I Want To Have a Storytelling Event Within a Park System – Now What? Finding the Correct Site Convincing the Park (Whether National, State or Local) WHO to contact Examine your desire closely as to why you want to begin an event. Try and connect with a reason for the Park (you are thinking about as a site) to have this event. Example: Haunting in the Hills Storytelling Festival was begun ...

Creativity as a Treasure Hunt It’s not enough to be creative, you have to be creative at something. Creativity is a doing, rather than a being. The doing comes from discovering goals, and achieving them. I say discovering goals, rather than setting goals, because we’re good at setting goals — New Year’s resolutions spring to mind — but then forgetting all about them. Usually we forget about the...

Creativity And The Jack Of All Trades You may be familiar with the saying, “Jack of all trades and master of none.” Well, I say, “Hooey.” That’s right. In fact, let me say it again. “Hooey.” It is perfectly possible to be a multipassionate person and do several things well. Many, even. I’m a writer, a mother, a photographer, a friend, an entrepreneur. Sometimes not all at the same time, but I d...

Creating Vivid Characters Most people listen to stories – in the newspaper, or in anecdotes, novels, films, etc. – to hear about people. What did they do, and why? How did they react to this or that odd situation? How are they different from me, and how are we the same? We watch Indiana Jones battling his fear of snakes, Jane Austen’s Emma match-making for her friends, Robin Hood winning an arche...

Creating a Successful Book Marketing Plan Let’s start at the very beginning. Before you begin haphazardly trying to sell your book a million different ways, it’s wise to invest some time and thought into cultivating a plan. This free book marketing tool will help get your started.So what do you need to do first? Research. Here are a few of the distinctions you need to make: Clearly identify ...

Crafting Personal Vision in Telling Folktales My interest in folktales began with an enthusiasm for the folksongs I sang in my early teens. As a budding guitarist of fourteen, I learned to sing along with folksong records and taught myself the words to old tunes from folksong books. I never learned to read music formally, but there was enough music in the air due to the folksong revival of the si...

Corporate Storytelling™ Fires Up Employees–and the Bottom Line Symbols, drama, stories, vision and love–these are the stuff of effective leadership, much more so than formal processes or structures….When you involve people, they feel ownership and perform up to 1,000% better.– Tom Peters, A Passion for Excellence Is your entire company burning with excitement about your vision? Is everyone in yo...

Copyrights Revisited I used to make this joke in my Advanced English Writing classes. I’d write on the board, “There are no new ideas” and attribute it to Plato, and then say in my lecture that he probably stole that quote. Are we allowed to do plagiarism humor in China? They forgot to comment on that in my contract. Anyway, dig this. Michael LaRocca, age 17, is crafting his award-winning THE BA...

Copyright Versus the “Fair Use” Doctrine Many people are confused about copyriting their work, when in reality they shouldn’t be. They shouldn’t be because your work is copyrighted the MOMENT you’ve“created” it! That story you wrote for your grandson — its copyrighted!The letter you just sent to Aunt Carol — it’s copyrighted!That email you just sent to Joe Bingham — it’s copyrighted! That’s rig...