Editor’s Picks — Top 10: Only Bold Ideas Make You Good Money

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Creativity is not for the faint of heart.

There is always danger in putting out something that has never been said before. Good writing always makes you uneasy when you are at it. A great story will always challenge a reader when she is reading it.

I loved the Godfather trilogy. But when I read the novel I liked it even more. On the first page of the book, Mario Puzo wrote, “Behind every successful fortune there is a crime.”

No, I am not telling you to commit a crime. I am only telling you to get out of your comfort zone.

The secret of getting noticed, according to Jeff Goins, is to write something dangerous.

Here is what Franz Kafka wrote in 1904 — please do not skim it:

“If the book we are reading does not wake us, as with a fist hammering on our skull, why then do we read it? So that it shall make us happy? Good God, we would also be happy if we had no books, and such books as make us happy we could, if need be, write ourselves. But what we must have are those books which come upon us like ill-fortune, and distress us deeply, like the death of one we love better than ourselves, like suicide. A book must be an ice-ax to break the sea frozen inside us.” (Today’s number one story used this paragraph.)

Find reasons to break free from your writing comfort zone. Challenging topics make you more creative. Don’t get stuck in simple writing.

Write about topics you never explored. Take risks while you are writing. There are enough people copying ideas, paraphrasing articles, and plagiarizing out there on the internet.

Respect your abilities, challenge your skills, and honor your innate desire to be wildly creative.

Let’s explore our top 10 stories to see if the writers moved out of their comfort zones or not:

10. 5 Writing Tips From a Published Academic Writer

Ana Writes is a 23-year-old kid. Master Student. Likes to talk a lot.

But she can write well too. Her writing style is frank, honest, and very engaging. She is very new to Medium and needs your love. She is going to be a big name on Medium.

It is from Illumination’s Mirror.

As a graduate student, my main priorities are reading and writing. I basically get paid to do research and then write about it in a way that it can be understood by people who are not familiar with the scientific concepts.

During my 3rd-year of college, I was the only undergraduate student in my program who had a published article. My writing skills stood out to a professor and he added me to an existing project regarding pedagogical research and turning that research into writing.

9. Now That It’s Hit the Fan

Barnhill represents a husband and wife team exploring the topics we are passionate about, both individually and together.

They are excellent writers. Their writing style is informative and full of suspense. Don’t miss this one and check their other work as well.

This week’s insurrection has brought to a head all the inflammatory incitement our president has been fomenting for the past four-plus years. Sure, there’s hope because the sun is about to set on his disastrously divisive administration. But because one man goes away doesn’t mean the problems go away. (And he’ll still be very public, by the way, just without power or a sanctioned platform.) The worst thing we can do at the beginning of a new administration is to turn away from this — sweep it under the rug and pretend that we’re moving forward when we’re simply walking with blinders on. I’m concerned about this because, historically, that’s what we’ve done more often than not.

8. Why Brexit Has Always Been About Dividing Society

Paul Abela, MSc is a blogger and systems thinker. Place a lens on the social, economic, and political causes of the climate crisis.

“You know very well the country is being ruined by foreigners. Just go to a shop and buy something: look round the place an’ you’ll see that more than ’arf the damn stuff comes from abroad. They’re able to sell them goods ’ere because they don’t ’ave to pay no dooty, but they takes care to put every dooties on our goods to keep ’em out of their countries; and I say it’s about time it was stopped.”

It’s not hard to imagine hearing these words spoken at the pub, with family members, or maybe even a political party conference. But these are the words of Bob Crass, a fictional working-class builder from The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, a semi-autobiographical novel set in Edwardian Britain over 100 years ago.

7. Freedom of Movement in Australia

Jack Holmes is an Australian lawyer, proponent of tactful sass, freedom of expression, and the Oxford comma — his words.

He is an excellent writer. His style is detailed, informative, and highly engaging.

On 10 December 2020, the High Court of Australia refused to imply a freedom of movement into the Commonwealth Constitution. The case is Gerner v Victoria, and was argued by, among others, the talented Bret Walker SC, the same barrister who famously convinced the High Court to unanimously overturn Cardinal Pell’s conviction in less than an hour, after the Crown used more than 4 hours of argument time.

The case at hand concerns whether persons in Australia can enjoy a constitutionally-protected freedom of movement. The freedom, if it were successfully argued, would have been for both intrastate and interstate movement.

6. 3 Songs That Show The Weeknd is Just Like Mike

Cody Collins is a guy who enjoys investing, being cheap, and a good side hustle.

I’m of fan of The Weeknd’s music. I’m also a fan of Michael Jackson’s music. If by some chance you aren’t familiar with either, stop what you’re doing and go listen immediately.

While The Weeknd doesn’t like to hear the comparisons to Michael Jackson, there are reasons people compare the two. They are both great artists. Listening to the songs below, I easily heard the resemblance between the two.

5. How To Begin A Meditation Practice

Amanda Edwards is a healer through sound and Reiki. She is a certified wellness coach and she is relearning how to live a simple joyful life.

Her writing style is honest, appealing, and engaging. Don’t miss this masterpiece. She is very new to Medium and deserves your love.

Prior to 2012 I couldn’t tell you very much (if anything) about meditation. Almost nine years later I credit the practice to completely changing my life. After years of battling mental illness that later developed into substance abuse to my anxiety prescriptions, I was desperate to find healing. I’d changed medication at least five times over a ten year span. The perfect cocktail didn’t seem to exist, at least not for an extended amount of time. I looked into changing my lifestyle as a whole and felt like it was my last shot at truly living. While a meditation practice alone hasn’t been my one saving grace; it has been a major factor for creating a life of happiness and wellness.

4. Here Is the Real Reason Why Photos Are Banned in the Sistine Chapel

Jason Ward is a freelance journalist, author, and an excellent writer. His writing style is informative and very engaging. Many of his stories have appeared in the Top 10 series.

Don’t miss this masterpiece.

In 1512, Pope Julius II held a special vespers service. It was an evening event that was held to inaugurate the Sistine Chapel after Michelangelo had finished four years of toil painting frescos on the ceiling. It is now the most visited room in the world.

If you have ever visited the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican, you will have heard the guards saying, at regular intervals, “No photo! No photo!” There are signs everywhere forbidding both photography and video and this is enforced every few seconds by the staff.

3. Trump’s Social Media Ban Reveals The Failings Of The Information Age

Steve QJ writes about meditation, content creation, and personal development. But he is writing wonderful articles about politics as well.

Many of his pieces have got thousands of views. You’ll love his work.

The day after Donald Trump’s cheerleading encouraged a troupe of YMCA rejects to storm the Capitol and prompted Twitter and Facebook to suspend his accounts, New York Times columnist, Aaron Ross Sorkin, made the following observation:

So Trump has access to the nuclear codes but he can’t Tweet or post to Facebook.

2. The Nashville Bombing Has Exposed US Inefficiencies

Gayle Kurtzer-Meyers has an experience of 20+ years in property management. She is a freelance writer, an advocate for positive thinking, enjoys running for charity events, and she is interested in a variety of topics.

She has thousands of followers. You’ll love her style of writing. Do check her other work.

On Christmas morning, Nashville woke up to a massive explosion when a man detonated a bomb inside an RV. The bombing took place outside an AT&T facility in downtown Nashville. The bomber, later identified as Anthony Q. Warner, also perished in the bombing. He was present inside the vehicle before the bomb went off. Before the bomb detonated, officers and other witnesses reported hearing an RV broadcast to warn bystanders. It asked individuals to evacuate the site because a bomb was about to explode.

1. 10 New Books We Recommend This Week’: How Mediocre Writing Saturated the Market

At number one, it is Ana Mamic. She is a reading facilitator, ESL teacher, pedagogical anarchist, and a multilinguist. Her writing style is beautiful, elegant, and highly engaging.

She is an extraordinary writer. If you like reading this story, check her other work.

Kafka was barely in his twenties, and 8 years away from writing The Metamorphosis, when he shared the above insight in a letter to a friend. To me, it shows that he already understood what qualifies as a work of art in any field: the ability of the work to shake something loose inside you and reshape you. You are not the same person after your encounter with it.

To this day, I remember the first time I walked into the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, and the first time I glimpsed the city of Petra in the Jordanian desert, because I cried openly on both occasions. I didn’t cry when I read The Brothers Karamazov for the first time last year, but I was punch-drunk for days.

This post is part of the Top 10 Series:

1–2–3–4–5–6–7–8–9–10–11–12–13–14–15–16–17–18–19–20–21–22–23–24–25–26–27–28–29–30–31–32–33–34–35–36–37–38–39–40–41–42–43–44–45–46–47–48–49–50–51–52

Final Thoughts

If your story was selected as one of the top 10, please share another one of your stories in the comments with a brief introduction and a short review that can convince a reader to read your piece. (Please write the review in the third person and start it with your name.)

I must have missed some good stories. I cannot read every story on Illumination and Illumination-Curated. Dr Mehmet Yildiz, the Chief Editor and Founder of Illumination and Illumination-Curated, read, highlighted, and applauded every story when he started his publications. He still reads almost all of the good ones. I try — and fail daily — to read all of the masterpieces.

Kindly help me to find and rank the best work of the writers of Illumination and Illumination-Curated.

Write dangerously this year. Happy New Year.

To improve your odds of success as a writer, read these curation guidelines.

You can read my curated stories here.