Originally posted by apprentice Rarely will you find highly successful individuals willing to share their most closely guarded secrets for achieving success in their chosen field. I I have to disagree with this opinion. Whether they do it through free advice or mentoring or through books designed to share what they have learned, MANY highly successful people in ALL fields often offer insight how they achieved success. I find that it's more often those who have not truly succeeded that guard their "secrets" and their methods because they fear that someone else might walk off with the prize. Truth is that there's no real "secrets" to success in writing or anything else. What works for one writer may not work for another and it mostly takes a lot of hard work, determination, ability to learn, and the chutzpah to do all that and more. Some natural talent helps too and can't be duplicated with any book or course. Take some natural talent and work hard on it to improve and you're likely to find success but there are no guarantees. It's apparent than Apprentice feels very strongly about these courses and that's fine. If they helped, great. Overall, though, my opinion stands you can be a writer or copywriter without such courses or instruction methods. Missouri Writers Guild2005 Editor's Pen Award (Scrivener's Pen)Visit my blog at http://leeannsontheimermurphy.blogspot.com RE: American Writers & Artists Institute mammamaia 10-02-2004, 10:23 AM it is a bit suspect that apprentice only joined to post that glowing review of the course!... i have to take it all with a box or two of mortons, since the writer doesn't identify him/herself other than as a fan of the book/writer in question... for 100% free help/mentoring:www.saysmom.com"You must BE the change you wish to see in the world." Gandhi RE: American Writers & Artists Institute westie1 10-02-2004, 12:35 PM Hi everybody! New to this discussion but I too have recieved AWAI material in the past and on the surface it sounds usable and possibly worth the cost but I tend to agree with those that are not too sure. Resources are all over the place. If a person really wants the 411 on the type or style of writing he or she is seeking then searching out a mentor of that kind of writing is an excellent way to go. RE: American Writers & Artists Institute haakon59 10-02-2004, 1:46 PM As I stated above, I have not taken the AWAI course so I can't comment on whether it is good or not. But I am surprised at the number of people who seem to believe that you can just learn everything by doing. Of course, reading a book by itself doesn't make you anything, you have to apply the principles the book talks about by practicing. You have to master the use of the principles written about, not just passively read them. I wonder if those who advocate the "just do it" view can point to any intellectual pursuit that doesn't include learning from those who have mastered the field before them? Would you want, for example, to have someone tell Civil Engineering students to stop wasting their time taking engineering classes, that they ought instead to just go out and learn to build bridges by doing? If so, PLEASE let me know where these bridges are, because I want to only drive over the ones where the engineer went to school and knows what he is doing because he has taken the time to master all the factors that go into bridge building BEFORE he builds his first one. In fact, I feel the same way about doctors and lawyers and plumbers and everything else. No one should reject the knowledge gathered before they came along as being irrelevant. On the other hand, some teachers and books are lousy; some are fantastically insightful. We have at least one person who has been through the AWAI course who thought it was well done. Perhaps someone else has taken the course and wasn't impressed. At least we have this forum where we can help each other by giving feedback on which books and courses are good and which are not. Regardless, I am going to continue to do both: read and learn from people who have mastered the craft before me and practice and extend that learning by using my acquired knowledge along with my own insights. Isn't this what all progress is built on? RE: American Writers & Artists Institute apprentice 10-02-2004, 6:03 PM Nope...apprentice is not Bob Bly. I guess if I was, I would have all 50 of his books, and not just two. While I have read this forum a number of times before, I registered to post because it happens that I spent the last two weeks going through the course in question. It was fresh on my mind and I felt I could add something to the discussion. On second read it seems my response might have come off a little "hot"....not my intention. And on second thought.....I take back what I wrote that successful people do not often share their secrets. I have had a number of very successful, and very generous mentors in my life, so my own experience did not even coincide with the point I was making. While some leaders play their cards close to the vest, most are more than happy to share their success "secrets" with anyone who will listen. In my own experience, you can learn just about anything "on your own". But it sure trims time off the learning curve to learn what has (and has not) worked for others. It is also true that you will learn more from driving a road than you will from any map. It's the doing, not the reading that will move you toward your objective. Page 1 of 2 (31 items) 1 2 > Copyright © 2005 Kalmbach Publishing Co.