#like being unable to use jargon in most writing because it needs to be accessible and comprehensible to a larger audience gets really

[maidenofcrows]

What? A writing struggles post? Absolutely

I was trying to look up whether unmarried women in the ancient world did anything to cover their hair and the information wasn’t super conclusive?? Married women certainly did and unmarried women sometimes did depending on a number of things like social status, geography, unspecified religious practices, weather. Unmarried women in Sparta apparently left their hair uncovered, but how do we know that?? Very little is actually known about Sparta and what we have is written from other places and therefore full of bias. It also did not state whether this would have been pre- or post- militaristic Sparta.

Dangerously close to just saying yes to the head coverings because it’s still just fanfiction but I’m also trying to be respectful

[oh--jeez]

FIRST OF ALL: there is nothing wrong with being bad at something, whether you are doing your best or not. you are obligated to nobody and nothing to improve your art or your appreciation of art, as long as you don't make it someone else's problem. i am MAGNIFICENTLY BAD at sewing, and i sew my own clothes anyways, and wear them! where people can see!! and if i download a sewing pattern and fuck it up - which is inevitable, given my dyspraxia and ADHD - that's on me, and i can either fix it or walk around looking lumpy. i choose lumpiness at least 75% of the time, because i am now old enough to be eccentric and not just unfashionable.

THAT SAID:

i keep seeing fic authors apologising for their clear, well-written, engaging fics being "confusing" due to reader complaints about, among other things, changes in narrator perspective, use of subtext, and (tagged, always) unreliable narration.

these are extremely basic narrative tools in story writing, and it's fine to use them.

stop apologising for your readers, who, until they found fanfiction written by other children their age, hadn't read anything they weren't assigned in school, for being functionally illiterate. stop apologising to people who prefer manga, and have decided to get mad at you for writing a wall of text instead of publishing your story as a dōjinshi manga.

you have done nothing wrong. you are writing a story, and you absolutely are not obligated or even advised to provide a humble apology with your author's note c-notes to people who want to read horny fic about tobirama in the potterverse, but refuse to engage with written medium at a level, frequency, and breadth of topic that would allow them to GET BETTER AT IT.

reading fiction is a practiced skill that gets easier and more enjoyable with time, barring the interference of chronic disabilities. there is a reason why we start with 'THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR' and work our way up to 'Hóng lóu mèng,' and it's not that little kids can't invent and enjoy more complex narratives, or that an adult, upon entering an adult literacy program, will automatically be able to take in and enjoy advanced literature with intricate grammar and subtle wordplay, simply cos they're adults. it's the reading. you have to put in the time and effort to get better at reading written language, and familiarise yourself with the function and utility of basic-to-complex grammar, even if you don't study the technicalities.

i ask you to stop apologising for doing nothing wrong, because people are starting to believe they're entitled to an apology from creators for creating things they don't like. i'm not talking about racist, misappropriated, or misogynist content, or people producing fetishising, transmisic, or pedophilic material for the delight of rapists and chasers. i'm talking about people just not liking where the story is going, or how you choose to portray inner monologues vs spoken ideas, or your use of techno-jargon. those are stylistic and creative choices by you, in your art, and if they don't like your flavour they can go read someone else. you are not responsible for entertaining everyone, all the time.

your readers are free to enlarge the text, use a dictionary, pay attention to who is talking instead of skimming cos the chapter is "boring" and "too long" (?!?!), or any other material or ephemeral adaptation they need to make it accessible and enjoyable to them, before coming to you and complaining that you're writing for a level of literacy they are unable or refuse to get to.

"reading with a dictionary what kind of nerd shit is that" the kind of nerd shit that wants to know what words mean so they can enjoy what they're reading, until they know so many words they don't need a dictionary to understand what's happening. it's what nerds used to do before the internet, when we didn't have a way to reach out instantly and demand the author explain their story to us, personally. we had to write LETTERS demanding that, so most - not all - of us opted to just open a dictionary or consult a grownup about what a turn of phrase meant instead of waiting a month for a reply.

to readers who want a story explained: the story you are reading is the explanation. that's the author explaining it to you. they have taken a piece of their heart and carefully written it out and posted it for you to read, for free. if you didn't understand it, read it again to see if you missed anything. if you don't want to do that, or you didn't enjoy it, move on. otherwise, you're like people who leave bad reviews on free advanced sewing and advanced knitting patterns, complaining that you tried it and it is too complicated for you. the world is full of accessible, beginner-level fiction and crafts. either resolve to get better at the thing you want to enjoy, or stop complaining that fun and challenging things exist for people who are good at reading, knitting, and any other pleasant recreational or cultural pursuit.

NB: if the author was being a bigot and not just writing about a bigot, by all means yell at them. learn the difference, first.

also, if you're fixing your mouth to talk about how i piss on the poor, this isn't directed at people with learning disabilities, of which i have several.

because of those, i'm not an author. yeah, imagine that: i'm someone who is passionate about being kind to creators and engaging with their chosen medium in an informed and honest way, without myself being a creator. it's called "being a person, and understanding other people are also people."

i could probably try writing fiction, and maybe get better at it, but it's not a pressing issue and i'm perfectly happy just reading. fic authors are magical beasts we should value and love, not treat like AU spank bank vending machines that ate our money.

EDIT: man this sure is a lot of words about how i don't write

[zomakassignment]

Zomak Assignments: 5 tips for BSBTEC501 Assignment writing success

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Writing the assignment, however, can be quite difficult for new students who don’t have the proper knowledge of the format of the topic. Strategy for e-commerce can be understood as customising the feed of the application or webpage to cater for the millennials and GEN-Zs in terms of shopping, food choices etc. With Zomak assignments, the assignment writing can be made simple and easy for the development and implementation of the e-commerce strategy.  

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[writingmyselfout]

Because I Could Not Stop for Death - Chapter Ten

Language: English

Rating: Teen+

Pairing: Hermione Granger/Harry Potter

Tags: AU - Canon Divergence, Reptilia28′s Don’t Fear the Reaper Challenge, Manipulative Dumbledore, Black Hermione Granger, Slight Ron Weasley Bashing

Prologue 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Chapter 10: Gimme Some Truth

Summary: The will.

MINERVA McGonagall was not generally known for impatience. In fact, quite the opposite: she was quite possibly one of the most patient women in the world, Muggle or otherwise. So it is with an uncharacteristic sense of impatience that she wakes early Saturday morning to get ready for her day back in London. When she realizes just how early, she forces herself to take her time with eating breakfast before taking the time to leave a reminder to her prefects and the Head Girl, a Gryffindor 7th year girl, that she would be away from the castle most of the day and they were to reach out to either Professor Flitwick or Professor Snape should the need arise.

In truth, she doesn’t anticipate anything of great importance occurring on the first weekend of the school year, but she’d also been teaching for long enough to know that when it came to hundreds of adolescent witches and wizards, it was best to prepare for the worst just in case.

She considers, briefly, letting the headmaster know of her plans but opts not to. His own weekends were usually busy, often resulting in him rarely leaving his office or leaving the school altogether for business elsewhere. Even if this were one weekend in which he was free enough to note her absence, she’s not inclined to give him advance notice of her plans. Perhaps it was paranoia, but considering his attempt to maintain guardianship over Harry, she thinks it possible that he might try to dissuade her from looking into the will, which she was determined to do. 

Finally, she heads out. The school’s security measures means she’s unable to leave directly from Hogwarts to Diagon Alley. Instead, she goes into Hogsmeade, greets a yawning Rosmerta in the Three Broomsticks, and borrows her fireplace to Floo to the Leaky Cauldron in London. Most of the shops that made up Diagon Alley kept regular opening and closing hours, including those on Horizont Alley, Knockturn Alley, and Carkitt Market--side shopping areas--with only a few exceptions. Among those exceptions were the Owl Post Office and the Gringotts Money Exchange in the Carkitt Market, and the Healer Shop, Leaky Cauldron and Gringotts Bank directly on Diagon Alley, which were open all day, every day, for the convenience of their patrons. Some of the locations on Knockturn Alley likewise kept such hours, but McGonagall was not one to frequent that district, so which is knowledge she does not, nor cares to, possess.

What matters is that at eight o’clock in the morning, there are few out and about on Diagon Alley, but Gringotts Bank stands at attention at the end of the street, ready for its customers at all hours. And at this particular hour, there are few enough people even within the bank to ensure that she can be attended with little to no delay.

If there is one thing about Gringotts to be appreciated above all else, it is their efficiency. The goblins are not interested in wasting time, and are remarkably good at ensuring that all spells corresponding with Hogwarts and Ministry of Magic records are always working so their own documents are always up to date. They therefore are already well aware that guardianship has moved from the Headmaster to Harry Potter’s Head of House, one Minerva McGonagall. 

Upon stating her business, a goblin by the name of Nagnok is called to lead McGonagall to a room off of the main lobby. It’s a small office, with two chairs facing a desk behind which there is a chair, then a set of drawers set against the wall next to a back door. She’s instructed to take a seat as they would return shortly with the documents in question, then they leave through the back door. They are gone for less than five minutes when they return with a large envelope which, in place of a wax seal, has a string and button seal. Nagnok takes a seat at the desk, modified so that he is eye-level with the witch, and passes the envelope across the desk.

McGonagall looks at the envelope for a moment, then undoes the tie to open it. Inside, tied neatly together, is a small stack of papers with two envelopes slightly smaller than the one they’d been in sitting on top. She undoes that tie as well, places the original envelope and tie to one side, then separates the items before her. She sets down first one envelope, then the next, and finally the pages in a stack together. 

The first letter has Harry’s name written across it. When she flips it over, there is a gold wax seal with the image of a crest pressed into it. McGonagall realizes she has never seen the Potter family crest; had in fact never thought, as with most wizarding families, that there was none. The practice dated back to the twelfth century, and with the exception of families that had dealings with Muggle royals and received recognition from them, wizards and witches typically earned them for great contributions to the wizarding world after which the crest was magically included in Muggle records so as to avoid its use among Muggle nobles. McGonagall doesn’t quite remember when its usage fell out of favor and stopped being bestowed, simply that it was mostly only seen for institutions. Each wizarding school, for instance, and Gringotts as well as the Daily Prophet possessed their own heraldry. Not that she could recall what it looked like, but she was certain some of the older, wealthier families such as the Blacks and Malfoys similarly possessed their own unique family crest and coat of arms. 

She runs her fingers over the wax, feeling the small indentations of the different charges on the small shield imprinted there, and Nagnok advises, “That is spelled to only allow Mr. Potter to open the letter.” 

“I’ve no interest in reading a private letter addressed to my student,” McGonagall informs him, setting the letter aside. The second has no name written on the outside, and the wax seal on the back on this one is red and broken, indicating it had been opened before. She assumes by Albus, and she opens it and pulls out a folded parchment, surprised to find it completely blank. “Is there nothing written in this one?”

“As you can see, it is blank, but we were instructed to include it unaltered with the other letter and will. Albus Dumbledore also did not know what to do with it.” Nagnok grinned, amused, and McGonagall had a feeling that he took enjoyment at their befuddlement. There was likely a spell of some sort that only the guardian, or guardians, James and Lily had wanted for their son would know how to surpass. 

She put the blank parchment away, setting it aside with Harry’s letter, and turning at last to the will itself. The topmost page was clearly the bank’s, providing information on when the will was last altered, when it went into effect, the date it was first accessed, and a blank spot at the bottom denoting when will was fully carried out. As she set the page aside, magically adding today’s date as the last time the will was accessed. 

The details too small to see on the wax seal without much closer inspection were now enlarged and clearly visible. The next page had the full coat of arms and crest in all its magicked glory at the top of the page, before the official writing announcing the document to be the last will and testament of James Potter and Lily Jade Potter nee Evans. The shield of the coat of arms is black, with one large green chevron and three gold chevronelles. At the bottom is an open, azure book with black script that appears briefly, only to disappear again. The coat is charged with three red stags in the right corner, and two grapevines with a wheatsheaf, all three tawny in color, in the left corner. Above the shield, a stag with a caduceus makes up the crest, standing on a wreath of black, green, and gold, with a banner over it with the family motto in Latin. Briefly, she thinks she sees a hint of silver on the edges but the outline of the shield is black, and the lions on either side are gold with a red sash. She’s confident that the lions, considering their colors, are meant to represent Gryffindor, and she smiles. James had once mentioned, while Lily was pregnant, that he was sure to give McGonagall another Gryffindor to look after as all his family had been Gryffindors. She wishes she could tell him he’d been right.

She moves on, not wanting to dwell on things she could not change, and begins to skim through the documents. The will isn’t particularly long, so much as it is filled with legal jargon that makes it tedious to read. Ultimately, it outlines what items constitute the Potter estate, with related legal documents where necessary included with the will. Among such items was a London property that dated back to the 1600s, the cottage in Godric’s Hollow which was an ancestral home older than the London property, and the Gringotts vault, and the two deeds and Gringotts contract for each. There was also a small list of family heirlooms, with equal parts valuable and sentimental items, with a note as to whether it should be found at one of the properties or within the vault. 

All of this McGonagall skims over, until she finally reaches the section she’s been looking for, which states that should James and Lily pass before Harry was of age, guardianship is to be passed on to his godfather, Sirius Black III. In the event that he is unable to carry out his duties, Harry is to be given into the care of Frank C.J. Longbottom and Alice Longbottom, or Remus John Lupin. There is not a single mention of Lily’s sister anywhere to be found. 

Then there is a section regarding the funds in the vault. Once Harry’s old enough to go to Hogwarts, he’s allowed access to the vault directly, but until such time his key and the funds were to be overseen by his guardian. In that, Dumbledore had been adhering to the will, since he’d had the key, and it probably had been best to not give it to the Dursleys. McGonagall cannot imagine the Muggle pair coming to Diagon Alley to stand face-to-face with goblins, but stranger things had been known to happen in the pursuit of wealth. Granted, as she continues reading and notes that in order to protect Harry’s interests, funds removed from the Potter vault by anyone other than Harry would require an annual accounting to verify its use was in regards to needs directly associated with raising Harry, with a generous allowance to accommodate additional expenditures not directly related to Harry, but likely intended in the case of Harry going to one of his parents’ bachelor friends who might not be able to work as much if they were single-handedly raising a child.

“I have some questions,” McGonagall finally says to the goblin, who has been looking over papers and now looks up at her. “At the time of their deaths, all of the people noted here as possible guardians for Harry Potter would have been perfectly capable of carrying out those duties and being notified. Why, then, was Mr. Potter’s physical guardianship passed on to relatives not provided in the will, and magical guardianship given to Albus?”

“That would be the doing of your Ministry of Magic,” Nagnok informs her, the tone and sneer on his face making it clear how he feels about their interference. “Emergency provisions were put into place to allow for government intervention in the carrying out of wills and guardianship where they felt it best served the safety of the wizarding community, the Statute of Security, and-or the individual or individuals involved.” He’s clearly reciting the mandate from memory. “This was to be effective for two years starting October of the year one thousand nine hundred and eighty-one. It was extended an additional six years, and finally expired just prior to the current Minister of Magic taking office. Instead, it was decided that the provision would only continue to apply to Mr. Potter due to the extraneous circumstances, and there was no interest in challenging it.”

Of course there hadn’t been; the boy’s Muggle relatives were oblivious to the fact that he’d inherited a fortune, or that there had been a will at all left behind. McGonagall had a feeling that, had they known guardianship had been meant for others, they might have jumped at the chance to pass Harry off. It annoyed her to think that Albus had used his influence as such, and prevented Harry from going where he might have been wanted.

He could argue, for instance, that by doing so he had saved Harry from falling into the hands of his godfather, Sirius. However, Frank and Alice Longbottom had been perfectly capable at the time of taking in Harry. And with a child of their own the same age, Harry would have had at least a few happy years before the Longbottoms were captured and tortured by rogue Death Eaters fleeing the law, still trying to locate their defeated leader.Harry then would have likely stayed under the care of the formidable Augusta Longbottom, who was no doubt a strict woman, but one who would have done a much better job at raising Harry than his Muggle relations had done. 

Remus Lupin is the only one listed who might still take guardianship, but that as far as she knows lest Dumbledore failed to mention, the man has never reached out regarding Harry either. She could guess why, and thought it likely that even if he had known about being a possible guardian for Harry, he would have relinquished said guardianship to Dumbledore easily. But he is the boy’s only connection to his parents left, and she wonders if she can convince him to take up the mantle his friends had intended for him.

Moving back to the list of heirlooms, she taps a finger at the symbols indicating their locations. “The items listed as being in the Potter vault, of course, I’m sure are present and accounted for; this is Gringotts, after all.” It isn’t mere flattery; McGonagall is certain that if anything had been removed from the vault at any point after the will’s creation, they’d have noted as much. Their records were always meticulously kept. “Would it be possible to get verification that the items that should be here or at Godric’s Hollow are where they should be?”

“For a fee, we could provide services to do just that,” Nagnok advises. “However, bear in mind that Godric’s Hollow was for a time cordoned off by the Ministry as they dealt with the...aftermath of the Dark Lord’s attack.”

She recalls. “Then they let reporters and tourists visit, like it was an attraction instead of the site of a tragedy.” She sighs, still annoyed by it. “Are you saying it’s possible the Ministry, or some other party, removed items from the cottage?”

“Thieves and looters are not uncommon, even today, but especially in times of war.” 

Quickly and efficiently, she begins to gather everything altogether. “I presume I will be able to take this with me, in order to review its contents with Mr. Potter?”

“Fine.” Grumbling, Nagnok reaches out to take the Gringotts page, grabs a quill to sign it, and then passes both the page and the quill to the witch to do the same, as there is now a new record indicating that the will is being removed from the Gringotts property by Harry Potter’s acting guardian. “Please note we have a copy of the main will, and should there be any attempt to destroy or alter these pages, our records will be adjusted accordingly. We highly recommend, once Mr. Potter has seen the contents, that the will be returned here for safekeeping until he is of age.”

McGonagall nods in understanding, says she will be in contact in regards to contracting their services to verify the heirlooms not currently at Gringotts, and soon after is walking back outside. It’s perhaps been an hour since she arrived, maybe a little more, but foot traffic on Diagon Alley has already begun to pick up significantly. Nevertheless, she simply stands there for a moment, gathering her thoughts, trying to decide what to do next.

She can go back to Hogwarts, will in hand, and give everything to Harry. She would have to explain what the will says, certain that the will itself will be difficult for an eleven-year old boy to read and comprehend himself, but he would have it. He would know. There have already been so many secrets kept from him, she’s loath to continue the tradition, but she also does not want to do anything that might hurt the boy. What if Remus does, in fact, prefer to relinquish his rights as guardian? What if the London property is no longer habitable? What if he asks to go see the cottage in Godric’s Hollow? What if there’s something in that letter, written just for him, that prompts questions she can’t answer? Or an heirloom that they can’t locate? 

“Enough of that,” she scolds herself. She is worried about scenarios that may not happen, and as a former Gryffindor and the current Head, even if the worse were to happen, she would face those challenges as she always did: directly and without hesitation. 

The most important task to tackle was attempting to locate Remus Lupin, wherever he might be. She could ask the headmaster, who she suspects has kept a running tally on the whereabouts of all the living former members of the Order not currently working at Hogwarts, but she thinks she’ll leave that as a last resort. She has her own connections in London; friends, former students, or the parents of ones, with whom she might be able to find something out. Particularly those who had been familiar with James Potter and his group of friends during their time at Hogwarts. McGonagall thinks it would be ideal to speak with him face-to-face, but if she’s unable to do so, then the next option would be to try to write to him and hope that he can be found by owl. If that fails, and only if that fails, she will turn to Albus for assistance.

~~~

WHEN she has returned to Hogwarts, it is shortly before dinner. She is tired, frustrated that she’d managed to find three students who’d gone to school with James and Lily, two of whom had been Gryffindors, and yet none knew anything about Remus Lupin. The man, for all his friendliness and general good nature, had kept few friends during his time at school, and of those, none had made it out of the war alive except the one responsible for the others’ deaths. She would have to write to him, which meant deciding how much to put in a letter versus waiting until she could speak to him. McGonagall doesn’t want to admonish him for his lack of interest in Harry to this point, no doubt believing as she had that he’d been well in hand under Dumbledore’s care. However, she does want to impart on him the gravity of the boy’s upbringing, and that he was likely the boy’s best hope of getting away from the Dursleys. He was the last person named in the will, so without him, next of kin took precedence. 

If only James hadn’t been an only child.

Then there had been the added frustration of realizing, upon a second look, that there was no address in the will or the deed itself for the London property. She would have to submit an inquiry to the Ministry of Magic, but considering the state of things before their deaths, she wonders if perhaps the London home was also put under the Fidelis Charm. Without that secret keeper, forget finding the place herself, how would they be able to send someone to confirm the heirlooms that should be there?

“Hello, Professor.”

“Good evening.” She looks over at the student moving past her in the hall, notes it’s one of her Gryffindors, and says, “Ms. Spinnet, if you can locate Mr. Potter, please have him come to my office.” 

The girl answers in the affirmative before she runs off to do as requested, and McGonagall heads to her office. She’s decided; she will tell him that she has the will, but wishes to look into a few things before sharing it with him. Hopefully his trust in her will extend into believing her when she says she thinks it’s for the best. 

She’s a few lines into her letter when there is a knock on her door. McGonagall is only mildly surprised when the one who comes in is not the student she’s waiting on, but the Potions Master. “Severus--” She’s only just started to greet him as he’s closing the door, when there’s more knocking a small, messy-haired head peers in around the still open door.

“You wanted to see me, Professor?”

“Yes. Do come in, Harry. Have a seat.” She motions at the chair across from her, and Snape opens the door further to let him in. The Potion Master then looks back, raising an eyebrow at his colleague who nods for him to stay. She watches him close the door but remaining close to it, as if to ensure no intruder will come in.

“Is this about my parents’ will?” Harry asks.

“Yes. I was able to obtain their will from Gringotts, however there are some things I’d like to look into, now that I’m privy to its contents. I’d like you to wait until then for me to share it with you, all right?” She has set the quill down to one side, letter momentarily forgotten as she clasps her hands together on top of her desk.

Harry is quiet, considering. “How long will that take?” he asks after a few moments.

“Hopefully not long,” she tells him, but admits, “But I don’t know exactly. It may be a few days, or a few months.” She meets his gaze steadily. “I do promise that, one way or another, you will know before the school year ends.”

Silence again for a beat, then another, before he nods his head in agreement. “Okay.” 

“Thank you. Now go on, dinner should be starting soon.”

She sends him off with a smile, after which Severus comes over to take the seat he has vacated. “These things you would like to look into; anything I might assist you with?” 

“You wouldn’t happen to know where Remus Lupin is nowadays, would you?” She knows the answer, even before Snape’s lip curls in disdain and he scoffs, answering in the negative. It had been highly unlikely, she’d known that, but it was worth a shot anyway. “Well, he is the only one left in the will named as a possible guardian who could possibly take the role.” Severus’s raised eyebrow and incredulous look perfectly convey how he feels about that, but she continues anyway, “If he declines, then it would go to next of kin and Harry remains with the Dursleys. 

Snape sighs. “I assume you are going to try to write him?” She nods, and he continues, “I suppose I could reach out to some acquaintances of mine that may be able to locate him, just in case.”

She nods her head, grateful. “Thank you.”

“Is that the only matter?”

“Unfortunately, no. Before they went into hiding, the Potters were living in London. I’ll be sending an inquiry to the Ministry to see if there are records as to where, but as the address is missing from the deed itself, I suspect it may not be so easy.” She reaches into her desk, where she has stowed the will for the moment, and pulls out the blank envelope. “I suspect this might have additional answers, but as its magicked, I’ve no way of reading it.”

“May I?” McGonagall passes it over and Snape looks it over before pulling out the blank parchment.

“According to the goblin at Gringotts, Albus was equally befuddled by this blank letter, so it’s probably safe to assume that it’s not a simple matter of invisible ink or the like.” 

Snape nods his head in agreement, passing it back once he has replaced the parchment in the envelope. “I’ll look into what spell may have been used, and whether there’s a potion that might negate it.”

“That would be helpful,” McGonagall agrees, putting the envelope back in her desk. “Otherwise, we can only hope that Remus may have the answer. Other than him, the only one who might help is--”

“Black,” Snape finishes.

“Precisely. And I don’t fancy a visit to Azkaban, though I doubt he’d be keen to be of assistance.”

“Assuming, of course, that his sanity is still intact.”

“Excellent point.” Ten years surrounded by dementors. McGonagall shudders at the thought, and despite his crimes, she pities the man who’d once been her student and James Potter’s best friend.

Story Notes:

Chapter title is a John Lennon song. Hopefully, this chapter doesn't disappoint.

And look, I have no idea what the “J” in Lily’s name actually stands for, so I went with Jade for the obvious connection to her eyes. I didn’t want to put too much thought into it, lol.

For my own edification, and because I couldn’t actually find an answer to this, does anyone know at what point it was no longer required for the heir who inherited the family crest/coat of arms to change it in England? If anyone knows, or has better research skills and can actually find the answer to that, please let me know ‘cause I’m curious. I frankly spent way, WAY too much time looking up information on heraldry, especially considering what a small part the Potter crest I created plays in this and the artistic liberties I took with it anyway, hahaha.

In canon, Harry’s family has no known family motto or crest, which is not impossible but Linfred (the oldest family member we know of) made enough of a reputation for himself that he was able to leave a “significant gold pile” to each of his SEVEN children, laying the foundation for the Potter fortune; and his work was influential enough that some of his remedies/potions were the precursors for stuff in modern use (Skele-Gro and Pepperup are specifically named). Plus, his eldest went on to marry THE granddaughter of Ignotus Peverell, one of the brothers who inspired the Tale of the Three Brothers. Their names were lost to history, sure, but considering there’s a story about them, it means they would have been influential/famous enough in their own time to have warranted that kind of attention. His granddaughter would not be so far removed from his time to not warrant respect due her station, and a marriage to match, considering the attitudes of the time (assuming witches/wizard society was classist, which I think they would’ve been considering current attitudes in canon).

Anyway, I’ll stop rambling now.

[overnightmillionaireprogramrevie]

Overnight Millionaire System Reviews

Overnight Millionaire System Review [Wesley Virgin] This Will Shut You Up

Thanks for your visit to my Overnight Millionaire review. But you know what, there's no point in believing what I'm going to say. Believe what Wesley Virgin says. Read on just a little bit and you'll see what I mean.

We don't see many 'legitimate' make-money-online products with the word millionaire in the title. Most of them falsely promise quick success, which would only attract, you know, "think-big-but-do-nothing" dreamers. Whereas many ordinary affiliate marketers (including myself) would often deny that kind of thing without even looking at it. Promoting millionairism? That's so extraordinary that it must be a BS. It's all about building up your business over time. There should be gradual steps to take to get there... Well, who am I kidding? Am I a millionaire? No. Then who am I trying to convince?

Overnight Millionaire System - What Is It?

"Life is not a lottery based on luck", he says.

Wesley Virgin is a multi-millionaire, he calls himself "Billion Dollar Virgin" and one of his well-known products is Fat Diminisher. He teaches his ethos - millionaire mindset - through his other products, and the Overnight Millionaire System is one of them.

"Ah, millionaire mindset. I know all that. If you want to be a millionaire, start thinking like one. It doesn't work. It'll never work." That's it, right there. That's why we (including myself!) are not moving forward much from where we are now.

Of course, this "system" will not spontaneously make you a millionaire. It is a system that made Wesley a millionaire, and he tells you all about it. Is there anything that you can learn from it? YES. This is not a theoretical "how-to" guide by some mysterious seller from ClickBank. Wesley is real, and he will guide you to have the right mental attitude, and teaches a lot of practical tips in selling products as an affiliate.

Overnight Millionaire System is sold for $20, but at your checkout you'll be given a 10% discount coupon code - this 10% will be used on a good cause. I'll tell you about it later.

What's Included?

10 x WHYs

Wesley asks you to write down why you want what you want. People are always after technical know-how. But Wesley says it doesn't matter HOW it's going to happen at the beginning. It's much more vital to clarify WHY you want to become a millionaire.

Audio Files

5-Sets of MP3 audio files "Overnight Mindset Hacks" to listen to for a minimum of 60 days - changes your unconscious mind for success and abundance.

Access to the "Millionaire Mindset Hacks"

The "Millionaire Mindset Hacks" includes video clips that are both motivational and educational, including;

How to come up with all the ideas that could potentially make you $1 million or more, and write them down.

How to visualize and reflect on having $1m in your bank account.

How to become a "high-value person" with a successful skill set that people value and will pay for.

It's important to listen to people who actually have $1 million or more saved up.

Create unshakable belief in yourself to keep pushing forward so you can see results faster.

How to find ways to create multiple streams of income in areas that already are in high demand.

Learn how to become a master at sales, marketing and persuasion as a newbie without reading a lot of books.

What Made Him Determined

Another video within the "Mindset Hacks" is Wesley's own emotional breakthrough story - he talks about his family and when he didn't have money. I know he's a great storyteller, but there was a moment that made him absolutely determined to be successful.

I personally think this 30-minute video is a must-watch. I'm sure Wes's story is relatable to many, and it makes me think, what's the point of life if you don't value yourself high? You are powerful. We all are. With the right mindset, you can do anything.

Upsells

There are plenty of upsells, including;

Affirmation Cash Course ($17) - Affirmations designed to harness the power of the law of attraction and positive thinking, for you to chant them. Wesley's extremely confident about this product, offering 365-day, 100% money-back guarantee. He even says he'd give you 3x your money back if you weren't happy.

Million Dollar Persuasion & Psychology Techniques ($9) - What makes a person buy or not buy. "Cognitive psychological triggers" to get your customer (or anyone, spouse or a child) with you without resistance.

But the most powerful one is "Unrevealed Secrets Of A Millionaire Mind" ($99). It's Wesley's 10-day course with some mind-boggling subjects including;

Day 3 - "Disconnect" - Why your friends and family are the reason you are unable to create the life you deserve. Basically, you may have to cut some people out of your life. You might say "What!? I can't do that to my friends! Who the hell are you to tell me...?" Then fine. You'll be stuck where you are, you see? I can't speak on behalf of Wesley. See what the multi-millionaire actually says.

Day 4 - "When a millionaire speaks...shut up!" - All you need to know about socializing with millionaires, even down to what to wear, what to take and what to trash.

Day 5 - "A Millionaire's Best Kept Secret" - True reasons why you've never been successful in your life. As mentioned earlier, it's not about "how", but it's a "why" mentality that matters.

Day 6 - "Sexual Transmutation" - This is a very interesting one. An ancient method (use your sexual desires to create wealth in life), proven to 95% of millionaires and successful entrepreneurs. With Wesley's personal experience.

Day 8 - "Wealth Fundamentals Were Never Taught In School" - College won't help you become the successful person you deserve to be. I absolutely agree with that. People who have the least knowledge of money are teachers. (No disrespect - I'm from that kind of background myself).

Day 10 - "Be A Giver" - why you must give in order to receive. Why sharing your wealth will make you even richer. This is another one of most wonderful things that Wesley has, and teaches.

Create Better Sales Page

Of course, the product is not just about affirmations, but he will also give you some tips to increase sales. He advises Amazon and ClickBank have the best products, and all the tips he provides are invaluable for every new internet marketing hopeful. For example;

The importance of becoming an expert in your chosen niche.

Wes's "million dollar formula" - address a problem, find out how many people have the problem, and create the solution.

Create ideas instead of having to chase "tricks".

As an affiliate, the key is to make your sales page better than the seller's original page.

Wesley Is Raw

I think the difference between Wesley and other online gurus/tutors is that Wesley talks to your heart from his heart. Don't get me wrong, I know there are thousands of other helpful tutors, who dedicate their heart and soul and whatever. This is hard to explain - Wesley's very raw. He's got nothing to hide. He talks a lot about himself but many of his stories are so relatable to us, he's essentially helping us without consciously trying to help us. Does that make sense? That's how I feel anyway.

By the way he's so pumped up (literally) with so much energy throughout the videos. All of a sudden he would shout "Motivated!!" (#Ahhgg my eardrums.) But I must also add, there's nothing technical, no jargons, anyone can understand it.

He Spends A Lot On Good Causes

Wesley donates a lot of money to the local church and charities. He gives a lot of tips to the waiting staff in restaurants (100-300%!)

Not because he can afford it (well, he can afford it) but because that's what he believes to do. Share and people will share back. Give to receive. What goes around comes around. While you are reluctant to give a 15% tip because you didn't receive a good service... You spend your life forever worrying about "15% of the restaurant bill" level of money.

The Overnight Millionaire System - the price is $37 but he will give you a special $10-off discount coupon code. This discount will help feed homeless people. Wesley's father is a pastor, and he goes to his church every Sunday morning to help them.

Isn't that crazy? They normally ask you to pay 10% MORE to pay towards charitable causes. Anyway that's what he does. He's not making this up, there's a video clip to prove in the link destination. If you don't believe it, that's fine. Then that's what you are - do you see what I mean?

60-Day Money Back Guarantee

If you're not happy, you can ask your money back by contacting Wesley or via ClickBank within 60 days of purchase.

Pros

You'll get all the success tips from a REAL millionaire.

Extremely motivational.

Easy to understand (he talks to you from his heart).

Your money will be partly spent on a good cause.

60-day money back guarantee.

Cons

He's a bit loud (!?)

Not for you if you're expecting an instruction manual type.

Overnight Millionaire Review - Conclusion:

Before Wesley Virgin made his own financial success, he met a lot of millionaires who didn't inspire him. Now being a multi-millionaire himself, he knows how to help you set the right mindset.

If you are a moaner or skeptic but you haven't been successful, perhaps it's about time you considered listening to this guy. Maybe this what you need. I recommend this product to anyone who doesn't want to stay where they are, and take a bold step to make money online.

[starsaboveyouadoption]

light years

As you’ll come to know if you haven’t already, like any world of idiosyncrasies, the adoption community has its own jargon to navigate. One term you may not be as familiar with as others is the concept of “cocooning”. This is a widely used word within adoption to refer to a period of time immediately following your child moving home with you, whereby you make your child’s world as small as possible in the early days of forming an attachment, and is a vital process in the timeline of your child coming to feel safe and secure in their new family. This blog will take a look at what cocooning actually is (especially in practical terms), and some helpful tips for how to manage this space of time so that it has its best intended effect. Again, I can only talk of my own experience, and as a parent to a fairly young toddler, I didn’t experience some of the added complications that may arise with older children, but most of what I’ll write should be applicable to most age groups. On this note, even if something sounds geared to babies, chances are you would want to replicate the same principles for an older child, however strange this might seem, and sometimes especially so, given the more complex layers of emotions they (and you) may be going through.

 So, “cocooning”…what am I talking about?

Cocooning is a term used to describe a timeframe of usually a few weeks once your child is home, immediately following introductions where you take certain measures to help your child settle with you. It will be something your social workers will discuss with you on preparing to take your child home, and certainly will be a point of conversation during review meetings in introductions. It is essentially about limiting your child’s exposure to, and involvement from, people outside of their immediate parent(s) – you – in the very early days for certain therapeutic reasons related to trauma and attachment associated with their move.

 It serves a few purposes:

·        It allows early bonding and attachment to start taking place between child and parent by providing physical and emotional space for your family unit. This is, in many people’s views, the work of months, years, and perhaps a lifetime, but the cocooning phase acts as a crucial kick starter and sets the template for the beginning of your life together.

·        It allows your child to settle into their new home, to start feeling comfortable, safe and secure in their new environment.

·        It provides crucial space for your child to begin to heal and recover from the trauma of separations from their birth and/or foster family, and for all parties, the intense emotional toll of transitions that came with introductions.

·        It enables your child to understand their relationship to you and attach to you as their parents, as opposed to other adults who have been caregivers to them, but not fulfilling the parental role. For some older children, this may be particularly confusing given that they may have lived through several foster moves, and have conscious memory of time with their birth parents, not to mention all of their involvement with a whole team of social workers and outside professionals, without ever having parents of their own. This period of time helps to transmit the message that you are permanent, safe, and in a special relationship with them.

·        It allows adequate time to put your foot on the brakes and allow your child to gradually, and appropriately attach to members of your wider family and friends network, without some of the pressure that may come with traditional expectations associated with the arrival of a birth child.

·        It helps you as a family to find your routine and to put into practice everything you have learnt about your child to date, to care for them, and provide them with a sense of security.

·        It helps highlight any potential issues that you may need support for as a family, and gives you the space you might need to work through some initial surmountable, but stressful challenges with professional help before you add the additional pressure of enmeshing wider family into your new life.

·        For many children, young and older, it can help fill in the blanks of some of the care and stability they have missed

 The cocooning period is also part of the period of time between your child moving home and being able to apply for their legal order. This period stretching beyond cocooning, will involve lots of review/settling in meetings with your social workers to provide a space to discuss how things are going. For us, this meant weekly meetings for the first 6 weeks, followed by fortnightly meetings and 2 formal reviews thereafter before our legal order came through (which happened comparatively quickly to most adopters for whom this period would stretch out further).

 On a practical note, “cocooning” with your child will look something like this (of course with some exceptions depending on the advice you receive about your child):

·        All main care done by the parents only – so personal care, washing, feeding, toileting, dressing, sleep etc

·        Physical contact and affection limited to parents only – this will mean asking others not to pick up, hug, kiss, hold your child for the first few weeks

·        Providing a solid, very consistent routine, emulating their foster routine as much as possible for the meantime, with no major changes in the first few weeks. As pedantic as this may sound (though I promise it makes sense when you’re living it), this might mean anything from keeping their toiletries, clothes, and smells the same (there’s an awful lot of washing powder chat on the adoption forums!!), through to ensuring their routine, clothes, comforts such as blankets and dummies etc, and toys/activities remain familiar to them for the first few weeks while adjusting.

·        No or very limited introductions to wider friends and family, and no visitors to the home until they are settled. Typically, the recommended period for an under-2 may be about 2 weeks, whereas for older children, this could mean more. Thereafter, ensuring introductions are very gradual in line with your child’s needs and comfort level.

·        Cocooning doesn’t have to mean staying inside the house like you’re on lockdown (ha!), but might mean local trips to low-key places such as parks, playgrounds, and local shops so they start to get used to the area. We were conscious that our hometown was geographically a long distance and a change from a rural to an urban environment for our Little Star, so had to be mindful of how busy/overwhelming it could potentially be.

·        For older children, it is likely to mean a delayed start to their new school. For younger children, a limit on clubs or playgroups for now.

·        By virtue of the above, this will necessarily mean your child not being babysat with friends and family in these early weeks. After cocooning, as part of our process, we had to nominate a few close family (grandparents) to be DBS checked during Stage 1, to be able to provide care other than us during the period before the legal order and were unable to leave Little Star with anyone else, including registered childcare providers. Remembering at this stage, that you will not have full parental responsibility (you share this with the state until the legal order and will be given papers outlining what you are/aren’t able to do during this period, which usually includes needing to seek permission for stays outside of the home for longer than a couple of days. It also includes other elements such as your level of permission to authorise medical treatment)

 I’m sure it’s needless to say that as you’re reading this, you’re imagining cocooning as an intense time, and it certainly is! It’s a weird limbo between bringing your child home and really being able to ingratiate them into your daily lives, because of the added ingredient of separation trauma that you will be trying to mitigate with cocooning. This does mean that at your most emotionally vulnerable time, you can find yourself feeling a little isolated and unable to access some of the usual things that would help such as seeing family and friends, getting away, etc at a time of stress. I had a bit of a struggle in my first I’d say 4 weeks at home with Little Star and found myself getting very depressed and anxious. I’m grateful that this was relatively short-lived and passed, but hindsight is a wonderful thing, and there is so much I wish I’d remembered to do to take care of myself at such an important juncture of my life. For what it’s worth, here are some tips based on my reflections of that time (which by the way I feel the need to say is in equal measures beautiful at the same time as all the stress – I intend this blog to be a real view of adoption but I equally don’t wish it to scare people off!):

 Cocooning Survival Tips

·        Treat this time as if you have had a new-born. What’s a little strange in adoption is that both your own, and others’ reaction to you bringing a child home, is not always the same as if you had just come out of hospital having had a new-born baby. There is a sense of excitement but also sometimes inadvertently a sense of carrying on as “before”. Here you are with this enormous life change overnight and a child you are having to get to know on the spot, and sometimes because they are not a tiny little 6lb bundle, you can set yourself completely unrealistic expectations which are just not warranted. I’m the first person to say that I never wanted to be one of those parents who centres my entire life on one aspect of my identity as a parent, but it would be ridiculous not to acknowledge that my whole world (at that time) had been shaken upside down, and I can’t return to the exact “same” person I was pre-child. My perspective and priorities have necessarily had to change. I would encourage any new adopter to “think new-born” within cocooning. Would you expect yourself to socialise, be available for a barrage of visits, be putting on a full face of makeup every day, replying to messages and emails, if you’d walked out of the hospital a week ago and were recovering from a caesarean? I think not. We may not have the scars of child birth but we do have the scars of our child’s traumas and we are becoming new parents too, but you will likely learn that as adopters we don’t always get the same grace and validation that birth parents do in terms of what we are taking on. Certainly, give yourself permission to be selfish, recognise this huge adjustment for what it is, and if you need to go off the radar for a short time, go off the radar! The right people will understand and this all links back to the work you will have done during Stage 2 on really testing your support network.

·        Allow yourself full permission to be as slobby as you need to be to focus on the most important things! Obviously a lot of it was just the sheer anxiety of having a baby in the house and largely being on my own in the house looking after them, and with time this got easier, but I can tell you, I didn’t take a lot of showers in those early days! I struggled to find time to eat, message people back, to keep people updated with the latest “news”, and I wasn’t always enjoying it. I wasn’t basking in some heavenly earth mother glow. I was stressed, down, anxious, and my memory seemed to dissolve overnight. I thankfully can tell you it all came back in a few weeks! But during that time, I was just headless chicken mode. I didn’t know Little Star well enough to know what they liked, didn’t like etc and it meant every day felt like a guessing game, so I just didn’t have any head space. If I ever did this again, I would now fully prepare for those first few weeks to be that way and plan accordingly!

·        Some small little things really help with self-care. Having some alone time with your partner when you can (nap times, evenings etc) can help you reset and recharge and check in with each other about how you feel it’s going. For single adopters, your social worker is likely to encourage you to make especially strong use of your support network, even if it has to be remotely. Someone to lean on and talk to about how you’re honestly feeling (not what others expect you to feel) is so important. I thank the stars for my Mum who listened to me over so many texts about how I was feeling, sent flowers when I was bursting into tears in front of the highchair, and who heard me out when I wasn’t sleeping and was at my wit’s end trying to be perfect (but of course failing miserably!). These things will pull you through. Early nights will help you get as much sleep as possible, and some outside time will work wonders for clearing your head. PJ days are more than fine, and for me, I am an early bird admittedly, but getting up half hour before baby meant I could at least get a cup of tea into my system before starting the day.

·        Structure really helps. You’ll of course want space for spontaneity but that’s probably not so much the order of the day at this point. I found the empty days really hard especially when my partner returned to work and thinking of the day as 4 blocks (AM/PM before/after naps) meant each chunk felt more achievable. Sometimes all I did was sit in Costa having what I called my little “pity-latte”(!) but it got me out, got me to feel I was having a treat, and it provided a focus for the morning. Now I look back and I truly don’t have to even think about how to pass my day – it’s gone in a blur, I enjoy it 9 times out of 10, and we get on fine, but time can slow when you’re in a bit of an enforced bubble. You’ll hopefully notice that feeling dissipate when you’re back out of the bubble and able to see family  and friends (just being able to see my Mum and my brother in person made an enormous difference) but for now, do what you need to do to feel sane!

·        If you are the person taking the main leave, and you have a partner, as long as they are able to take off to help with cocooning and transitions the better. People advised us of this at the beginning and I can really see how relevant it was in practice. The thing is, it is arguably a bit of a middle-class advantage to be able to take extended periods of time off work, and it won’t be possible for everyone financially and that’s okay – it’s just an ideal. My partner had frustratingly just started a new job, so whilst we had originally planned a 50/50 split with shared parental leave, we ended up with me taking the main leave and him having a fairly standard 2 weeks off, which included a week of introductions and I can say this felt nowhere near enough time. In an ideal world, I think we would have had about a month together, but it really is down to your circumstances. Do consider shared parental leave – in practice, I think with adoption having a more steady presence of both parents can make a huge difference (bizarrely we have come to benefit from us all being together during lockdown, though in sad circumstances).  If this isn’t on the table, think about how a combination of parental leave, annual leave, and if an option for you, unpaid leave might work to give you that little bit longer.

·        I felt so much pressure to be “on” all the time when Little Star first came home. I felt I had to be actively playing with them all day and attentive to them every single second otherwise I’d feel a huge wave of guilt and/or imposter syndrome, and that’s part of why I struggled to look after myself well enough in the early days. Every parenting blog I read seemed to suggest that all stay at home parents were literally doing nothing but sitting adoringly playing with their baby for hours on end, and I just couldn’t understand how anyone was up to that. It got exhausting. It didn’t take that long for me to work out that in reality, parents are people. We zone out, we get bored sometimes, and God forbid, sometimes we are just watching the clock for bedtime! But that doesn’t take away our wanting for our child, it just means we’re human. I’d have put much less pressure on myself in this regard. Don’t beat yourself up if you have lazy days, PJ days, days where you give them less than ideal food or they are subjected to a bit of TV – it may conversely be the thing that saves everyone’s sanity!

·        Showing affection to your little one is a weird one. I know I certainly felt a bit strange about kissing/hugging them at the start. Being honest, it felt forced and a bit surreal. Now I think nothing of picking up my Little Star and squishing their face, and harassing them for cuddles, but back then, I felt odd about it. In any other circumstance being intimate with a child I’d just met would feel inappropriate. Somehow through it all, I managed to strike a bit of a balance. I put absolutely no pressure on myself to instantly feel love for them (more of that in other blogs), but I did try to make a conscious effort to find opportunities for touch that felt as natural as possible. A bit of rough and tumble, some light hearted chasing games and peekaboo, kisses and cuddles at times that felt natural such as bedtime, and as Little Star was used to a very particular soothing method, I had opportunities for lots of close proximity. I can’t liken it to skin-to-skin for new-borns as I don’t know enough about that, but I guess the principle is similar. Finding opportunities for touch and eye contact really helped us bond.

·        I cannot state this one enough – utilise your social worker! Cocooning is in many ways an extension of introductions and your social worker will fully expect you to be struggling at times. Don’t be a martyr or feel you have to keep up a perfect image – it’s okay to call and say you’ve been having a rough time. Our social worker was brilliant and never made me feel judged or less than for how I felt. Oftentimes they will be able to make visits to you if you need some human contact outside of your bubble and a space for a vent – they should also be able to provide practical hints and tips as I guarantee you they will have heard it all before.

·        Staring at the walls all day can really take its toll during cocooning. We spent a LOT of time in outdoors spaces like woodlands, parks, and farms just having long walks and enjoying some quiet family time with Little Star. It served the purpose of bonding, practice being out and about with a little one, and a chance for us to clear our heads. I’d highly recommend it.

·        Accept help – if like me you’re useless at asking for and accepting help this can be a real challenge but do try to think about ways your support network can be there for you. People are happy to help and there may be small things that help make your life easier. They may not be able to see you physically but it could be things like video calls, dropping off meals/shopping, running errands for you, or if you already have other children, doing the odd school pick up to help out. Now’s the time to draw on that network you spoke about in your assessment.

·        Finally, all of this comes at a huge caveat – nothing is more important in those early days than your mental health. So if that means that you need to “break the rules” and meet up with family a little earlier than planned, or take some time out while your partner picks up the slack one day, the benefits of that for your wellbeing entirely outweigh anything else. The emotion I most closely associate with becoming an adoptive parent in the first weeks is “shock” – you are trying to adapt at immense pace to this huge life-changing event. Don’t be afraid to reach out and put your head above water to breathe if you need to.

So that’s cocooning, and let’s say that you’ve survived the experience intact, and are starting to introduce your child to friends and family. Knowing when the right time is will be a combination of your own instincts, your child’s comfort level, and your social worker’s views on appropriateness. I have a large family and because social workers knew this, I felt quite “monitored” in this regard, but it was all with good intent and after 2-3 weeks, it felt okay for us to start branching out. Here are some considerations to help this stage go smoothly…

 ·        Understandably, most people in your network won’t be fully familiar with adoption processes, and the concept of cocooning is likely to be alien. It can help to provide friends and family with a heads up about what to expect which may seem out of the norm ahead of time. First4Adoption do a fantastic crib sheet for loved ones on how best to support a new adoptive child into the family: 

https://www.first4adoption.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/how-family-and-friends-can-help.pdf

·        Think about the best physical space to meet in. Usually it is best to opt for a neutral space like a park or a café – somewhere your loved ones can spend some time with your new arrival without too much pressure and where your child will not feel their space is being invaded, nor be confused about going to too many new houses, especially after having just gone through a transition between two houses in quick succession. For us, it actually felt best for Little Star to meet people at our home where they were comfortable, but you will know your child best. If you do have visitors at home, think about making visits short and not too intense with too many people at a time – we tended to introduce people in pairs so as not to overwhelm Little Star.

·        If you are adopting an older child, it may be worth explaining to your family that this child may have some behaviours or understandings that are out of sync with how your family do things. It takes time for any child to know what the established “rules of the house” are in new settings, and many older children in the system will have experienced differing rules at their foster homes, or may have been removed at an older age from a birth family home where their home environment was far different. It is not uncommon for older adopted children who have experience of their birth homes to struggle with following “expected” social rules about noise, politeness, silly things like how to use cutlery, sharing etc, because this may not have been their experience in the harsher world they lived in. Setting everyone’s expectations at the start will avoid unnecessary awkwardness and embarrassment, and ensure your child is put at ease. Some babies/children will demonstrate behaviours younger than their developmental stage, due to the level of disruption they’ve had. Not least this may make you feel a little “odd one out” as a parent – hopefully you will have as supportive a family as I am so lucky to have but if you do feel there could be some misunderstandings, better to discuss them in advance.

·        On the same vein, it’s worth giving people a heads up about affection. We had a few situations where people innocently went to pick Little Star up and give them a cuddle, and at the time I didn’t deal with it very well as I felt awkward about it and didn’t want to come across weirdly. If you have the conversation before meeting up, that way people know where they stand. The same goes for things like taking photos, sharing information or news about your child with other people and social media.

·        Advice which worked really well for us was to start with people who you expect will have close relationships with your child, working outwards to wider family at a later date. You’ll want to pay special attention to meetings with key people such as Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles etc which all helps your child to differentiate that these are special people and not just another adult they are meeting. We had to expediate some things a little earlier than ideal as Little Star moved in with 6 weeks until Christmas, but somehow we found a way to make it work by thinking about the best order to do things in.

·        For introductions, especially for babies, you will likely have made use of photo books for close family members for your child to familiarise with faces and names. These come in handy to reinforce key people again and again on the build up to real life meetings – we found this particularly helpful for Grandparents.

·        If your child has a comforter like a blankie or a dummy, make sure they’re on hand when meeting new people. It may seem a small thing, but them having a little piece of familiarity with them can be very soothing

·        If your circumstances mean that family helping with childcare will be a necessity in the near future, find small ways to build up to this. I ended up having a couple of times I had no choice but to ask Grandparents to babysit Little Star in the early days for short periods of time but ideally I would have waited longer. Ideally, it would take some months before you ask family to babysit, and certainly if this involves any over night stays, but of course it isn’t possible for everyone to wait this long, especially single adopters. We found good ways to build up were small things like watching them for half an hour while you grab a coffee or pop to the shop for a small chunk of me-time, or perhaps watching them while you attend an appointment. Unfortunately this is an area we’ve not been able to work on well as Lockdown was a spanner in the works so at present Little Star isn’t particularly used to being in others’ care almost a year in but we hope to resume working up to this as soon as we’re able.

·        This may seem overly rigid, but try not to compromise too much on your little one’s routine to work round others in the early days. In the first few months, a sense of familiarity and predictability will be important for your child and even seemingly innocuous changes can be quite destabilising. Others will understand and it needn’t be forever, but this will pay in dividends later when you’ve created a solid foundation to start from.

·        And finally, try to avoid overwhelm when you do branch out to doing meet ups. For me, meetups actually felt like a lifeline when I was feeling low and desperate for some familiar faces, but for many there may be a lot of pressure involved. People will naturally be excited to meet your child and this may result in slight pushiness or unannounced visits which are less than ideal. Keep the diary for the weeks following your arrival home clear as possible, limit visitors to what feels the right balance for you, and put expectations of “hosting” aside.

 And we come to the end of another rambly blog! As always, I hope this was useful, and I’m looking forward now to opening up the blog to more general adoption topics now we have followed a broad timeline of the process from Stage One. We will talk about the legal order in other blogs, but for now, our next stop will be reflections on our first 100 days as adopters – some thoughts I put together some while back when I was thinking about what we’d learned so far at that stage of the journey.

 Until then, take care and keep safe.

[d-is-here-to-help]

You are still valid if you have:

Borderline Personality Disorder PT 4

The credibility of individuals with personality disorders has been questioned at least since the 1960s. Two concerns are the incidence of dissociation episodes among people with BPD and the belief that lying is a key component of this condition.

Researchers disagree about whether dissociation, or a sense of detachment from emotions and physical experiences, impacts the ability of people with BPD to recall the specifics of past events. A 1999 study reported that the specificity of autobiographical memory was decreased in BPD patients. The researchers found that decreased ability to recall specifics was correlated with patients' levels of dissociation.

Some theorists argue that patients with BPD often lie.[155] However, others write that they have rarely seen lying among patients with BPD in clinical practice.[155] Regardless, lying is not one of the diagnostic criteria for BPD.

The belief that lying is a distinguishing characteristic of BPD can impact the quality of care that people with this diagnosis receive in the legal and healthcare systems. For instance, Jean Goodwin relates an anecdote of a patient with multiple personality disorder, now called dissociative identity disorder, who suffered from pelvic pain due to traumatic events in her childhood. Due to their disbelief in her accounts of these events, physicians diagnosed her with borderline personality disorder, reflecting a belief that lying is a key feature of BPD. Based upon her BPD diagnosis, the physicians then disregarded the patient's assertion that she was allergic to adhesive tape. The patient was in fact allergic to adhesive tape, which later caused complications in the surgery to relieve her pelvic pain.

Since BPD can be a stigmatizing diagnosis even within the mental health community, some survivors of childhood abuse who are diagnosed with BPD are re-traumatized by the negative responses they receive from healthcare providers. One camp argues that it would be better to diagnose these men or women with post-traumatic stress disorder, as this would acknowledge the impact of abuse on their behavior. Critics of the PTSD diagnosis argue that it medicalizes abuse rather than addressing the root causes in society. Regardless, a diagnosis of PTSD does not encompass all aspects of the disorder (see Brain abnormalities and Terminology).

Joel Paris states that "In the clinic ... Up to 80% of patients are women. That may not be true in the community." He offers the following explanations regarding these gender discrepancies:

"The most probable explanation for gender differences in clinical samples is that women are more likely to develop the kind of symptoms that bring patients in for treatment. Twice as many women as men in the community suffer from depression (Weissman & Klerman, 1985). In contrast, there is a preponderance of men meeting criteria for substance abuse and psychopathy (Robins & Regier, 1991), and males with these disorders do not necessarily present in the mental health system. Men and women with similar psychological problems may express distress differently. Men tend to drink more and carry out more crimes. Women tend to turn their anger on themselves, leading to depression as well as the cutting and overdosing that characterize BPD. Thus, anti-social personality disorder (ASPD) and borderline personality disorders might derive from similar underlying pathology but present with symptoms strongly influenced by gender (Paris, 1997a; Looper & Paris, 2000). We have even more specific evidence that men with BPD may not seek help. In a study of completed suicides among people aged 18 to 35 years (Lesage et al., 1994), 30% of the suicides involved individuals with BPD (as confirmed by psychological autopsy, in which symptoms were assessed by interviews with family members). Most of the suicide completers were men, and very few were in treatment. Similar findings emerged from a later study conducted by our own research group (McGirr, Paris, Lesage, Renaud, & Turecki, 2007)."

In short, men are less likely to seek or accept appropriate treatment, more likely to be treated for symptoms of BPD such as substance abuse rather than BPD itself (furthermore, the symptoms of BPD and ASPD may derive from a similar underlying aetiology) and possibly men are simply more likely to commit suicide prior to diagnosis.

Among men diagnosed with BPD there is also evidence of a higher suicide rate: "men are more than twice as likely as women—18 percent versus 8 percent"—to die by suicide.

There are also sex differences in borderline personality disorders. Men with BPD are more likely to abuse substances, have explosive temper, high levels of novelty seeking and have anti-social, narcissistic, passive-aggressive or sadistic personality traits. Women with BPD are more likely to have eating disorders, mood disorders, anxiety and post-traumatic stress.

Manipulative behavior to obtain nurturance is considered by the DSM-IV-TR and many mental health professionals to be a defining characteristic of borderline personality disorder. However, Marsha Linehan notes that doing so relies upon the assumption that people with BPD who communicate intense pain, or who engage in self-harm and suicidal behavior, do so with the intention of influencing the behavior of others. The impact of such behavior on others—often an intense emotional reaction in concerned friends, family members, and therapists—is thus assumed to have been the person's intention.

However, since people with BPD lack the ability to successfully manage painful emotions and interpersonal challenges, their frequent expressions of intense pain, self-harming, or suicidal behavior may instead represent a method of mood regulation or an escape mechanism from situations that feel unbearable. Linehan notes that if, for example, one were to withhold pain medication from burn victims and cancer patients, leaving them unable to regulate their severe pain, they would also exhibit "attention-seeking" and self-destructive behavior in order to cope.

The features of BPD include emotional instability; intense, unstable interpersonal relationships; a need for intimacy; and a fear of rejection. As a result, people with BPD often evoke intense emotions in those around them. Pejorative terms to describe people with BPD, such as "difficult", "treatment resistant", "manipulative", "demanding", and "attention seeking", are often used and may become a self-fulfilling prophecy, as the negative treatment of these individuals triggers further self-destructive behavior.

The stigma surrounding borderline personality disorder includes the belief that people with BPD are prone to violence toward others. While movies and visual media often sensationalize people with BPD by portraying them as violent, the majority of researchers agree that people with BPD are unlikely to physically harm others. Although people with BPD often struggle with experiences of intense anger, a defining characteristic of BPD is that they direct it inward toward themselves. One of the key differences between BPD and antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) is that people with BPD tend to internalize anger by hurting themselves, while people with ASPD tend to externalize it by hurting others.

In addition, adults with BPD have often experienced abuse in childhood, so many people with BPD adopt a "no-tolerance" policy toward expressions of anger of any kind. Their extreme aversion to violence can cause many people with BPD to overcompensate and experience difficulties being assertive and expressing their needs. This is one way in which people with BPD choose to harm themselves over potentially causing harm to others. Another way in which people with BPD avoid expressing their anger through violence is by causing physical damage to themselves, such as engaging in non-suicidal self-injury.

People with BPD are considered to be among the most challenging groups of patients to work with in therapy, requiring a high level of skill and training in the psychiatrists, therapists and nurses involved in their treatment. A majority of psychiatric staff report finding individuals with BPD moderately to extremely difficult to work with and more difficult than other client groups. Efforts are ongoing to improve public and staff attitudes toward people with BPD.

In psychoanalytic theory, the stigmatization among mental healthcare providers may be thought to reflect countertransference (when a therapist projects his or her own feelings on to a client). Thus, a diagnosis of BPD "often says more about the clinician's negative reaction to the patient than it does about the patient" and "explains away the breakdown in empathy between the therapist and the patient and becomes an institutional epithet in the guise of pseudoscientific jargon". This inadvertent countertransference can give rise to inappropriate clinical responses, including excessive use of medication, inappropriate mothering, and punitive use of limit setting and interpretation.

Some clients feel the diagnosis is helpful, allowing them to understand that they are not alone and to connect with others with BPD who have developed helpful coping mechanisms. However, others experience the term "borderline personality disorder" as a pejorative label rather than an informative diagnosis. They report concerns that their self-destructive behavior is incorrectly perceived as manipulative and that the stigma surrounding this disorder limits their access to healthcare. Indeed, mental health professionals frequently refuse to provide services to those who have received a BPD diagnosis.

Because of the above concerns, and because of a move away from the original theoretical basis for the term, there is ongoing debate about renaming borderline personality disorder. While some clinicians agree with the current name, others argue that it should be changed, since many who are labelled with borderline personality disorder find the name unhelpful, stigmatizing, or inaccurate. Valerie Porr, president of Treatment and Research Advancement Association for Personality Disorders states that "the name BPD is confusing, imparts no relevant or descriptive information, and reinforces existing stigma."

Alternative suggestions for names include emotional regulation disorder or emotional dysregulation disorder. Impulse disorder and interpersonal regulatory disorder are other valid alternatives, according to John G. Gunderson of McLean Hospital in the United States. Another term suggested by psychiatrist Carolyn Quadrio is post traumatic personality disorganization (PTPD), reflecting the condition's status as (often) both a form of chronic post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as well as a personality disorder. However, although many with BPD do have traumatic histories, some do not report any kind of traumatic event, which suggests that BPD is not necessarily a trauma spectrum disorder

The Treatment and Research Advancements National Association for Personality Disorders (TARA-APD) campaigned unsuccessfully to change the name and designation of BPD in DSM-5, published in May 2013, in which the name "borderline personality disorder" remains unchanged and it is not considered a trauma- and stressor-related disorder.

[pantysleep64-blog]

Is it Time to Change Your PPC Strategy or Agency or Approach?

Being a full service digital marketing agency, we are used to working with elusive data and fickle metrics. While we, for instance, know that getting a link on a relevant, authoritative site will work towards improving your metrics, quantifying its exact contribution is practically impossible, even after the fact.

If you’ve ever had to explain your methods and their purpose to a client, and you are professional instead of a snake oil salesman, you’ll welcome the chance to support your work, assumptions, and suggestions with some hard, clear, unambiguous numbers. PPC allows for this kind of accountability, by allowing you to track each investment and measure its final impact. This transparency means that miscommunications between agencies and clients should be easy to avoid. 

That’s why we’ll open this collection of advice on how to decide between changing your PPC agency; steering them in an alternate direction; or accepting that your approach to collaboration was the problem and making the necessary adjustments; with a general, rule of the thumb type rules, and slowly move on to the more specific ones.

But before we begin, just a little caveat – despite PPC being the least blurry part of digital marketing, that doesn’t mean it lends itself to sweeping statements and dogmatic rules much better than some of its cousins. So, even though we’ll try to emphasize this when talking about specific issues, let’s straighten it out right off the bat – even though a certain type of behavior in an agency you’ve hired to manage your PPC advertising may be a cause for alarm in 99% of the cases, don’t cut the strings before giving them a chance to explain their actions (or lack thereof).

So, if you want to take an intensely closer look at your PPC agency, you might want to focus on:

Their Reporting/Progress Transparency – The More You See, The Less You Owe

We’ve already made the common sense based assumption that, if an agency you hired is willing to provide you with detailed insight into everything they are doing for you, chances are they have nothing to hide. Well, that might be the conventional wisdom and might be true in the majority of cases, but there are chillingly creative examples of agencies using transparency to hide the truth instead of accentuating it. We’ll elaborate.

Imagine working with an agency which:

Denies you any kind of access to the AdWords account used to manage your campaign

Are slow to answer your questions, and the answers they provide don’t do much towards dispelling your confusion – i.e. they don’t solve your quandaries, only misdirect them until you can no longer follow the thread and give up

Lingers in vagueries, promises and meek attempts at infecting you with their obviously false optimism and enthusiasm

Seems like a clear-cut case of shenanigans, right? Well, most of the time.

In other instances, they might have a decent to completely valid reason for the way they act – respectively:

Ok, this one is tough. If you are, even upon inquiring about it prevented from accessing your AdWords account, there are really not many valid excuses that they can give you. If, however, they are using third party software or services; relying on proprietary, in-house tools for certain parts of the process, or anything along those lines; their decision to keep certain aspects of your campaign from you might be completely devoid of any malice or manipulation, they just might be protecting their methodology, resources, partners or whatever. After all, when you order a Coke in a restaurant, it doesn’t come with a recipe.

While they might be purposefully misleading you, and it might seem that they are using an improvised Creole of half jargon marketing speak and half empty phrases, you need to remember that the responsibility for the effectiveness of a conversation rarely rests on just one of the involved parties. In case we’ve failed to communicate our point – sure, they might be trying to confuse you, but, as uncomfortable as it may be to admit, they might actually be doing the best they can to involve and inform you, but are unable to do so because of your lack of appreciation for some of the finer points of the process. While this failure to describe and substantiate their decisions or tactics to a client can also be seen as a failure on their part, it’s not nearly as unforgivable or unmendable as trying to lie to a client.   

Pretty similar to the last item, but distinct enough. Again, it revolves around manipulation of client’s perception, but instead of relying on withholding critical information or anything so elaborately devious, agencies that are resorting to over-inflation of your expectations are, sometimes, doing nothing more subtle or sophisticated than straight out lying to you. If you’ve had any kind of contact with digital marketing, you have probably already learned to be wary of people making too specific promises. Even in data-driven PPC, those claiming to know exactly where you’ll be at the end of a campaign either don’t have the beginning of a clue how the whole thing works or are hoping that you don’t and that they can exploit your inexperience and trust. All that being said, if they seem too eager, it is still possible that they are perfectly honest, and simply take pleasure in their work.

As long as they provide you with all the info you ask for, and don’t try to over-inflate or avoid answers to your question, you should be good, right? Yeah, no. The final and the most brazen technique for stringing you along for as long they can is not based on skewing or hiding information, but instead on showering you with amounts of data that you couldn’t handle even if you were as skilled in PPC as they are.

Agencies attempting this will send mile long reports that you cannot make heads or tails of; list metric changes without giving you a clue on why you should care about them, or whether the fact that one of them is rising is good for you or a  signal of imminent disaster; and as a coup de grace, if you haven’t been made dizzy enough by swarms of context devoid numbers, they’ll spice the entire thing up with a couple of graphs that are, somehow, always climbing, but never really lead anywhere.

If this chapter seems like a needlessly elaborate way to say that sometimes people lie, and sometimes they don’t, here’s a brief summary of what you should be able to expect from your PPC agency.

Being able to access your AdWords account is a must

They provide you with clearly presented info that describes actual campaign progress and do their part to ensure that you understand what they are saying

Aside from regular progress reports, they need to provide any other information you request. If they refuse and fail to provide a valid reason for that refusal, they are either hiding something or simply can’t be bothered to assuage your doubts – neither is good

They should keep the conversation focused on results they’ve achieved, not sidetrack it to tasks completed. If they seem eager to accentuate the latter, they might be more interested in what they can charge you for than what they’ve actually done for you.

If you want to avoid misunderstandings, have your expectations as defined as possible before commencing a relationship with an agency – starting from the results you’re after, and ending with the type, extensiveness, and frequency of the reports you expect them to send.

Their Reputation

If you are thinking about reassessing your current PPC agency or hiring a new one, and have no other criteria to go by, checking their references, reviews, and, if you are prepared for a somewhat more demanding research, their past clients’ performance; should give you some insight into what you can expect.

You’ve probably conducted a similar research when hiring them, but now, after working with them for a while, you might be able to extend it or find new meaning in the info you have. For instance, you might have learned about their other clients, and perhaps even when exactly was it that they worked together. You can either choose to contact those former clients directly and ask about their experience with the agency or, if you prefer a sneakier approach, you can use tools like SEMrush or SpyFu to observe the performance of your agency’s past clients at the time of their collaboration. Naturally, data provided by these tools will sometimes be sparse or outdated, and interpreting it correctly will demand quite a bit of expertise.

While we’re on the subject of these or similar tools, if you get comfortable with them, you can also use them to get info on your current performance, as well as on the performance of your competitors. Aside from maybe giving you a chance to come across interesting strategies that you might want to later try yourself, comparing your campaigns with those done for your competitors might help you identify major faults, minor errors, or strong points of the agency you are working with.

Once you’ve learned what you could this way, you may as well give online reviews a go. Sure, they are often unreliable; people writing them might be intentionally spreading misinformation about the agency (positive or negative), they might be driven by strong emotions when leaving a review (we say emotions, plural, but if we’re being realistic it is usually just one – frustration); or they may have the purest of intentions and the ‘levelest’ of heads when leaving a review, but they simply may not have too firm a grasp on the subject they are talking about.

Even so, if you find enough reviews of the agency you are working with, you might:

Begin noticing patterns, which can, depending on how organic they look either indicate foul play, for instance, noticing the same, specific phrases used across different reviews, apparently left by different people, but clearly suggesting an organized promotional effort; or, on the other hand, the tendencies you start noticing may turn out to be a product of genuine shared enthusiasm, like different people praising the same aspects of the agency’s service, without it looking like a part of a coordinated effort.

Actually come across verifiable info on the agency, that you can use to expand your research.

Again, whatever it is that you conclude in the course of this research, we would suggest giving the agency you are working with the benefit of the doubt, and approaching them openly about what you’ve learned.

Just one final quick tip. If your agency (or the one you are thinking about hiring) claims to be a Google Partner, there is a slight possibility that they are one of a decreasing number of agencies who still think they can get away with lying about something like that. Naturally, someone who believes that it’s a good idea to use a rough approximation of Google Partners logo to con people, probably couldn’t fly under your radar for too long before exposing themselves through sheer incompetence, but if you want to know instantly whether you are dealing with one of these insultingly lazy grifters, you can search their agency by name in the official Google Partners Hub, and in just a couple of minutes either expose them as frauds, or verify their credibility.

Their Performance

Most of the items listed so far come down to nothing better than circumstantial evidence, hearsay, and hunches that you may or may not want to listen to. While all of this can give you an idea of who you are working with, ultimately, the most straightforward and sensible method is to take a close look at what they are doing for you. Here are some of the things that you should consider.

Basic Campaign Setup

Chances are, you’ve already been keeping an eye on the way your campaign is being led, and if you haven’t, the agency in charge of your PPC may not be to blame if you are not receiving the expected returns from this channel. You can perform as extensive a research as you feel you have the time for, but if you just want a quick run through, the checklist of essentials would include:

Targeted keywords – are the keywords you are pursuing relevant, realistic, and potentially feasible

Targeted audience – has the agency supplied a list of negative keywords to eliminate pointless impressions/clicks; is their geo-targeting adequate; and basically, have they done their best to save you money will still reaching everyone you want to reach

Goal setting and tracking – are you meeting your goals? If you are, is that because the agency was less than ambitious when setting them? The same goes for metrics, are they only observing those they can count on improving, or are they focused on true KPIs?

How is your budget allocated? – PPC is transparent when it comes to expenditures, however, that doesn’t mean it’s easy to decide how much to invest in which segment of your campaign. One strategy might be a complete flop with a daily budget of $50 and an amazing success with just another $50 invested. The truth is, even though you should give this a look, chances are you can’t really ever be sure that there’s not a better approach than the one you are trying at the moment.

Having worked with a number of clients who were trying to stay interested in their campaign, but didn’t really have too clear an idea of how to do so, take it from us – while you should be as involved as possible, this doesn’t mean that your agency is supposed to update you on every single thing they do for you. In other words, while your campaign is being set and after it starts unrolling is the ideal time to learn all you want about it, and specify all the details with the agency you’ve hired to carry it out for you.

At this point, no question is too inane, and no suggestion obsolete.

However, if you keep pestering your agency every couple of days, expecting them to account for every minuscule detail of how they are managing your campaign, they might drop you as a client long before you decide on whether or not to give them the boot.

This is something that applies to just about every suggestion given in this post – while you shouldn’t allow anyone to manipulate or deceive you, you also can’t act paranoid with people who are just trying to do the job you’ve hired them for. Once you’ve decided that you are working with a credible agency, they will need a fair amount of your trust if they are to actually formulate and execute a successful campaign.     

Account Change History

While there are campaigns which, once you set them, don’t require too much attention, they are very rare, and usually, just something that you have on a backburner, i.e. they are as optimized as they are ever likely to get, and are probably not costing you too much. However, for a huge majority of campaigns, constant monitoring and tweaking is absolutely essential. When you consider the daily changes in the market you are after; shifts in keyword popularity; degree and type of competitor activity; and a host of other unstable factors that have relevance on how your campaign is led, it becomes clear that a “set and forget it” approach is by no means adequate.

Luckily, your AdWords account gives you easy access to Change History log, where you can review campaign modifications made in the recent past, and check first-hand how vigilant the agency you are working with really is.

Are they trying to respond to the trends cropping up in the market you are after? Are they considering better keyword combinations? Are they performing an adequate number of tests with ad copy, landing pages or targeted audiences (if they aren’t, is it because you’ve been too stingy or controlling, preventing them from exploring anything but the safest options)?

Naturally, you can see as much activity and as many changes as you like, this still doesn’t necessarily mean that your agency is doing a good job, but a serious lack of activity, especially with newer, larger, or stubbornly underperforming campaigns is usually a bad sign. The same goes for A/B testing – just because they are doing it, doesn’t mean they are doing it right; but if they aren’t it might be because they are:

Not interested in providing you with better worth for your money

Not capable of doing so

Too constrained by the terms you’ve given them, or by the type of relationship you have formed to even consider doing something without direct payoff – in which case, you should really reconsider your approach, as most serious agencies wouldn’t be willing to work with a client of that type

Results

What all of it boils down to. Is your ROI close to what they’ve promised or perhaps even better? Is this marketing channel performing better than the other ones you are investing in? Have you had an open and honest collaboration? Even if all the answers are positive, could you have done even better, and if you do want to do better in the future, do you stick with the same agency, but refine your communication, or do you try to sign another one?  

Take it from us, once you build a relationship with an agency, and once you determine them to be credible, dedicated and capable of reliable, if not always too precise forecasting, you should stick with them as long as you are not planning to drastically change the scope of your campaign.

The Final Verdict

Even after taking a long, hard look at your agency’s reporting, reputation and performance, you might still be at a loss regarding your next step. If in doubt, we suggest you start from first taking the least severe approach – changing your attitude and approach to your collaboration first, then, if that fails to appease your doubts; trying to force a change in their strategy; and eventually, if neither of the less drastic tactics works, consider finding a new PPC agency to take care of your AdWords campaigns.

As disappointed with the results as you may be, you may stand to lose more by hiring, briefing and getting accustomed to another company; but at the same time, as well as an agency may be performing for you, there’s no point in sticking with them if you find out they have been lying to you.

If you are still having a hard time making up your mind, hiring another agency for a detailed PPC audit may be the perfect way to go. Even if you are not planning on changing the agency handling your PPC, affording them and yourself with a fresh perspective provided by an outside consultant can only help you refine your marketing efforts and reassess the way you work with agencies of this kind.  

Source: https://fourdots.com/blog/time-to-change-your-ppc-strategy-agency-approach-3697

[siliconwebx]

Readability Score: What It Is, Why It’s Important, & How to Get a Good One on Every Post

Writing is, at its core, communication. If you are unable to communicate your point to your audience, you fail. Regardless of how well-thought out your argument is, how large your vocabulary, or how salient of a point you’re making…if people have no idea what you’re talking about, it’s all for nothing. Luckily, we can quantify that clarity with something called your readability score. With it, you can make sure the content of your website always reaches the broadest audience possible.

What is Readability Score?

In general, it’s how easy to read your content is. Sounds obvious, right? But because people read at different levels, what a Master’s student considers readable is different than what a freshman in high school does. What’s readable to me might not be readable for you.

And if you write only to what’s readable for you without taking into account others, there will be misunderstanding, ambiguity, and frustration around your content. Thus…the readability score.

With tools like the Flesch-Kincaid Readability Tests, you can determine at roughly what level a reader needs to be to understand your text. There are other metrics and scales out there that take different elements into consideration, and some are more subjective than others. But for the most part, this is what goes into determining readability:

sentence length

too many short sentences give the content a staccato feeling of starting and stopping too often

too many long sentences make the content feel burdensome and cause the reader to lose focus

scanability

use of headers

paragraph length

vocabulary level

how common each word is

syllable count for each word

the overall length of each word (on average)

active vs passive voice

use of standard punctuation and mechanics

Like we said, there are multiple readability tests that you can use, but one of the most popular is the Flesh-Kincaid readability score. Most online tools that look over your text for readability (such as Readable.io and Yoast SEO), have a Flesch-Kincaid score built in. With that in mind, let’s take a look at that scale in particular.

Flesch-Kincaid Readability Score

Flesch-Kincaid uses a scale of 1-100. The higher the score, the easier it is to read.

Flesch wrote a great article on how to find your score manually, and he gave a pretty simple explanation of how to use the 0-100 scale.

You can also use this formula: Multiply the average sentence length by 1.015. Multiply the average word length by 84.6. Add the two numbers. Subtract this sum from 206.835. The balance is your readability score.

The scale shows scores from 0 to 100. Zero means practically unreadable and 100 means extremely easy. The minimum score for Plain English is 60, or about 20 words per sentence and 11/2 syllables per word. Conversational English for consumers should score at least 80, or about 15 words per sentence and 1 1/2 syllables per word.

Here’s a quick reference chart he made for it.

There are tools out there that do this for us, thankfully. But doing this a few times on some of your pieces of writing gives you a good idea of where you stand.

Wikipedia even has a useful chart to show grade-level equivalency for the scores.

Flesch said that we should be aiming for an 80 on the scale. That means we should be looking at a 7th grade reading level (that’s 12ish years old in the United States). When you consider that age, it can take some care to make all your writing readable by that range. Especially if you are working in a highly technical field or trying to explain a particularly complex issue.

Some tactics like not using technical jargon (such as referring to an ethernet cable solely as CAT5) are fairly straightforward. But making sure that your sentence length is appropriate for your target audience or that your headings are broken up by few enough words aren’t as easy to eyeball. Especially if your audience isn’t the general public, but a slightly more advanced readership. For instance, this article scores a 67.8. That’s fine because you’re a technical audience with a foundational knowledge of the subject.

Now, let’s look at some of the tools you can use to keep your writing as accessible as possible.

Top 3 Readability Tools and Calculators

Having a good readability score is so important to publishing successfully that you will have no problem finding both free and premium services to check your work. No matter your budget, there is something out there to help you get a better readability score.

1. Grammarly

One of the most widely known writing tools on the internet, Grammarly tells you in real-time (if you have the browser extension installed) what parts of your writing need to be either clarified or are straight-up wrong. In the free version, you get spelling, punctuation/mechanics, and basic grammar checks.

In the premium version, you get all that plus word-choice suggestions, more complex grammatical analysis, and more in-depth checking across the board. Given that you can have the real-time checking for free with a simple browser extension, you should definitely check it out. I personally run everything I write through Grammarly at least once because…why not?

2. Readable.io

A premium option you have is Readable.io. While the service is paid, the plans start at $5 per month for their basic services. You can scan existing content by URL or as a file. They provide downloadable reports and email scanning, too. If you go into their higher tiers, you can simply put in the primary URL of your site, and they will scan the entire thing and send you a report of what works and what doesn’t. You also have the choice of automated alerts is something goes wonky — perhaps if a contributor doesn’t meet the standards and the work needs to be fixed. If you’re truly serious about making sure your audience gets your best foot put forward, Readable.io is an option.

3. WebFX Readability Test Tool

Coming into third (though this is in no particular order) is the WebFX Readability Test Tool. This tool is impressive. What’s even more impressive is the price. It’s free. Not only can you copy/paste the entire text directly to be analyzed, insert a single link at a time, or even include a button in your footer or sidebar where you can dynamically check any page on your site. When you get the results back, you get not only the Flesch-Kincaid results, but also the SMOG, Gunning Fog, ARI, and Coleman Liau scores. Plus the breakdown of how each score was calculated.

For a free tool, you can’t get much better than this. I mean, just look at that analysis you get from just copy/pasting a URL.

WordPress Readability Solutions

There are a few players in the readability and SEO game for WordPress. And if you want to get some useful info in your dashboard, you can for free. In general, WordPressers look to Yoast for the readability score for their posts. They do so because over the years, Yoast has made such an impact that many of the previously used plugins have not been maintained (but still exist on the repository). That doesn’t mean Yoast is your only option, though. There are some good alternatives still being maintained.

1. Yoast SEO

Yoast SEO is the big dog in this yard. Not only does it keep track of the keyword targets you’re writing for, but it also has a completely separate section dedicated to the readability of your posts. You are given a rating of red, yellow, or green depending on where your content falls on the scale. You are graded on a lot of different points, and you don’t need to get a green rating in all of them to be good. They’re just suggestions, after all.

While getting a green (as in you’re good to go) rating with Yoast isn’t a guarantee that your blog will take over the internet, it’s a good indication that you’ve done enough to make it stand above the crowd.

2. SEMrush SEO Writing Assistant

If there’s one company who knows what Google wants out of your content, it’s SEMrush. So when they put out a writing assistant plugin, you jump on it. This plugin will go over your content, give you a Flesch-Kincaid score, suggest keywords based on your content, help you adjust based on the top Google results, and even check for plagiarism to make sure your content isn’t gonna get in trouble. Once your content is scored (in real time), you will get suggestions based on which sentences and words you can improve. SEMrush has proven themselves again and again. This is no different.

3. Squirrly SEO

If you’re not the type who wants numbers to rate your content, and you just want to know that it’s good enough for Google, Squirrly SEO is for you. Where the other tools give you a number on the Flesch-Kincaid (or another) scale for you to interpret, Squirrly tells you in what ways your content is adequate or inadequate.

It also tells you whether or not you have keyword stuffed so much that your content is unreadable (the Over Optimization metric). Probably the most useful is when it tells you that the article is human-friendly or not. Because Google runs on algorithms and the Flesch-Kincaid is done by formula, Squirrly SEO looks over your copy and tests for semantic readability, not just mechanical and grammatical. This one is absolutely a contender for WordPressers who want to rank and get read.

Tips for Achieving Readability

Readability is quantifiable. Obviously. We’ve gone over that a lot. But it’s because of that quantification that we can put together a quick list of rules for you to keep in the back of your mind.

Keep Sentences Short(ish)

If you feel like you’ve been typing for a long time, full stop. It can be very easy to get into your flow and just keep typing. We have an idea, and we want to tell people. So we never use simple sentences. We use compound sentences because they’re able to get our point across better. Until they run on for multiple lines. People don’t read everything. They scan over content. They’re not going to read James Joyce-length sentences on a blog. Even if they’re the best sentences you’ve ever written.

Write Like You’re Talking to a Kid

It’s hard to look at your own writing and say, “Yep, that’s written at an 80 on the Flesch-Kincade scale.” In fact, that’s almost impossible. Some of the best advice I have ever been given was to make sure that when you’re explaining something, break it down like you’d break it down for a child. That doesn’t mean dumb it down. Kids are smart, after all. They’re sharp. It means that you need to simplify it.

The difference in dumbing something down and simplifying something is this:

Complex: To make sure it achieves escape velocity from the surface of the Earth, roughly 11.186 km/s, a rocket’s fuel must be carefully calculated, as the mass of the necessary combustible fuel will differ in the launch’s relation to the Earth’s rotation.

Simple: Because fuel is so heavy, a rocket will need different amounts, depending on which direction it is aimed when it launches.

Dumbed Down: Rockets go boom to get to outer space.

That’s all it is. You don’t have to lose the overall concept, and you can adjust the amount of simplification at any time. However, if you think of how you’d explain the process to a child, you will come up with some extremely readable copy that you can then go back through and spruce up.

Hit Enter More Than You Want To

People hate walls of text. Bulleted lists are great for scanning, and so are short sentences. On top of that, short paragraphs are great, too. In general, you never want a paragraph to take more than a handful of lines on your page.

And try to add in single-line paragraphs every now and then for variety or emphasis.

By breaking up the text visually and using the whitespace of your site, your readers will be able to more easily get the gist of your content. If you hit them with a 600-word wall of text with no whitespace to break it up, they’re going to bounce and not return.

Read Your Text Aloud

If you have trouble reading what you’ve written out loud, something is off. After all, the whole point here is to be readable. When the person who wrote the stuff stumbles over words, gets winded before a sentence is over, or just flat-out drones on and on, your text needs jazzing up.

You might not be in an environment to read it fully aloud, but you can whisper quietly to yourself and get the same results. Fun fact: this is also a great way to get yourself back on track after a break. Just read the last few sentences out loud, and you will more easily be able to regain your train of thought.

Don’t Try to Sound Like a Writer

When I taught freshman composition, I told my students every semester to stop trying to sound like a writer. They thought if they wanted to succeed, they had to write in this grand, sweeping, epic style, using words they barely knew the meaning of (so they badly miscontextualized them) and couldn’t pronounce. When I would ask them to explain what a sentence meant — because I seriously couldn’t parse it — they wouldn’t be able to explain it, either.

That is literally unreadable.

Like I said at the beginning, writing is about communication. We know how to communicate. We talk every single day. So my advice to you is the same advice I gave them: don’t try to sound like a writer. Write like you talk. 

Conclusion

While much of the internet today is populated by bots and run by algorithms, the content that we all produce is meant for humans. So it’s our job to make sure that real people can understand our work. Keyword stuffing, trying to sound too smart, or just getting excited and writing far too much without stopping can affect the readability of what you’re writing. So whether you use Yoast’s plugin, manually work out the Flesch-Kincaid readability score on your own, or just take some of these tips and try to work them in organically, your readers will thank you. And so will your search engine rankings.

What tips do you have to maintain readability in your writing?

Article featured image by Studio_G / shutterstock.com

The post Readability Score: What It Is, Why It’s Important, & How to Get a Good One on Every Post appeared first on Elegant Themes Blog.

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Info about the Credit Repair Businesses

Nearly everywhere you turn now, the subject of small business funding comes up. The National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) has recently reported that the amount of authorities business funding solutions endorsed SBA 7(a) loans have significantly dropped during the recession. In actuality, just 41% of businesses obtained funding from all different resources while 16% were unable to get or did not request any credit.

The simple fact is that the conditions are ripe for private creditors to measure up to the plate. The personal creditors know there is a chance to provide capital to businesses and it's a win-win E-Fix Credit Inc. circumstance. The creditors can provide business loans, venture capital or startup funding and earn a superb return on their investments. The businesses get the money that they need.

You just can't help wondering how so many companies endured the downturn when they could not get any credit. But don't be fooled by the amounts. Many of those 59% of businesses which didn't get credit from conventional lending sources did earn money. Their money came from angel investors and equity partners as well as many others. There are plenty of companies that could qualify for this type of funding also, but they do not know how to request it.

Working Around Marketplace Inefficiencies

The money markets are inefficient in that lenders and borrowers can't always find each other in a manner that maximizes financing. That's the reason there's a marketplace that's composed of private funders who would like to lend capital to businesses. These lenders offering business financing go right to the source making it simpler for borrowers to locate investors and lenders to find borrowers. Because traditional financing sources are making it so difficult to match lenders and borrowers, it's perfect conditions for a private business funding marketplace.

It's a simple fact that the tiny companies were responsible for producing 64% of new jobs within the previous 15 years. That's astonishing and makes you wonder why conventional lenders like banks would cut off charge just like they have. You'd think they would assure companies have access to funding, yet it's understood that trillions of dollars are only sitting in corporate accounts and on bank balance sheets.

In reality, the private small business financing market delivers a greater assortment of funding choices. The large financial companies and banks aren't lending so it's left up to the free enterprise markets to give the capital in other ways. There is a busy marketplace made up of private capital lenders and borrowers that have venture capital and startup financing. Those are two of the most difficult classes to finance. It's possible to discover angel investors, business loans and even equity partners.

Would You Know How?

Among the questions frequently asked is this: if there is financing available then why aren't more businesses tapping into it? The solution lies more in customer attitudes and lack of knowledge about the personal lending markets.

Don't understand the investors exist

Don't know how to prepare a quality business plan

Do not know how big the business funding america private market

Don't Need to ask after being turned down so many times by large banks

Do not need to pay exorbitant loan fees billed to riskier enterprises

The thought of asking for cash from equity partners or asking venture capital is too intimidating for new companies searching for startup financing. Let us face it - moving from bank to bank just to be turned down is demoralizing.

Employing a central purpose for matching lenders and borrowers makes sense in many ways. It's an efficient market due to centralization. It a economical market since you don't have to travel around the country searching for opportunities. But first and foremost, it offers funding solutions for companies that are ready to grow or expand and that's good for the economy.

You Will Learn Everything in Life With One Of These Approaches

The Right Way: (the law of proxy, gaining knowledge from other people's experience and expertise, and through studying about history.)

The Hard Way: (from your own labors, egotism, inexperience, overconfidence, repair bad credit fast services trial and error. = "The school of hard knocks.")

The Long Hard Way: (This manner may be necessary before actual positive change can take place. But this way is better than not learning the lesson at all. Individuals may very well see the read this article journey they're On and have the solutions; nevertheless, they are hanging on to some thing that keeps them on the incorrect street so in the end this experience will not be for nothing.)

Never: (where people keep making the same mistake constantly, is not that the meaning of insanity, thinking the error will not occur even if we continue doing the same thing over and over again?)

BUSINESS FUNDING COMPONENTS INVESTORS LOOK AT

VISION: Investors look first and foremost for 2 things; do you know how people see your eyesight and will you present your vision in a clear and succinct way. If either the Investor or you can't find either side of the coin and have an intelligent conversation, then you won't receive the funding you want.

COMPATIBILITY: Your vision has to be compatible with all the Investors' E-Fix Credit Inc. business financing method to be successfully financed.

STRATEGY (IES): Suitable Business Funding will only be reached by being opened to make the most of different approaches such as submitting many programs and going for several types of business financing.

SUBSTANCE: Why does your business plan have worth? Does it show Investors the necessary elements such as; need for your product or service, favorable expansion, reliable info, etc.? You may only get business financing if you meet their guidelines.

SUPPORT: In what capacities can Investors support your business/project? This is important as 60% of all start ups are relying on their own business/project to encourage them and their families through this whole business financing procedure!

YOU: You're the Wild Card to getting business financing! If you set at the moment, determination, and dedication to operating throughout the machine you will be prosperous. But, decide to speed up the procedure by taking short cuts and you will fail.

BUSINESS PLAN, APPLICATIONS, and PROPOSALS: This is exactly what must be done and it needs to be done right to make the ideal impression! Whatever, you do no matter caliber will create an impression; to save yourself a hassle make certain it's the right impression the first time!

REVIEW: REVIEW, REVIEW, and REVIEW make sure that your application, business plan, and proposal is sellable, well composed, and complete!

RESEARCH: Investigate Many Different Kinds of Business Funding do not settle on just one:

1. Business sky blue credit repair Loans

2. SBA Loans

3. Government Grants

4. Foundation This blog Grants

5. Venture Capital

6. Angel Investors

7. Non Traditional Loans

8. Business E-Fix Credit Inc. repair business Credit

9. Additional Avenues

SIMPLICITY: Simplicity is the name of this game; (KISS) Keep it Simple Stupid! The worst thing you could do is to write a company funding credit repair specialist san francisco proposal full of a lot of technical jargon; as the perfect Investor for your project may have zero experience in your area.

If you're a new business owner you may find yourself a little confused by the different kinds of loans and investors. Among the most complicated to understand is referred to as a venture capital agreement. This for more abou us on Wikipedia type of arrangement is often overlooked, but it might be an excellent opportunity for you to finance your business. Within this guide we'll discuss company financing keys which involve enterprise capital.

What is Venture Capital?

To put it differently, it is the assets that a business owner places down when asking an investor to get a loan. This may sound much like a bank loan with an attached private assurance, but it is a little different. As it is an investor putting down the cash, they hope to gain a larger profit from the company in contrast to what they invested in it. A Venture capital firm will also occasionally wish to have some rights on how your company is run, believing that they want to make a big gain.

Only specific types of organizations are suitable for this type of agreement. If you're a company that is expected to make a massive return gain in a short quantity of time, then this could be among the best kept business bad credit debt help financing keys for you. If your business is expected to have slow growth, only requires a small cash for startup costs, or if you are decided to run your business your own way, venture funds is not the thing to do.

Pros and Cons of Venture Capital

There are many things to consider prior to obtaining a financing. Although they are a means for one to completely fund your enterprise, you have to sacrifice a lot to do so. Not only are you potentially giving the assets up You put down, you also can not have as much control over your company. On the other hand, not needing as much control may be a fantastic thing. Venture capital investors are highly experienced in whatever they do, often limiting themselves to a single sort of company to put money into. They'll have the ability to direct you towards the very best business solutions, although they may make changes in your institution's organization, possibly including how it's managed.

It is also rather difficult to find this sort of loan. The investors really want to see that they will generate a high profit off of your business in a short quantity of time. You have to have strong foundations for your company plans and proof that your idea will work. You ought to have the ability to make the investor enthusiastic about your business, or else they will think it is not worthwhile for them to invest in. Do not think you are confined to this type of loan however, because there are plenty of other business financing keys out there that you may not know about. If you think this isn't for you, think about looking into a personal investor, or getting funding from banks.

Starting a business is among the most exciting and challenging things you can certainly do. To help you meet the challenges of beginning a new business, you can turn into business consulting options for advice, tools, and ideas.

Starting a new business is both enjoyable and challenging. Determination, commitment, and effort can be your investment for the first few decades. To minimize the challenges and make it easier assembly them, you can request assistance from a business consulting firm.

Access to knowledge and expertise

You probably believe access to venture capital financing, a topnotch staff or state-of-the-art equipment are all you need to observe a brand new company through its formative years. Even though these things are important, financing, the skill of your groups and your gear might not be sufficient when difficulties begin piling up.

Consider the individual regarded among the greatest business leaders ever: Steve Jobs. He was called brilliant as well as a trailblazer when he found Apple. Still, Jobs needed to lose his organization and learn important lessons from the years before his return to Apple, where he turned it into one of the most important companies in the world.

Experience and knowledge are important when challenges face a business, or in spite of the simple, everyday things required to successfully run one. In the competitive E-FixCredit Inc. business environment of today, you may not have the opportunity to learn. A business consulting company provides you access to this knowledge and experience.

Running a business requires at least a working understanding of several disciplines. You or perhaps your close partners don't have any opportunity to understand http://.e-fixcredit.com them, or the tools to recruit enough people to cover the openings. A company consulting firm can easily perform those tasks for your advantage.

Usually, these businesses have consultants who run their own companies and concentrate in each area. If you have questions, then they most likely have the answer. When challenges become more demanding, the set of knowledge and experience in a business consulting company can mean the difference between your organization growing or not.

Getting the Ideal tools

An additional means to fulfill the many challenges in running and developing a business is to have the correct tools. Again, funding, people and equipment can only take you so far. If you do not have even some of the more basic administrative instruments, all of your venture capital, team members, and advanced equipment will mean nothing.

Getting a full suite of business consulting services can help. Financial experts help you make paperwork like income statements correctly and fast. Making the ideal business program can E-Fix Credit Inc. Social Profile be difficult, so these packages give several templates that you can easily use. Report generators help you make presentations that are both enlightening and professional looking.

Even better, these company consulting alternatives are online so that they are accessible anytime, anyplace, so long as there's an online connection. This may be important when you have to recheck your business plan during awkward times. Having the important documents and data of your company easily accessible can go a long way to ensuring you meet the challenges of conducting one.