Practice makes perfect? Tuesday February 21, 2012

I shudder when I look back at some of my earliest daily messages. Two years ago I was yet to find my feet. I had no clear vision of what I was supposed to write about, but more than this, I recognise that my style was stilted and clumsy.

I'd spent much of my prior working life assembling words, but as an advertising copywriter their purpose was to persuade people to buy things they, perhaps, didn't know they needed (to put it charitably).

Nowadays I compile a message like this every morning, sometimes writing two if the following day is likely to be busy enough to deny me the chance to sit, think and type.

We receive tremendously helpful feedback, which Caroline assiduously reads and replies to before passing on to me.

Most is positive, but not all. Every piece has helped me learn however, and although I know I don't get it right all the time, I'm pretty sure I've improved over time, thanks to the direction of the people who matter - you and our other readers.

There's a bigger point here, though, and I reckon it's absolutely relevant to you.

We get better, I believe, at the stuff we do most often.

And it's probably true of our thoughts just as much as it is of our actions.

So think positively, and you'll get better at it.

But maintain a mainly negative way of seeing things and this, instead, will become your 'strength'.

I'd be the first to admit that I'm no ray of sunshine. My ruminations have taken me to some pretty bleak places over the years.

But even on the darkest day, it's nearly always possible to find tiny chinks of light.

So when you see them, please hold on to them tightly. Put them in a jar.

They're worth their weight in gold, and the more you have, the better you'll get at producing them.

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