We are ruled by uncertainty. The need to know shapes our motives, what we ask for, desire, fear and seek to claim.
And so it is in writing that we encounter a somewhat safe haven.
The writer has a general idea of the destination of her or his story if not, how it shall end.
But this is an illusion too.
Uncertainty, Destination, and the Need to Know… Read More »
It’s really hard to write. I’m traveling with my youngest.
I hated leaving home. And yet I felt stuck.
Stuck.
Not a good place to be as a writer.
And yet it happens.
I don’t experience writer’s block, as much as encountering periods wherein it is just hard to write. I lack the stamina to even get started.
I feel not excitement.
Ideas for a new story, ever how short, evade me.
Perhaps this is writer’s block.
Writer’s Block, Travel and Encountering Ourselves… Read More »
“Like turning base metal into gold, that’s what revision is to me.”
Susan Gabriel, psychotherapist, and author of Seeking Sara Summers
During my recent interview with Susan Gabriel she honestly stated that when first beginning to write she hated the process of revision.
On thanking her for being so truthful, I said that I had felt the same way.
We both then agreed that now upon reaching the stage of having written the rough/1st drafts of novels we love the stage of revising.
It was at this point that Susan wisely coined the phrase that she experienced the process of revision as one of “…turning base metal into gold.”
Magic, Mosaics, and the Alchemical Process of Becoming… Read More »
Recently I’ve been helping my high school teenager with the story they are writing. Now that school has ended and summer vacation has begun they are spending more time writing on their work.
It is wonderful to watch them pour their energy in passion into the project.
Doing so revives wistful memories of when I began writing nearly two decades ago.
Recalling my first attempts at writing a novel, brings to mind not simply the excitement and angst at setting out accomplish such a great feat.
I doubt we would have succeeded had most of us who have accomplished this goal understood the full nature of our undertaking and what it would and has required.
And so it has been with care and caution in choosing my words and responses that have and sought to nurture my child’s passion when they have sought my guidance and consultat
Introspection, Thought and Nascent Creations… Read More »
The Muse then is that most terrified of all the virgins. She starts if she hears a sound, pales if you ask her questions, spins and vanishes if you disturb her dress. We might start off by paraphrasing Oscar Wilde’s poem, substituting the world “Art” for “Love.”
Art will fly if held too lightly.
Art will die if held too tightly.
Lightly, tightly, how do I know?
Whether I holding or letting Art go?”
–Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing/Essays on Creativity
Beckoning and befriending The Muse takes work and energy. The focus required to summon The Muse asks that we turn inward. Looking at one’s own self consolidates awareness of our motives, those conscious and unconscious, what drives us to move through and impress ourselves upon the world in a unique manner that distinguishes us and expresses our personality.
The impetus to create involves two simultaneous processes, one of bringing the formless into form, making something out of the rawness of nothing. And then there is transformation under which each artist goes when carving and crafting our creating.
The Muse oversees and directs these two aspects of making while being remade, molding while being reshaped.
Art, The Muse and Beholding The Other… Read More »
“It isn’t easy. Nobody has ever done it consistently. Those who try hardest, scare it off into the woods. Those who turn their backs and saunter along, whistling softly between their teeth, hear it treading quietly behind them, lured by a carefully acquired disdain.
We are speaking, of course, of The Muse.”
–Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing/Essays on Creativity
Many people imagine the life of a writer as one of awakening each morning to a flowing stream of words that pour onto our writing tablet or through our fingers and onto the computer string, our greatest challenge being that of writing or moving our fingers quick enough on the computer keys to catch the words.
There are times like that. But more often than not, we struggle to find those words that ideally give readers a smooth ride into the escape of our stories and novels.
A more honest way of describing what we do is to say that the smoother our sentences flow and the more intense a readers entrancement into at story, the more the writer toiled at kneading and carving that ease of journey presented in the magic carpet of our words.
But what of The Muse?
The Muse, Mystery and Grace… Read More »
“You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you…writing allows just the right recipes of truth, life, reality as you are able to eat, drink, and digest without hyperventilating and flopping like a dead fish in your bed.”
–Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing
On reading this last night I considered how long it’s taking me to get my novel together, The House, that is. In actuality, the novel is written, and edited. I’m presently working on the layout of the text. I’m a do-it-your-selfer. After purchasing an edition of Adobe’s Design CS4 I feel obligated to at least make an attempt at transferring my novel that I am self-publishing from MS Word to book format.
Adobe’s Design CS4, Intoxication and Zen in the Art of Writing… Read More »