Monday Miscellany for December 28, 2009

Hello:
For all of you who celebrate the Christmas, Hanukkah and/or Kwanzaa holidays, I hope they were filled with special people and magical moments.  May the coming year be your best one ever.
Here’s to your writing success.
Mary Anne
Wrangler Rugged Wear® Adventures Essay Contest
In 150 to 200 words, tell a story about your favorite outdoor adventure and how clothing played a role in its success.  Win three pairs of Wrangler jeans or pants, and three Wrangler shirts. No entry fee.  Limit: entry per person per calendar year.  http://bit.ly/8ODHeR
 
The New Letters Literary Awards
The $1,500 New Letters Prize for Poetry for the best 2010 group of three to six poems, the $1,500 Dorothy Churchill Cappon Prize for the Essay for the 2010 best essay, and the $1,500 Alexander Patterson Cappon Prize for Fiction for the best 2010 short story.   $15 fee for first entry; $10 for each additional entry.  Deadline:  May 18, 2010. http://bit.ly/8KaxAc
Campaign for Free Expression Essay Contest Essay Writing Contest
Students enrolled in an accredited college or university are invited to submit an essay about “The Importance of Free Expression and Its Limits (If Any).”  Each entry must address the question of what limits national governments or recognized international bodies, such as the United Nations, may justifiably place on free expression.  Deadline: January 31. First prize is $2,000.  No entry fee.  http://bit.ly/72rdZW

Best Busiess Continuity Writing Competition
Continuity Central and its sister publication, the Business Continuity Journal, have jointly launched a competition which aims to discover the best new business continuity articles and papers.
Authors of any status, whether established business continuity professionals, academics, students, or journalists, are invited to submit articles and papers written within the last twelve months. These will be judged by David Honour, editor of both Continuity Central and the Business Continuity Journal, and by a judging committee drawn from the Business Continuity Journal’s editorial review panel. The winning entry will be rewarded with a £500 ($US 800) prize and the best entries will be published in either Continuity Central or the Business Continuity Journal, as appropriate.  http://bit.ly/5dP897
 
Transitions Abroad Narrative Writing Contest
TransitionsAbroad.com is looking for pieces which reflect a respect for what you have learned from native peoples, their cultures, and their unique relationship to the land—and how you have put your new awareness and empathy into action.  $500 top prize. Deadline: January 2, 2010.  No entry fee. http://bit.ly/6Z0ute

Monday Miscellany for December 15, 2009

I know, it’s Tuesday, not Monday.  I was out Christmas shopping much of the day yesterday and wasn’t able to send this out on time.  In any event, here come this week’s writing contests.  

Southern California Genealogical Society 10^th Annual Writing Contest 

Category 1

Family- or local-history articles of 1,000-2,000 words in length, published or unpublished.

If previously published, entries must be accompanied by the written permission of the publisher allowing article to be reprinted by SCGS.

Awards:
1st Place, $200
2nd Place, $100
3rd Place, $50
Honorable Mentions, certificate
Finalists, certificate

Category 2

Family or local history articles of 1,000 words or fewer, published or unpublished.

If previously published, entries must be accompanied by the written permission of the publisher allowing article to be reprinted by SCGS.

Awards:
1st Place, $100
2nd Place, $50
3rd Place, $25
Honorable Mentions, certificate
Finalists, certificate

Deadline: December 31, 2009 No entry fee. 

http://www.scgsgenealogy.com/2009contest-cat.htm 

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Calling all Canadian students—How Poems Work Writing Contest

Arc is searching for the brightest and most insightful poet minds in the country (Canada). Send us your “How Poems Work” essays and win a subscription to Arc, publication online, and mentorship with our Poet-in-Residence.

• Choose a Canadian Poem about which you would like to write a How Poems Work essay
• Write a maximum 500-word essay deconstructing a published poem by a Canadian poet, including publication information regarding the poem (in case we need to seek reprint permission later)
• In order to be eligible for consideration submissions cannot be published or be under consideration for publication.
• THERE IS NO ENTRY FEE REQUIRED FOR THIS CONTEST

Deadline is February 1, 2010

http://www.arcpoetry.ca/mag/contests/how_poems_work_student_essay_contest.php

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Want To Drive a 2010 Tesla Roadster Sport? Writing Contest!

 High Gear Media and Tesla Motors are offering aspiring automotive writers
a chance to win insider access to the 2010 Tesla Roadster Sport to write a review for High Gear Media

• All published articles submitted between December 8 and December 31 count as entries. (There is no limit to the number of articles you can submit.)
• The person who writes the best article, as selected by High Gear Media editors, will be the winner.
• High Gear Media will fly the winner to the San Francisco area for a January 20th visit to Tesla’s facility, an interview with Tesla personnel and a test drive of the 2010 Tesla Sport with High Gear Media Executive Editor Marty Padgett. The winner writes a review of the experience and car to be published on the High Gear Media network.

http://www.highgearmedia.com/iwanttowrite/ 

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Women on Writing Flash Fiction Contest

 WOW! hosts a (quarterly) writing contest every three months. The mission of this contest is to inspire creativity, communication, and well-rewarded recognition to contestants. The contest is open globally; age is of no matter; and entries must be in English. We are open to all styles of writing, although we do encourage you to take a close look at our guest judge for the season (upper right hand corner) and the flavor of our sponsor, if you are serious about winning. We love creativity, originality, and light-hearted reads. That’s not to say that our guest judge will feel the same… so go wild! Express yourself, and most of all, let’s have some fun!

Word Count:

Maximum: 750

Minimum: 250

$10 entry fee

 

http://www.wow-womenonwriting.com/contest.php

Could Fear of Success Be Stopping You from Writing?

I just finished reading an article about fear of success, to which I’ll provide the link at the end of this post for those of you who are interested.  I’d never truly understood before how one could tell the difference between fear of success and fear of failure until I read this.  To me, the terms were interchangeable, as both lead to the same result.

 

But now I know that’s not true at all, and the realization simply blows me away.  I see where I have clearly fallen on the fear of success side of the fence off and on during my writing career.

 

Here’s how I know—if I’d suffered from fear of failure all these years as opposed to fear of success, I most likely wouldn’t have attempted to do or try almost everything I’ve done and tried in my life so far, from sending out query letters and emails to launching WriteSuccess.  In the corporate world, I attempted (unsuccessfully) to climb the management ranks several times, and while I now know my inability to do so was simply the closing of one door and the opening of another, if I’d feared failure rather than success I most certainly would not have kept trying after the first rejection.

 

Fear of success, on the other hand, does explain why the mental paralysis some of us experience whenever we have a really big idea that we want to pursue.  Oh, we’ll take the initial baby steps towards big goals, and sometimes even spend a great deal of time, effort and (when necessary) money on them.  But as we get closer…some of us freeze.  We seem to totally lose interest, or do anything to avoid working on it.  Let’s face it, the comfort zone may be less than fulfilling, even boring, but man, is it ever comfortable.  Who knows what dangers lay beyond its borders?

 

There’s a certain amount of relief in having a name for what has kept me from making big moves or taking big chances for decades.  It doesn’t mean I’ve found a cure or antidote for it, but as the saying goes, knowing is half the battle.  I at least know what the dragon I need to slay looks like now, and I find that knowledge curiously exciting and refreshing.

 

How about you?  Could fear of success be keeping you from your writing success?  Read more about it here and see if you identify:

http://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/are_you_afraid_of_success

 

Here’s to your writing success.

 

Mary Anne

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