_A new study from the University of North Carolina shows that people who meditated for 20 minutes a day performed 10 times better than ones who didn't meditate.

Not just 100% better, but 10 times or 1000% better. That's an amazing shift.

If you're writing your next book, like I am, imagine how that would affect your productivity and creativity.

Studies have shown that the calmer your mind is, the better you feel and the more productive you are. In fact, it's a great way to overcome writer's block.

Some might say meditation is one of the fastest ways of coming up with new ideas.

Or maybe you just want to feel free of the busy, chattering mind.

When your mind is calm - in the alpha state - you are open to creativity and ideas can just flood in. Your "muse" can fill you with just the inspiration you need. Your heart, throat and third eye chakras open to let in love, communication and intuition from your higher self (or some say from their spirit guides) to come into the physical realm. Try the free download of my Chakra Meditations.

Happy meditating and writing,

Becca Chopra, author of The Chakra Diaries

For more on becoming an author, go to:
www.indieauthorcounsel.com

_"Keys to the Spirit World" simplifies the process of communicating with your spirit guides, who are always there to help you navigate your path through the physical world.

This book helps you use all the spiritual tools and gifts you were born with, but most likely forgot. As a child, you may have heard your spirit guide(s) through your "inner ear," but blocked them out as you grew older and more conditioned by society's rules of what is reality and what isn't. This book is a breath of fresh air, saying "Yes, you can take guidance from your dreams, inner and outer voices, thoughts, and visualizations." Plus, O'Neill offers guidance on how to relax and allow communication with your spirit guides to happen. She even includes exercises to help you tear down the walls to spirit communication.

I especially liked the section on chakras and their correlation to spirit communications. O'Neill explains how chakras, our energetic centers, allow information to be received from the spiritual realm. She takes you one by one through the chakras, with special emphasis on the Heart Chakra, which is elevated and expanded through higher consciousness, the Throat Chakra, used for channeling information during spirit communications, and the Third Eye Chakra, which opens you to clairvoyance and clear seeing.

The author shares some of her own experiences as a child growing up with psychic abilities and the sensations she felt in these chakra areas before she understood their relationship to the spiritual realm. And she offers 10 Tips for Working with your Spirit Guides, invaluable for anyone who wants to have a stronger connection to spirit and accept guidance on their path.

Have you tried automatic writing, dream journaling or spirit guide meditation? O'Neill offers advice on how to use these tools to connect with your spirit guides. She ends her short yet very comprehensive giude with common blocks to spirit communication and how to solve them.

Communicating with Spirit Guides is immensely valuable - this book gives you the tools you need to take advantage of what is offered to each and every one of us from the spiritual realm.
Namaste!
Becca Chopra, author of The Chakra Diaries

_Jennifer O'Neill is a psychic and spiritual teacher whose bio says she devotes most of her time to teaching people how to live a healthier, happier life. "Inspirational Quotes" does this so well, she can now relax while we all take advantage of the wisdom, the universal truths she inspires us with in this wonderful book.

Even if you read the book cover to cover, you'll want to use the book as O'Neill suggests - turning to a page at random whenever needed for just the right message to help you believe in yourself and achieve happiness in your life.

The book's overall message? That no dream is too big, life is easy and meant to be happy. The author presents Universal Laws, such as "Happiness is not bought, given, earned or learned - it is a state of mind based on your perspective. Happiness is simply a choice."

There are many quotes on how to find happiness within yourself, your relationships, and in all you manifest in your life. And O'Neill inspires us to manifest greatness by following the Laws of Attraction, with quotes reminding us "...your thoughts send out energy waves. Want to know what you've been focusing on? Look around your life."

I intend to use this wonderful book as oracle cards, to inspire me daily with just the right message to keep me on my path... a path that we're all on, a path that O'Neill has beautifully laid out in this book.

For your free copy on Kindle, today and tomorrow, go to http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007BTRADI

Namaste!
Becca Chopra, author of The Chakra Diaries

_Have you gone through life's tough experiences and come out the other end with wisdom to share? My friend Peggy has gone through chemical injury, breast cancer, broken bones and more. And she's learned methods of coping, plus inspiration to help others as well. So, she's starting to write. You may have a story to tell as well, and it's cathartic (which can be good) to get your words out.

Whether you are writing a self-help work, like I am with Balance your Life, or fiction, as my colleague R. R. Harris is penning with Double Take, it pays dividends to be organized. “An outline is crucial and saves so much time. It tells you where the story is going.” John Grisham

So, how should you start?

TITLE: Give your work a name, or something that can reference your project.

GENRE: : Be flexible as this may change as the plotline and characters and your thoughts morph and develop. List all of the genres that your story might fit into.

POINT of VIEW: Will it change from scene to scene or will the main character narrate in first person throughout? An author friend of mine said that when she began her autobiographical “coming of age” novel that her original intention was to have the first-person voice change as her character grew and matured. However as she drove further and further into the hinterlands of her work, she realized how maintaining that direction complicated her writing and de-railed it from flowing freely from her consciousness. For example, she would have to ensure that her teenager was not speaking with the voice of a worldly and wise, middle-aged maven or vice versa.

Some authors choose voice from scene to scene by weighing what character stands the most to lose. Although unless skillfully written, this approach can leave a reader wondering what is going on and especially, who is talking.

WHO wants, WHAT do they want, WHY do they want it and What/who stands in your character’s way? Not sure where to begin?

“What if X happened? That’s how you start.” Tom Clancy

“Don’t wait to be struck by an idea. If you are a writer, sit down and damn well decide to have an idea. That’s the way to get an idea.” Andy Rooney

SETTING: Can make a story gel into a dish fit for the Queen or alternatively turn it into cold tasteless soup that even hungry flies shun. Of course, there are endless possibilities. You can create memorable characters as at home in the book’s setting as a well worn slipper, but who enliven it and blaze brightly at the slightest provocation. Perhaps others triumph despite all odds or seemingly invincible villains meet their match in a unforeseen avalanche of choices that could not have been forecast.

“Most of our lives are basically mundane and dull, and it’s up to the writer to find ways to make them interesting.” John Updike

HOOK/SPARK: Yeah, the night was dark and stormy and she came to the door with nothing on but the radio, but then what? What will I write in the second paragraph and on page 87 that will keep my reader into the book? Will the last sip of my book be as satisfying as the first, or even more so?

As an author I must constantly ask – have I set-up conflict, created suspense and action and left the reader panting for more? Am I solving a problem the reader has, conveying knowledge or fulfilling a need?

“I want the reader to turn the page without thinking that she is turning the page. It must flow seamlessly.” Janet Evanovich

DON’T QUIT: “Nobody cares whether you write or not, and it’s very hard to write when nobody cares one way or the other. You can’t get fired if you don’t write, and most of the time you don’t get rewarded if you do. But don’t quit.” Andre Dubus

Namaste!
Becca Chopra, author of The Chakra Diaries
www.IndieAuthorCounsel.com

_I spent three years writing my first novel, The Chakra Diaries. Then, a full year on the sequel, Chakra Secrets, which I can happily say is now finished and on the way to the editor.

Now, I’m ready to write the book my students and readers around the world have asked for – Chakra Healing Simplified. I have the title ready, Balance Your Life, and my enormous pile of information at the ready.

I want this book written quickly. So, I decided to jump into a new way of writing for me – an organized routine and structure for writing. I was introduced to this program, NOVEL IN A MONTH, when joining Indie Author Counsel, and I’m going to see if the system works to use both my left and right brain to complete my self-help guide.

Now, are YOU ready to write as well? Laptop at the ready, a rough story outine lying pent-up, cramped into the folds of your brain, awaiting glorious release through your fingertips?

Anton Chekhov suggested that every sentence should spend two days in the brain, lying perfectly still and putting on weight. But using that principle, your work might be completed by the time you are 98 years old.

If you want to join me in the challenge of writing a book in a month, try the program along with me….

Learn how YOU can write your own book in just ONE MONTH, by visiting the official website:

http://www.novelinamonth.com/?afl=90058

I’ll be posting my progress as I move through my outline this week. If you try the program or have other writing advice, please share your comments as well.

Happy writing,

Becca Chopra, author of The Chakra Diaries
www.IndieAuthorCounsel.com

_The Happy Place is part poignant memoir, part self-help. It's a quick read, but can have profound long-term effects on your life. What Gosselin does so well in her book is to take the most recent neuroscience research confirming that the brain is capable of change, tell us how she changed her own brain circuits, and then simply explains how the reader can too.Gosselin recounts how her expectations were creating her reality and how we're all doing that every day. Once she realized that she was programming her mind with her "words" or "feelings" every morning, she learned to correct the negative programs she was running in order to lead a more happy, healthy and fulfilling life.

Like the characters in The Chakra Diaries, she needs to revisit her past, recognize and change her "story."

"Don't live as if the present is the past," she writes. Instead, check in with yourself every morning, asking "How do I feel?" Then she explains how to follow the feeling to its root - usually in childhood to the first time you felt this way. Once you become aware how your brain was "wired" early in childhood and became addicted to certain feelings, you can then choose a better feeling and change your words. Doing this every day for 28 days will rewire your brain, explains Gosselin, so it's a good daily practice.

Taking Gosselin's journey with her as she discovers why she is unhappy, or always feels second-best, and then dramatically changes her life by processing her own feelings, is very inspirational and can guide anyone along the same beautiful path.

The Happy Place is available in Kindle version on Amazon.com.
Happy reading,
Becca Chopra