Thursday, December 17, 2015

How to Use the Passive Voice Correctly

The passive voice is a misunderstood entity in the world of writing. It is unfairly judged by many authors. Some writers, without taking the time to get to know this grammatical structure, avoid it at all costs. Others use it ineffectively because they do not understand how it works. How can you get to know this mysterious literary device?

First, let’s start with an explanation of what passive voice is.

Wednesday, December 16, 2015

What Are the Best Ways to Deal with Difficult People?

Difficult people can quickly turn your dream job into a nightmare if you let them. However, your happiness and productivity are worth the fight. Let’s consider the best ways to deal with challenging personalities.

Start with Yourself

In “Man in the Mirror,” a song recorded by Michael Jackson, the lyrics provide an effective formula for improving your environment: “Take a look at yourself, and then make a change.” Self-examination might reveal that you are overreacting to a situation.

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Main Verbs: Definition and Examples

The main verb is also called the lexical verb or the principal verb. This term refers to the important verb in the sentence, the one that typically shows the action or state of being of the subject. Main verbs can stand alone, or they can be used with a helping verb, also called an auxiliary verb.

Helping verbs do just what they sound like they do—they help! Different helping verbs help or support the main verb in different ways.

Monday, December 14, 2015

Monday Motivation Hack: Get Your Mind Right

When you picture someone meditating, what do you see? A yoga class? A person of South Asian descent in a religious context? A random businessperson in a stock photo?

Messages about mindfulness have been muddled, messy, and largely unhelpful since its rise to popularity. In the last few years, mindfulness has moved from hippie-and-yogi buzzword to bonified productivity skill lauded by the likes of The Harvard Business Review and Tim Ferriss.

Thursday, December 10, 2015

The Importance of Proofreading Your Résumé

Did you know that recruiters only spend an average of six seconds reviewing your résumé? You have a very small window in which to wow them, and in this competitive job market, even the smallest mistake can be enough to knock you out of the running. There are three main aspects of proofreading: spelling, grammar, and consistency. We’ll look at each of those below, but first, some sobering statistics about how many errors we found in a sampling of résumés.

Wednesday, December 9, 2015

Commas in Complex Sentences

Complex sentences are sentences that have two clauses. There can be two independent clauses (each having a subject and predicate), or an independent clause and dependent clause (missing a subject or predicate). Whether a comma is used between them depends on the types and positions of the clauses.

An independent clause is a clause that can stand on its own as a sentence.

I have a cat.

Monday, December 7, 2015

That Emoji Might Not Be Saying What You Think

This morning, my guy texted me:

And I texted back:

He said, “Good morning! It’s a beautiful day. Love you!”

And I wrote back, “Good morning! I’ve got a song in my heart. Mwah! Love you, too.”

The texter and I are close. We know each other, so our emoji-only conversation made sense to us. The message is unambiguous enough that even an outside observer might have interpreted it similarly.