After 20 days of copying Jane Austen’s work, here’s what I learned:

• Well-crafted characters are essential to good writing.
• Just using big words isn’t enough.
• It takes time to develop your writing style.
• Don’t force your ideas. Let them flow.
• Good sarcasm is well-masked.
• If it doesn’t make someone do a double-take, it’s probably not worth writing.
• A good story has a deeper philosophical truth behind it.
• Don’t force your ideas, but make the reader question his own.
• Challenge yourself with your writing.

I don’t like the term “work-life balance, because I feel like it is overused.

But that’s what I have been exploring for the last month. My situation is different from most, because I am not only working remotely, but I am working around a large family.

It’s wonderful, really. I don’t mind it at all. But it takes being intentional about my work space and my time.

I have the ability to take short breaks to clean, help with the kids’ school, or hang out laundry. It gives me the perfect activity to fit in between computer work.

I admit, it’s hard to sit for a whole work day when I am used to an active lifestyle. But I’m learning what works.

Here’s to the next month of balance.

Work copied: Pride and Prejudice Chapter 19

Some visions change the world. Others fade away with the life of the individual who birthed them.
What makes the difference?
The visions that make the most impact are the ones that other people can grasp. If no one understands the idea, it will not transfer into the world.

But some ideas resonate with everyone around them. To grow, a vision has to catch fire in the soul of someone who can carry it on.

Some people call it social capital. I say it’s vision casting. Surround yourself with people who are willing to have a part in putting your vision for the world into action, even if just in part.

Then, when you die, your vision will live beyond you.

What is vision? I define it as the ability to see something that others can’t.
In a deeper sense, to have vision is to have a goal for the future that is so deep in your core that it can’t be separated from who you are.

Recently I watched The Greatest Showman and it struck me that this story, in its purest sense, is about a man who had vision for the future. He built on his vision throughout his life, realized more of what it meant as time went on, made a couple mistakes, but came back in the end to his original goal.

Vision will have costs. You will give up all you have sometimes for what you believe is right, but a man with vision cannot be stopped.

In retrospect, and I quote Solomon: “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” -Proverbs 29:18

Don’t be afraid of the dreams that are in the core of your being. Search your soul and find the deep purpose for your life. You’ll be surprised how fulfilling it is, even if you give your entire life for your vision.

Work Copied: Pride and Prejudice Chapter 15

This video was a long time coming. I can’t let anything unfinished, however, so I completed the deliverable for Month 4 Week 3 as soon as I got into the rhythm of my apprenticeship.

In the lecture series Commerce and Culture, Paul Cantor delivers his thoughts on the market and art.

There’s a misconception in many people’s minds regarding past artists. We imagine dying, poor individuals that feverishly worked on their pieces, only to be recognized years after passing away.

While this is the case in some art, it is a highly misconceived notion regarding art in general. Mostly, the market dictated what artists created, and had an intense role in culture.

Here’s my short video: