CAROL TAYLOR

How do you manage to balance your time between family, friends, and writing?
That’s an easy question to answer, because all these things are connected. My family, friends and my writing are all together; each thing contributes to the other. Everything I do relates back to my writing, so it’s not something that I do for only 6 or 8 hours a day. I do it all the time, conceptualizing ideas and stories or characters, or sorting out emotional issues or my personal relationships. Or I hang out with, meet, talk to, and brainstorm with creative people. Everything I do, my teaching, freelancing, editing, speaking engagements, all relate back and feed into my writing. So there is never a separation of my day job and my dream job; my dream job is my day job. Now remember a dream job is not an easy job, it’s just a job you love to do that you can support yourself doing. To be successful as a writer you have to live the creative, writing lifestyle. You should know and network with writers, attend writing functions, participate, network, socialize in the writing and creative worlds and you have to do it all the time. It’s easy to do this when it’s your world because it’s always happening around you.


If you could spend one hour with just one person, whom would you choose?
Since I can’t choose one, I’m going to choose four, but I’ve chosen them for the same reason. They are all brilliant strategists.

Michelle Obama is a brilliant strategist who is doing everything the President is doing, except she is doing it in high heels and quietly. She is his advisor, his wife, a mother and a public figure, and a brilliant professional who is doing it all so flawlessly.

Anna Wintour is a brilliant strategist who understands the idea of branding and brand identity and exclusivity within a commercial agenda. She is a woman in a position of power who manages to balance being a mother, a woman and a powerful person. She always has a clear vision that she sticks to regardless of what anyone else seems to think. That’s a gift.

Mark Zuckerberg is a brilliant strategist, and forward thinker who understands the idea of having the right people in the right places. He also understands that we’re all connected and knows that it’s not just about creating things but also figuring out how to make the thing you’ve created function better.

Niccolo Machiavelli was another brilliant strategist. He always saw the big picture, and he understood the game of power, identifying those who have it, utilizing it, creating it, and strategically making it work for him, but quietly and behind the scenes.