Emulate to create, not to duplicate just to imitate

After skimming through tattoo, health, and car magazines at Barns & Noble, I stumbled upon an article about an exotic car. The car brought me to the page, but the article that talked about the car kept me at that page. The lead had nothing to do with the specs of the car, but describes the anticipation of the owner’s next drive in the car as they walk away from it. The nut graph then talks about the manufacturer, Lamborghini, and their reputation when it comes to their customer base and car enthusiasts that admire their cars. Coming from someone that’s interested in cars, the lead painted a great picture of how I would feel after I close the door of my own Lamborghini Aventador. I would think of another errand that I need to run or make a random road trip to the next city over. 

I would like to utilize this technique, but something that’s more universal because this lead was catered towards a review/article about a car. Somewhere along the lines of after an event/situation a person has a positive connotation with it and wanting more of it. I don’t know if that makes sense, but if I were talking about paying for a parent’s lunch (The first time I bought my mom lunch was In-N-Out), I would start the lead with the sentimental feeling of paying for the person’s lunch who’s raised me as we walk away from the cash register. From there I would talk about anything related to the situation.

Article taken from EVO magazine

Photo taken from gdefon.com

A little too much wax in the ear, but having heart in my work

Within the 12-step process to good writing, the one I would have difficulty in the most would be Step 3: Listen. No, it’s not that I don’t clean my ears (THAT’S NASTY), but it’s because I tend to take notes of the details that don’t really matter and let the details that matter most adrift into space, in addition to getting sidetracked easily. I could probably improve this weakness by trying reiterating what they said to see if I understood what they said. If they said no, then I obviously wasn't paying attention to the right details, but if they respond with a “yes” or even “sort of” then I know I’m progressing with my listening skills.

The step I find easiest is Step 11: Care. I learned in a previous English class that “If it’s painful to write, it’s going to be painful to read.” Whether it’s writing a topic that I'm interested in or something that I’m not too fond/lack knowledge of, I have my ways to make it something fun and interesting so that I’ll be glad that I wrote the story instead of being glad that I’m through with it.

When life hands you lemons, put them on your face!

Choosing just one of the six feature categories to talk about was a struggle. I’m sort of a knowledge “mutt” since I’m interested in a variety of topics, but after stressful flipping multiple coins and name-pickings out of a hat, I've decided to talk about a hybrid mix of the “food” and “health” categories since the ideas do overlap each other (I hope I don’t get marked down for this from my professor). These specific ideas that I chose to talk about are things that I already do because I don’t feel it’s ethical if I were to write stories or articles that give advice, yet I don’t take the advice myself or if I do the complete opposite.

The first idea would be about the benefits of using lemons on our faces: decreasing the amount of pimples and blackheads, brightening of the skin, and other positive effects with lemon juice by itself or being combined with other vitamin-rich foods. There is a lot of information and positive feedback about lemons being used for these treatments, giving credibility to this story, as well as my own personal experience of sleeping with a lemony-scent on my face at night. The downside for this story is that since there are multiple resources and stories that already back up this idea it would be hard to talk about it in a unique angle, as well as not having to pertain to those who have that “nice, smooth, silky skin” naturally. Also, it might not appeal to people because they’re just not interested in this.

The next idea isn't necessarily food, but we do consume it, and it’s the benefits of drinking water. It might sound obvious, but there are a lot more benefits that come with drinking water than we think there are such as weight loss, helping the joints, helps productivity and performance at work and school just to name a few. The whole “tap vs. filtered water” is probably the biggest con on this topic. Other than that and that it might be difficult to talk about in a unique angle since there is a lot of research about it and again, the topic might not be appealing to people.