Writing Articles in Nonnative Language

What would be the most difficult part in learning a nonnative language? Is it fluency in speaking? It is difficult for a nonnative to keep up with native speed of speaking. It is not easy to catch the contents of conversations in native pronunciation. How about writing? Are you confident in writing in the appropriate language with correct composition? As one's language study progresses, the difficulty changes. As a nonnative writer and speaker of English, I always had a problem in writing.

You can speak as you wish. Even if you make a mistake, it is okay as long as you could make yourself understood. Writing is different. Your mistakes would stay there and keep you embarrassed on the mistakes you made. I did not like writing because of this reason. I did not like reading whatever I wrote in English, because it would embarrass me later. I did not like even proofreading my own writing, because either the contents or the English would bother me.

However, I discovered that writing is the most effective way to push up your language level to a higher stage. Native speakers would not correct your English in a conversation, as long as they understood you. You might end up making same mistakes for a long time without being corrected. Instead, you can ask your native friends or colleagues to proofread your English. Thus, you could clearly know the mistakes you made. You would be given an opportunity to correct the mistakes you made, possibly forever.

You would not be able to brush up your language skills without trying. Many people are afraid of trying because they are afraid of failing. You need to go over this barrier, first. It would help if you expected to fail. Failing is one of the learning processes. Therefore, you do not have to be afraid of or embarrassed by failing. It is natural. It is not only you who makes a mistake. Everybody does.

I describe the sequence as follows:

T: Trial

F: Failure

C: Challenge (Continue Trying)

P: Progress (Make Progress)

Blogs are popular these days. I do not recommend blogs for language improvement. Nobody will comment on your language in your blog. It is rude. Nobody will comment on your language.

I recommend using article writing and submitting sites, such as "EzineArticles.com". What is the most important part is that they have an approval process. Your articles could be approved and posted or rejected and sent back for corrections. Thus the author must be serious to use proper English to have their articles approved. There are some websites, which help you to correct your language with reasonable cost.

If you try this way of writing articles in your nonnative language, you would find later that it is not only your writing ability which improves. Your speaking, reading, or even listening capability would be improved, because you are improving your language ability as a whole, in this way.



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The Weak Is Strong, Zen Paradox For Marketing Strategy

Zen seeks for the ultimate status of mind, which is close to awakening, or Epiphany. It uses a training method to discuss paradox questions. The most famous one is; "Nothing is everything. Everything is nothing." As many of them are highly spiritual, it is a surprise to find a paradox question, which is helpful in the modern daily lives. One of them is; "The strong is weak because of his strength, not because of his weakness. The weak is strong because of his weakness, not because of his strength."

One can prove this statement is true taking an example of Japanese Beer market. A company, who has top market share, should be careful in its strength not weakness to keep the top market share.

Kirin was the top share maker in Japanese beer market about 20 years ago. Kirin had been top share beer maker for about 10 years, then. Their lager beer was so popular that no competition could beat them. Kirin was so proud of their strength in their lager beer. They did not have to bring new products for a long time. The lager beer was Kirin's strength in Japanese beer market. Sapporo was the 2nd market share beer maker. Asahi was the 3rd.

Sapporo took a brave strategy in their effort to gain No.1 position in the beer market. They analyzed Kirin lager and found that they will never defeat Kirin in the beer market. Sapporo threw a stone into the market. They started to market and sell an entirely new product. It was Sapporo Draft Beer. They advertised the weakness of Draft Beer. Sapporo advertisement was; Sapporo Draft is a spoiled and demanding beer. Enjoy its crispy and clear taste during a short time of freshness.

Sapporo attacked Kirin's strength taking advantage of weakness of Sapporo Draft Beer. At that time, Draft Beers were only in the bars and restaurants. People did not believe they could drink Draft Beer home. People jumped into Sapporo Draft. One year later, Sapporo became No. 1 market share Beer Company. The weak defeated the strong by attacking their strength with their weakness.

Several years later, Asahi took the same strategy attacking Sapporo. Asahi came with a new concept of beer, Dry. Asahi's slogan was; it tastes like a beer, you feel like drinking a beer. Their alcohol content was 2% higher than others. Their message was "a real beer for a real beer drinker". Since people started to like lighter alcoholic contents drink, they used reverse marketing to regain the market. Asahi became No. 1 share with Asahi Dry.

Kirin recovered its No. 1 position with a new concept of Draft Beer. That was "Kirin Ichiban". They competed exactly as this old Zen paradox statement. The weak is not weak because of his weakness. The weak can win with his weakness.




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An Experience in Article Writing and Submission

It was a big and significant decision for me to participate in an article submission site in English. Being a nonnative English speaker, I originally thought it is too much to take part in an English Article site. But, I liked writing an English Article, I decided to join in an English article site. They regularly host article submission event writing one article in one day every day. When I tried in summer last year, I failed miserably. I gave up in the earlier stage. I was sick in the early July. Even after recovered from my sickness, I did not feel up to writing articles for a long time. Suffering from a sense of failure, I did not have the courage to write another one.

It was middle of September, 2010, when I received an email invitation to the next event. My first reaction was negative. I thought there is no way I could participate in the challenge, again. I had not thought about it for a couple of days. Then, I received a personal message from a Japanese friend on Facebook. She wrote that she had noticed that I had been writing articles in English. She introduced herself, saying that she studied English by herself, dreaming about making friends with people in the world. She said she had enjoyed my articles, especially the ones which talked about Japanese culture. She wished to write her own articles some day. She concluded by asking me to continue writing articles in English.

It was beyond my imagination that my Japanese friend sent me an encouraging message like it. Her message was helpful. I started to feel fortunate because I could write articles in English. Suddenly I remembered that I had not written an article for one and a half months. Needing some motivation to start writing articles, I decided to take part in the next event of article writing.

During the event, my account was suspended for about two weeks because one of my articles was rejected too many times. It was October when I got a new project to create a website for a Japanese client who hoped to have his site both in English and Japanese. I became busy working on my new web development work. This new project took much of my time. When I found my own time to start writing articles, it was already past midnight. However, I did not want to give up this time. I decided to wake up at least one hour earlier than before to start designing my new article of the day.

When I finished this event on December 29th, 2010, I felt so relieved and happy. This time I had done it. When I received a congratulatory email from the site owner, I was proud of my accomplishment. I was glad I started to write and submit my articles in English.





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How to Find Topics for Articles

The people who write articles for their blogs or for article sites tend to think that the more time they have, the more articles they can write. Such is not necessarily true. When Mr. Suga started to write blog articles, he enjoyed it and wrote at least one article per day. In the first sixty days, he came up with many topics to write about. His experience traveling overseas was one of them. General business matters were the other ones, which led to ideas for many topics. He came up with many topics by thinking back over his forty years of life.

After the first sixty days of writing articles and posting them to his blog, Mr. Suga suddenly ran out of topics to write about. Thinking harder, spending more time thinking, and browsing the Internet for topics did not even help. He had not written an article for about ten days by then. He was annoyed, irritated, and frustrated, and still had no clue about his new topic. He thought he would not be able to find a topic anymore.

One day, his wife found out that a new fitness center had opened nearby. She asked Mr. Suga to join the new gym. Mr. Suga was more frustrated since he wanted to find a topic that day, and had planned to browse the Internet. He was about to reject his wife's idea, but then he remembered that he had not exercised for about a month. He agreed to her idea and they went together to the new fitness center that had opened just that month.

The new fitness center was clean and fresh. They joined in a group exercise. It was a new style of aerobics, combining dancing, aerobics, and shadow boxing practice. After an hour of group exercise, Mr. Suga took a swim, and his wife did machine exercises. They both had an excellent time.

Even their conversation while driving back home was better than usual. They talked, joked, and laughed. Back at home, he turned on his PC. Now he was full of new topics. They included "the effectiveness of exercise for health," "review of a new gym in the area," "review of a new style of exercise," "how to refresh one's relationships with spouse and family," "suggestions for being active for life," or "enjoying conversation with your family."

It appears that the only way to pick topics for article writing is to stay active and participate in different and new activities. If someone stays inside his brain, continuing to think about his topics, he needs to think again. There are websites which give you ideas or suggestions for your writing topics. I will not deny that they are useful, but, in order to write a quality article, we need our own participation and action.




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For International Writers

It has been more than four years since I started to write and submit my articles in article submission sites. Since English is not my first language, it was not easy for me to continue writing in English. My problems include not just English but also topics, contents, messages, and time. Time is always running against me. An author is always under pressure to write an article in a short time without sacrificing the contents. A writer would never be able to secure enough time to write an article that satisfies him.

Since I have reached the highest level for an author in an English article submission site, I would like to take a moment to advise international authors whose native language is not English.

First, in selecting an article submission site, my recommendation is that an international author should choose one that has strict rules on article content and language. Although an international author would struggle at first, because the site regulations and rules are stringent and exacting, such as he cannot publish whatever he writes, his English ability and communication skill would significantly improve along the way.

I have three suggestions for selecting an article submission site:

1. Select a site that has strict policies and rules, especially on the language.
2. Select a site that provides a program requiring continuous submission of articles.
3. Select a site that recognizes your effort.

After writing an article, an international writer needs a proofreading service to correct the English, logical arrangement, and content of his topic. There are also sites offering software-editing services.

Although I found the machine services useful to understanding grammar and basic rules, I discovered that they are unable to check whether one's writing sounds natural. I recommend using sites that provide human proofreading services. Only native speakers can check to see if your English sounds natural or not.

I actually use both software and a human proofreading site to check my writing. Here are four tips for selecting a proofreading service:

1. Understand that software proofreading services cannot check whether your English sounds natural or is even grammatically correct.
2. Software proofreading services can still be useful for checking your grammar and learning the basic grammatical rules of the language.
3. Only native-speaking human proof-readers can check to see if your English sounds natural. It is better to use proofreading services that use people to write articles themselves.
4. Sometimes you may want to ask questions about corrections. It would be ideal if the service had a two-way communication option.

My English improved considerably during this process and I earned the highest-level author position. It is worth continuing English article marketing. If you are an international writer and struggling, do not give up; you will be successful if you continue to strive.







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The Fight of Kenshin Uesugi, A Seeker of Justice

Kenshin Uesugi was a legendary local lord in my parents' hometown, Niigata. Niigata is located on the Japan Sea side of the main island of Japan. It is snowy country. Every winter, there is 6-12 feet of snow accumulation. Kenshin was a local lord in this snowy country in the sixteenth century.

Kenshin Uesugi was unique among local rulers in sixteenth-century Japan. He dedicated his life to protecting "Gi" which means ultimate righteousness or justice.

In 1530, when he was born, his mother dreamed that the General of Spiritual Protection, Bi-Sha-Mon-Ten, jumped into her mouth, and he believed himself to be the incarnation of that spirit. His army was well-trained and motivated: they were willing to give their lives for this "Living General of Buddhism". Out of more than 100 wars, he never lost a single one, and his army never betrayed him.

He was spiritual, inspirational, and religious. It was almost as if he believed he must have been spiritual, otherwise he would lose all his strength. All of the local lords needed motivation to fight each other. Some believed in building a peaceful country by unifying all of Japan, which was a mess at that time. Others wanted to prove they were stronger than their rivals. They were all ambitious, including Kenshin Uesugi. What made him unique was that the mission that drove him to fight was to protect Gi. He fought to ensure that Gi prevailed. In the Dark Age, power and greed were almost the only things that drove any of the other local kings.

According to historical records, Kenshin explained, "Gi, for me, was the every reason for human beings to exist. I need to protect it by all means." There were many times that he practiced Gi when he could have been more ruthless, such as in his dealings with another local lord, Shingen Takeda, who constantly fought against Kenshin over the area between their territories. When Shingen's castle was under siege from another local king, his supplies of salt-a necessary provision-were cut off. Kenshin, hearing of Shingen's problem, sent his own troops to supply Shingen with enough salt to support his army for a year. This was only one of many of Kenshin's kind actions.

Kenshin's strength was in his power to remain determined to continue his efforts. Gi was his motive to govern and to fight. It was his vision. He believed so strongly in it that that he felt he would never lose. Two years before Kenshin died, he fought against Nobunaga Oda, who was very close to unifying all of Japan under his rule. Oda's army consisted of 30,000 soldiers with 3,000 guns. Kenshin brought his army with less than 10,000 soldiers and only 500 guns. Kenshin defeated Oda's army easily.

Kenshin could simply have attacked Oda's castle and ousted him from power, but he did not. Later, he said of his victory, "I showed Oda it is not just power, greed, and ambition which decides victory. It is enough for now." He might have had his own strategy to get rid of Oda and unify Japan, but unfortunately, he died shortly after this battle, in 1578. Despite being unable to live to see his dream of a unified Japan fulfilled, Kenshin gave an important lesson to the Japanese people: he showed that idealism and motivation are the most important things.





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