Young Writers Society

Welcome to Squills, the official news bulletin of the Young Writers Society!

What will you find here? Tons of interesting news about YWS, including but not limited to: articles about writing, art, and the world of humanities; interviews with YWS members; shameless plugs; link round-ups; and opinionated columns.

And where will all of this come from? Take a look at our fantastic creative staff!





Of course, our content can’t come only from our staff. We also depend on you to help keep Squills successful. You’re all a part of a writing community, after all. If you’re interested in submitting to Squills, pop on over to the Reader’s Corner to find out how you can get involved by contributing an article or participating in other Squills activities. You can also subscribe to the Squills Fan Club , or PM SquillsBot to receive a notification each time a new issue is published!

Well, that’s all I have for now. So, what are you waiting for? Enjoy!

1. FM Interview
2. The 5 Stages of Going Healthy
3. New Arrivals
4. The Weekly Roundup
5. Shameless Plugs
6. Subscribers

FM INTERVIEW WITH ROECKERCODYwritten by Elysium < PM: >

Hello everyone! Elysium your community reporter here with an interview with our Featured Member for August 11 - August 25, @roeckercody!




roeckercody: When I found out I was the new featured member I freaked out. It was so exciting because I joined in July and was welcomed so strongly by this community,with open arms and excitement. It's been a wild ride, and I am so glad that I get to be a part of this wonderful community filled with such kind people!



r: I had no idea whatsoever! It was a complete surprise on all fronts. I saw I had nine messages the first day and my reaction was "Woah, did something I wrote get seriously noticed?" and although that was not the case, I was still super duper happy and honored. It means the world to me.



r: I love the ability to find new voices in those around me, of varying ages. I am a firm believer that motivation actually helps. Criticism mixed with positive feedback can really push someone who is already talented pursue a career in writing. I have always wanted to be that motivation somebody needed and I strive to do that every day on here.



r: I want to be a writer, so I am attempting to write longer stories, but I recently started my process and am working hard in finding my niche! I am a sucker for fantasy, I love creating worlds and magic, and all that stuff. I have recently been into poetry, realistic and heartfelt. I like making people think. I also love writing scripts. One of my favorite things I have ever written is my script entitled "Monsters In The Light" which I am going to try and get published by a play-writing company sometime in the future!

Thank you for your time, and congratulations on becoming the new Featured Member! That's all for this edition of Squills!

THE 5 STAGES OF GOING HEALTHY written by Skydreamer < PM: >

Welcome to the second wellness article! *Yay!*

These five stages I went through is meant to shed a light on how wellness and "being healthy" is a lifestyle (and mindset), not just a movement. And how a lot of people are swept by the idea of going healthy until they reach some of these stages. If you've reached any of these stages and yet prevailed in your quest to be healthy, congratulations! You are trying to live a healthy lifestyle with a healthy mindset as your focus. That will get you through pretty much anything! And if you've hit some of these stages, or are thinking of going healthy, this should give you some pointers. Enjoy!

1. Excitement. This is when you've seen people, or heard people, or read articles about people, who have gone healthy. You're PUMPED! Ready to run, jump, hike, eat right. Everything looks possible. For me, this was the stage where I planned a lot, where I did my research, where I basically soaked in the idea of getting healthy. I was eating, sleeping and thinking healthy. Healthy was like my new best friend I couldn't let go of. And this stage is usually the beginning stage of a lot of things we start but may not finish. We're excited, into it, we know that it might change our whole life!

But sometimes it's best to take the excitement down a notch, to figure out what's plausible in our life and current circumstances and what just isn't. I didn't really think too much of that. I was saving recipes for American meals and Italian meals, and so many things I couldn't actually get here. (Although they do have some stuff like, Quinoa, yay! They actually have a lot of stuff here, slight exaggeration.)
It's important that instead of just wanting to jump into the pool, we learn exactly how deep it is, how long we'll be able to swim, and we learn to swim if we didn't know before. And I know there are some who are careful, and they don't just get overly excited about things, but sometimes it just depends on the thing. Everyone has something they might let their guard down for. And I'm not actually saying you shouldn't be excited, I'm saying it's better to be realistic as well as excited when it comes to changing something big in your life.

2. Full force. This is after the excitement has turned into energy to fight for the win! However, it's good to keep in mind, you might win the battle, but will you win the war? This is where (in the case of exercising, especially) you go all out.
You create a plan to be exercising regularly or somewhat regularly, and you get the app to run, or the app to do different reps. For me, this was when I created my website/blog on going healthy. I called it "Affordable Healthy" because we (Mom and I) didn't have the cash to be buying all them expensive fruits and veggies. But we tried, and we managed to go to the markets where we can get them for better deals. Isn't it sad that some of what's really good for you can be really expensive?

Anyways, back to the stage, this is where you may be doing really well, and feeling really good about yourself. You have been succeeding in the healthy realm so far.
So, you push yourself hard! You run until you can't walk the next day (which I did, I accidentally pushed myself so far one day I was worried about my ability to walk, no joke).

This is the best time of going healthy, though! You know why and what you're doing it, and you are doing it as well as you can. However, this stage is kind of like the high before the low, the calm before the storm. After this stage, it might not go so well. Especially if you push yourself too hard. At this stage, it's best to calm down from the excitement period, and be reasonable, delegate times for exercise that you can do constantly, no matter how small they are.

If the exercise is simply walking a mile or two in the morning (everyday) then, you stick to that, and stick to eating better, and there will be results. If your type of eating healthy is simply making sure to have greens with lunch and dinner, while portioning down meat, then go for it! If it's to cut off from unhealthy sweets by replacing them with healthier options, go for it! Whatever you do, at this "full force" stage, don't actually go full force, take it one step at a time.

3. Burn out. If you have been going full force, like a phone used constantly, your battery will be depleted by the end of the day. Therefore, in a couple of weeks, months if you're fortunate, you might not have as much energy as you did before. Or in other words, you won't have any energy at all. It may be that you just get tired way easily, it may be that you just don't "feel like doing it", it may be that you're easily frustrated with whatever you do.

It doesn't matter how the burn out comes, if you go on full force non-stop, the burn out will come at some point. And who knows? The burn out might catch you by surprise. You might be thinking 'How am I so tired? I didn't do that much!', but it doesn't matter, if your body felt that you were doing too much, your body is going to be burnt out after a period of time. That is why it's so important in the full force stage you don't go full force! That is why you should have a steady pace at whatever it is you do.

Our bodies and even our minds at times can't really handle too much pressure, too much work. If we do a sprint of hard work, our bodies can sustain it, though we will be tired. But if we constantly run marathons, our bodies will just about collapse. I'm talking mainly of exercise, but it could relate to other aspects too. There's that saying, "Too much of anything is bad." And especially when we talk about physical things and food, this is true.
Now, while it may be debatable whether that applies to nutella (teehee), we need moderation in our life, otherwise things aren't going to go so well. Balance is key, it's important to have a good balance to maintain long-term success.

4. Look for alternatives. This is directly after the burn out, or a while after the burn out, and this is when we just are too tired to do what we originally planned. So, we opt for easier solutions, or what we think is easier. This is when some might go dieting and drinking health drinks instead of eating, going through cleanses. And I'm not saying, if you do those things you're doing it all wrong.

However, if your goal is to be healthy and not just to lose weight, you are definitely doing it wrong. Losing weight isn't going to work anyways without a healthy mindset because once the weight is off, we think that's it, and we're done. That isn't the case though, we have to keep losing weight, to stay at a healthy weight for ourselves. For me particularly, I don't like the idea of losing weight at all. If you want to lose weight, I'd suggest you just go healthy. Some people's ideal body weight is thicker than others, but as long as they're healthy, that's all that matters really.

Every body type is beautiful, right? So, being healthy takes specific planning, and it doesn't include cheating by taking detox drinks and "juice cleanses". Or causing your body harm by throwing up, or not allowing yourself to eat, or anything like that. Some juice cleanses, and green drinks are good for you, but if you're using that as an alternative to be healthy, then they are not good for you at all. Also, it's good to remember the moderation quote, and not to do those kinds of things too much. Mainly though, at this stage we avoid doing it the right or most difficult way, and try to find easier ways to either maintain a weight we want, or even easier ways to exercise or eat healthy. In my case, my alternative was when it came to eating and exercising, I would just do little runs in my home, and eat irregularly and sometimes I still do (unintentionally).
Although with me that had to do with a sleeping problem I was fighting with as well, will possibly discuss that in another article. Whatever it is that you want to achieve, being healthy isn't going to be quick, or easy, it's going to be long and it's going to take some sacrifice.

5. Give up. (Temporarily) And this is where I think I find myself now, at this stage. I have to be honest, and this is the truth. I haven't been that healthy lately, and it bugs me a lot. The reason it bugs me so much though is because, 1. I really want to be. And 2. I have a healthy mindset. Now, that may sound weird, if I have a healthy mindset, why not be healthy? Because knowing what is right and doing what is right, isn't exactly the same. Sometimes I eat healthy (or acknowledge what I'm eating is healthy and is happy about it, props to my mom) but a lot of times I just let it slide. My exercising had pretty much ended, and I had given up (temporarily). However, since my mindset was set on being healthy for the long run, for the long term, I still know that I will get back to it. And I know that I will avoid eating what I can, when I can. I still don't eat (or like for that matter) fast food anymore. I still notice whenever I eat unhealthy and I remind myself why. I still collect healthy recipes and keep up my Pinterest board "I've gone Healthy" and I kept that title the same even when I was struggling, because I realized that I have gone healthy. And once you go healthy you never go back, at least not in the way you think.

I hope this helped you to understand my personal journey and perhaps others like me, who have passed through the ups and downs of "being/going healthy". It's a fun thing, but it's hard work and it takes a resilient mentality. If you at least feel like you're in it to win it, even if you have to take a break due to life circumstances, then you do that! You'll be right back at stage one in no time!

Hope you all have a great (healthy) week! Peace!

NEW ARRIVALS
written by BlueAfrica < PM: >

Take a moment to welcome this week’s newest members to the site!

THIS WEEK'S ROUNDUP – 8/23written by megsug < PM: >

Buy one get three free! There’s never been a deal like this. Get the roundup while it’s hot!


@Deanie has started showing off her photos of books from her blog. They’re cool to look through if you’re looking for a good read or nice to admire with creative angles and positions. I like this picture because of the angle.







Check her thread out today.


@Strange created a thread considering what good band names would be for our imaginary bands. There were a lot of great ideas, I loved @ClackFlip’s:






His band would play jazz. What band name would you have?


Long long ago, @Sleeping Valor asked what her username made other users think of. Years and eighty-one pages later, people are still discussing what each other’s usersnames make them think of. What @Nightcrawler’s username makes @Tuesday think of is hilarious:







So, what does @dark’s username make you think of?


@Payne started up a game where users answer questions with song titles. It started out that the song title had to make up most of the answer, but now, it just has to fulfill the important part of the answer. @TheCatchphrase answered last, and his question was:







Pull out your playlists and find an answer!

SHAMELESS PLUGS

written by SquillsBot < PM: >

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