: "To make money in book publishing, you are best off looking at your first book [...]
Yesterday, I attended a wonderful writing conference at Chatham University here in Pittsburgh called Connections and Conversations. When I attended the conference last year, I was a writer trying to figure out the gist of my memoir Accidental Soldier. Now that my memoir is scheduled to be published in June 2016, I am now officially, [...]
Learning other entrepreneur's secret to their success can be very inspiring. This past week, I interview Terina J. Hicks, president and chief baking officer of CobblersWorld.com to learn more about how she had the courage to pursue her dreams despite a job loss. I wanted to know what she does now to stay successful. Here's [...]
Many of my memoir writing students start the writing process with a very high level of enthusiasm. It's wonderful to see. Somewhere along the line however, this energy wanes and comes to a halt. They prepare scaffolding activities and all exercises all very dutifully and then refrain from submitting the writing pieces. Once might say [...]
One of the hardest things I had to deal with while serving in the Israel Defense Forces was learning to keep the faith and staying upbeat in touch times. I hardly spent enough time in Israel as a kid to feel a comfortable connection with the country, and serving in the military albeit by accident, [...]