Article: Understand that it is okay to make mistakes. You may feel guilty but it is important to accept yourself in spite of your weaknesses. Forgive yourself and move on instead of dwelling on your issue. Focus on doing better now and in the future. When we make a mistake it is easy to get frustrated, overwhelmed, or give up altogether. If you are feeling overly emotional or stressed, take a break. It won't benefit you to try to fix your mistake if your emotions are heightened. Focus on ways of coping with negative emotions that may make you feel better. Think about ways you have coped with making mistakes in the past. Identify ways you have coped well and ways you coped that made you feel worse. Some common coping strategies for dealing with mistakes include: positive self-talk (saying nice things about yourself), exercise, and relaxing activities such as reading or playing a game. Some unhelpful ways of coping with mistakes include engaging in self-destructive behaviors such as: using alcohol or other substances, harming the self physically, ruminating, and thinking negatively about the self.
Question: What is a summary of what this article is about?
Give yourself a break. Keep your emotions in check. Cope.
Article: Your seating position and center of gravity make a huge difference in how the kart handles. Sit back in the seat and try to relax your body. Don't lean forward or bounce the kart by fidgeting or jumping in the seat. Go karts don't have seatbelts, but they do have bucket seats that will support you while you drive. Don't worry about holding yourself in the seat. If you find that your arms are getting tired after driving, that might mean you're holding yourself up with your arms. Try to relax into the seat while you drive! You should hold the steering wheel near where 9 and 3 appear on a clock face. Some prefer higher or lower (as high as 10 and 2 or as low as 8 and 4). Make sure your hands are symmetrically placed on the kart steering wheel. Don't grip the wheel too tight. Firm and steady is the way to go to keep your wrists flexible and quick. Never use your shoulders to steer. Try to consistently use the same hand placement. Familiar positioning will help yourself react instinctively and stay in the zone. Once you receive the signal to go it may be tempting to mash down on the accelerator, but this isn't always best. Jamming the accelerator from a standstill can cause the wheels to spin rather than effectively grip the surface. You'll need to get the feel for your kart. If your kart wheels spin when you jam the accelerator, ease back and try to learn the sweet spot of maximum acceleration. Weather, track, and tire conditions have a major effect too. Be sure to adjust. If your kart can tolerate jamming the accelerator without losing traction, go for it! It almost sounds counter intuitive to steer less, but any deviation from a straight line compromises acceleration. Try to plot your driving and turning to involve as little steering and braking as possible. The straighter your overall course and the smoother your turns are, the faster you'll go! While you'll have a general idea of the lines you want to take from evaluating the course prior to racing, sometimes you need to switch things up. As you get used to a course and the limits of your kart you'll find places where you can push the limits and go even faster. If turns are too easy - and slow - try braking and turning later and later. See how far you can push the speed envelope while still making a turn. After your race, take notes on the course, your kart, and what you felt went both well and poorly. This may seem boring, but is one of the most important things you can do to improve in the future. Just ask any pro and they'll tell you the same thing. Even if you just had your best-ever run, you can always improve!
Question: What is a summary of what this article is about?
Sit correctly in your kart. Maintain a consistent hold on the steering wheel. Use controlled acceleration. Steer as little as possible. Experiment with different lines. Take track notes.
Article: To write an effective prologue, you need to first consider which prologue type fits with your novel. Often, prologues are written after the novel has been completed or when a novel is in its finishing stages. If you are writing a prologue cold, with no other chapters written, you should still think about how the prologue is going to affect the rest of the book. Think about how the prologue is going to enhance your novel and feel integral to the story. Will it reveal character, setting, or point of view? Will it provide backstory or frame the rest of the novel in a particular way? If you are writing a prologue for a completed book, you should also think about how the prologue will interact with your first chapter. The prologue should hook your reader in and be just as strong as the details and scenes in your first chapter, if not better. The prologue should not regurgitate details in the first chapter or feel redundant in any way, as this will likely lead to a boring and dry prologue. Often, prologues are set within a scene, especially in action and thriller novels. This gives the prologue a fast pace and helps to engage the reader right away. You should think about which scene or scenes you would like to use in your prologue. This may be based on the character voice you decide to use for the prologue. Use the five senses to make the scene come alive for the reader, with a focus on what the scene smells like, feels like, sounds like, and of course, how it looks. Have your character interact with these elements in the scene and use your character as a way for your reader to access the scene. Most prologues are successful if they are short and to the point. Try to use only one to two scenes in the prologue, as too many scenes can make the prologue feel too long and drawn out. Often, using one powerful scene as the prologue can be very effective and draw the reader in right away. Avoid hopping around in time a lot in your prologue, as this can make the prologue feel confusing or jumpy to the reader. Try to stay in one time period or within one to two time periods so the prologue does not become too long. If you decide to use your prologue as a way to access a certain character's point of view, make sure you get into the voice of your character. Think about how the character might speak to others and to themselves. Consider the age, background, and gender of the character, and how this might inform the character's voice or style of narration. If you are using the prologue as a way to access a character that does not appear again in the novel or only appears as a minor character, use the prologue to really explore the character's perspective. This is your opportunity to show the reader more about the character and delve into what makes the character tick. If the purpose of your prologue is to reveal the past moments in a character's life or to discuss the history of a character, you should make sure there is enough backstory in the draft. Include engaging details from the character's past and have the character show why these details are important or necessary to the rest of the story. Though the backstory should be about the character, it should also connect to the larger themes or ideas in the novel.
Question: What is a summary of what this article is about?
Choose which type of prologue fits your story. Create a scene with sensory details. Aim for a prologue with one to two scenes. Use a specific character voice. Put backstory in the prologue.