Sell Your Ideas While Achieving Peace of Mind Sick of the frenzied whirlwind your life becomes when a deadline looms? Stressed about relying on that last-ditch overnight service to squeeze your proposal in under the wire? Does even thinking about writing a proposal or making a presentation freeze you in a crippling panic? Help is here. Whether you are requesting a raise, laying out a radically new marketing concept, pitching a book, or seeking a grant, The Zen of Proposal Writing provides solid advice, tangible examples, and the keys to remaining calm and in control. Drawing on the techniques and wit of Zen, Kitta Reeds shares her secrets as a seasoned professional--illustrating the stages of proposal writing with classic Zen parables coupled with on-point advice and practical instruction, including: * One Hand Clapping: The Sound We Make When We Forget to Connect with Our Readers * Zazen Meditation: How to Write that Proposal in Spite of Yourself * The Simplicity of a Zen Garden: How to Grow Strong Verbs and Clean Up After Yourself * Right Speech: How to Give a Sweet Pitch--and Win Over Your Audience With an expert at your side, learn to eliminate stress, hand-wringing, and procrastination while you calmly compose an effective and winning proposal, the Zen way.

The most innovative, unconventional, and profoundly practical career guide available--newly revised and updated With today's economic uncertainties, millions of Americans realize they must seize control over their own career paths. They want work that not only pays the bills but also allows them to pursue their real passions. In this revised edition, Laurence Boldt updates and revises his revolutionary guide to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century workplace. The first part of this book helps readers to identify the work that they really want to do, while the second provides practical, active steps to finding or creating that work. Zen and the Art of Making a Living goes beyond inspiration, providing a proven formula for bringing creativity, dignity, and meaning to every aspect of the work experience.

Investigators, their home institutions, and funding agencies play significant roles in the development and outcomes of scientific projects. Submitting a proposal to a funding agency is only one dimension of a multivariable and complex funding process, and understanding this is a good first step toward unlocking the puzzle behind why some research p

"The Zen of Writing" Author Alan O’Hashi is walking proof that perfection and organization are highly overrated. His parents and grandparents were all artists and applied a zen approach to nurturing their work, which influenced him as a creative entrepreneur. Rather than rigid plans and goals, they all were very contemplative and relied more on intuition and accepted life how it happened with no judgment. The story is partly a DIY personal growth book about how the author overcame self-doubt and perfection as a “Model Minority." He’s now more confident, no longer obsessed with perfection, and has become a prolific writer. The other part is a memoir about how the importance of owning life experiences and not being afraid to write about those. His writing is now much more emotional and no longer superficial. “All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.” is what Ernest Hemingway says about the essence of good storytelling. This book is for anyone who is a writer of organized words, whether they are fiction, nonfiction, poetry, work memos, grant applications, academic papers, or love letters. Read this book if you’re a professional writer, a novelist just starting out, or a screenwriter with a half-done script lost deep in the bowels of a computer hard drive. Are you a writer who wonders how to get over self-doubt, kick your obsession with perfection, and for whatever reason, can’t quite finish your writing project? This book provides insight and a few tips through the author’s experiences about becoming more confident in your ability to balance perfection and accuracy that results in a higher likelihood of finishing your work. Author Alan O’Hashi relates how his lessons from life were significant influences that resulted in his first book pitch based on a typed-up piece of paper in June. He signed a contract and finished an 80,000-word manuscript five months later. Alan is a native of Cheyenne, Wyoming, where he began writing as a 12-year-old reporter for his junior high school newspaper, “The Tumbleweed.” He relates his growth as a writer surviving a 1,000-year flood, an emergency landing of an airplane with a fire on board, two job layoffs after 9/11, and getting up from his death bed.

Undoing the Silence offers guidance to help both citizens and professionals influence democratic process through letters, articles, reports and public testimony. Louise Dunlap, PhD, began her career as an activist writing instructor during the Free Speech Movement of the 1960s. She learned that listening and gaining a feel for audience are just as important to social transformation as the outspoken words of student leaders atop police cars. "Free speech is a first step, but real communication matches speech with listening and understanding. That is when thinking shifts and change happens." Dunlap felt compelled to go where the silences were deepest because her work aimed not just at teaching but also at healing both individual voices and an ailing collective voice. Her tales of those adventures and what she knows about the culture of silence -- how gender, race, education, class, and family work to quiet dissent -- are interwoven with practical methods for people to put their most challenging ideas into words. Louise Dunlap gives writing workshops around the country for universities and social justice, environmental, and peace organizations that help reluctant writers get past their internal censors to find their powerful voice. Her insight strengthens strategic thinking and her "You can do it!" approach makes social-action writing achievable for everyone.

Want to publish your book? Learn how--it's easier than you think! Charismatic authors and literary agents Jeff Herman and Deborah Levine Herman have successfully sold hundreds of titles and learned--through trial and error--how to write a flawless book proposal that publishers can't resist. Now you can benefit from their hard work and publishing savvy. In this new edition, they offer guidance and advice that will inspire, educate, and, most importantly, give you the necessary edge to get your book published. They explain: * How to shape your idea and create a title * Ways to get to know the market and competition * Tips on writing an effective outline, query letter, and sample chapter * The art and science of fiction and nonfiction book proposals * How ten actual proposals (included here) were successfully sold to publishers--and why "A submission from Jeff Herman always gets moved to the top . . . his new book will show you how to move to the top."--Frederic W. Hills Vice President, Simon & Schuster "This book will take writers to the highest level of proposal writing and success."--Roger Cooper Quality Paperback Book Club "If you want your proposal to ignite a busy editor's interest, read this book."--Adrienne Hickey Senior Acquisitions Editor, AMACOM Books

No matter whether you are approaching public or private sponsors, this thorough and detailed step-by-step guide will enable you to plan and write winning proposals. Grantseeking is always a competitive process. As organizational needs outstrip resources, groups turn to grants as a means of strengthening their financial footing while pursuing their missions. This book draws on the authors' three decades of grantseeking experiences in writing successful proposals, conducting grant workshops nationwide, reviewing government and foundation proposals, and critiquing application guidelines for grantmakers to lead readers through the process of planning and writing successful proposals. The authors first provide practical strategies for project planning, including identifying sponsors, matching grantseeker needs to sponsor priorities, and qualifying prospects through pre-proposal contacts. The authors then guide users systematically through proposal writing, including introducing a template for letter proposals to private foundations and corporations, describing the primary elements of government proposals, and providing tips for constructing a realistic budget. This advice as well as the key questions to answer before you begin writing; actual proposals that were declined, with rejection reasons; and complete sample letter proposals comprised in this volume will help both beginning and experienced grantseekers to better plan and develop fundable projects.

Filled with tips and survival skills from writers and fund-raising officers at nonprofits of all sizes, Writing for a Good Cause is the first book to explain how to use words well to win your cause the money it needs. Whether you work for a storefront social action agency or a leading university, the authors' knowledgeable, practical advice will help you: Write the perfect proposal—from the initial research and interviews to the final product Draft, revise, and polish a "beguiling, exciting, can't-put-it-down and surely can't-turn-it-down" request for funds Create case statements and other big money materials—also write, design, and print newsletters, and use the World Wide Web effectively Survive last-minute proposals and other crises—with the Down-and-Dirty Proposal Kit! Writing for a Good Cause provides everything fund raisers, volunteers, staff writers, freelancers, and program directors need to know to win funds from individual, foundation, and corporate donors.

Includes, beginning Sept. 15, 1954 (and on the 15th of each month, Sept.-May) a special section: School library journal, ISSN 0000-0035, (called Junior libraries, 1954-May 1961). Also issued separately.

Shiga Naoya was a giant of Japanese literature but he is barely known outside Japan. This book is the first study of Shiga to explore in depth his affinities - both aesthetic and philosophic - with the long tradition of Zen art.