Editor’s Choice — Top 10: The Stories You Must Not Ignore
Selecting and presenting the best from Illumination today
Spending time reading the stories written by other superb writers can be productive if those writers become your friends.
After the so-called demise of Medium curation, and after lots of encouragement by Dr Mehmet Yildiz — the Chief Editor and founder of Illumination who wants the editors to highlight high-quality work — I have become convinced that like every other human activity, writing is more fun when your friends support you.
To help Illumination writers as an editor, I read many stories every day — before and after publishing them. But some of those stories, you should read with full concentration— without skipping and skimming.
Here is a list of the top 10 selected stories to chew on today:
10. 3 Ways To Decolonise Your Bookshelf
Shaheen Hashmi wrote this masterpiece but you must have missed it.
Each book we read transforms us in subtle yet radical ways. Leaving a small imprint on us, our thinking and perceptions of the world shift and grow with reach read. It’s like finding something new in a familiar picture, something you cannot unsee. Or like adding a new lens to your perspective glasses. Whether you agree with this new perspective or not, it inevitably becomes a part of you.
9. 6 Proven Ways to Generate Article Ideas
Kristina Segarra is the author of this brilliant story. You must have missed it, but every writer is looking for such pieces.
As a writer, I’ve been there. I knew I wanted to write. But what will I write? Every time I sat down at my desk, I felt frustrated because I wasn’t able to write anything. Not even a word. I knew I had ideas somewhere in the back of my mind, but I didn’t have a magic wand to let them out.
8. Improve Your Chances of Getting Into a Big Publication By Editing Like a Cambridge Exam Student
Alexa V.S. wrote this piece in a way that totally makes sense. I am sure most of you missed it — here is an opportunity to learn more about editing from someone who knows what she is saying.
I am, though, an English teacher specialized in the Cambridge exams. Following the official rubric, I’ve corrected hundreds of student essays, letters, reports, proposals, reviews, and articles. Considering four points — content, communicative achievement, organization, and language — I’ve helped countless learners achieve their goals.
7. Advice that changed my Writing style
Muda El Masry’s brilliant advice is an asset to be bookmarked. You have missed it, but once you read it, you’d want to read more from Muda El Masry.
As much as I have internalized inspirational messages like “write the book you want to read” and “believe in your writing”, I still procrastinate and feel down about the quantity and quality of my stories. Change is easier said than done. But on rare occasions, I find a piece of writing advice that triggers a metamorphosis. My entire mind shifts and I become an altogether different type of writer behaving in ways I had never tempted before, these are three pieces of writing advice that changed my life.
The image is not blank — there is a pen to the far left that is not visible in the thumbnail.
6. A Feminine Way to Productivity
Desiree Driesenaar is a fellow editor at Illumination. Here is a unique approach to productivity. Don’t miss it now if you didn’t read it already.
The feminine way to productivity is a smoother, easier way for me. I’m on a path of rewilding my soul and it works way better than the masculine pushing, pulling, and forcing. I used to have that in my life when I was still working full-time in my corporate jobs.
5. Life Isn’t Fair
This one minute read by John Ross is more compelling than my own 6-minute take on the topic.
There’s a quote I love from Naval Ravikant in Tim Ferris’ Tribe of Mentors which says “Ignore the unfairness — it is not fair. Play the hand you’re dealt with the best of your ability.”
4. 6 Golden Tips To Have More Confidence In Yourself
Amanze Collins is passionate about his writing. You must have missed it, but this piece will help you boost your self-confidence.
To tell the truth, I haven’t found the perfect recipe for self-confidence yet… perhaps because recipes don’t exist in this field (and when they exist, they don’t work for long).
However, I understood one thing with certainty: believing in one’s abilities is something that grows inversely proportional to our desire to please everyone.
3. 5 Steps to Financial Independence Without Giving Up on Dreams
The Maverick Files wrote this gem. If you missed it, here is an opportunity to undo that.
Most people mistake their dissatisfaction with their current jobs and professions for the desire to retire. As a result of this, they end up chasing the inaccurate goal of “early retirement” than trying to cure the fundamental problem — finding what you love and spending your life doing it.
2. Struggle to Wake Up in The Morning? You Don’t Have to be a Morning Person to be Successful
Thomas Oppong is the author of this masterpiece. He is extremely productive and he is talking about productivity.
New research, published in Nature Communications, confirms that if you struggle to be a morning person, it’s not anything you’re doing wrong — it all comes down to your genes.
The authors linked more than 300 genes to your inability to be active in the morning. In other words, there are many reasons you can’t feel more productive in the evening if you are a morning person, or on the contrary, get up very early, and there isn’t much you can do about it, because it’s all genetically predefined.
1. Why The Buddhists and Aztecs Insist That Happiness Follows The Words You Say
At number one, Sebastian Purcell, Ph.D. is talking about how your words pre-frame your mind. I wrote about this topic in one of my articles.
The noted psychologist, Robert Cialdini, relates a story that changed his mind about the impact of small words. He was invited to give a talk at SSM Health, a non-profit in the medical industry renowned for its stratospheric performance. Yet he was told that in his presentation he would have to replace specific words.
Final Thoughts
I am only human. I might have missed some excellent work. To help me out, please suggest other masterpieces in the comments. I would like to include them in my daily list of top 10 in the coming days.
Happy reading.
To improve your chances of success as a writer, read these curation guidelines.
You can read my curated stories here.