I finished reading a wonderful book, Writing Down the Bones, by Natalie Goldberg, which talks about how to get our creativity on the page and meditation. It touches upon the idea that writing can be meditation. I love this idea, because I'm not great about sitting quietly for any lengthy period of time. Give it a read even if you aren't a writer. There is useful information for all.
One of my favorite chapters was Trust Yourself. The title alone got my attention since I'm a big believer in the first step we must all take to peacefulness is trusting we have the tools we need for a fulfilled life.
As writers, we must learn to trust our voices. A strong writing voice is what will keep a reader glued to the pages. The writing voice can be nurtured to bloom with time and care like a garden. Or like a yoga pose. Even meditation. What's the trick? Trust yourself! But how do you do that when rejection letters pile up and your critique partners disagree on your piece or your teacher red pens away the humor in your writing? First, you listen to the varying opinions, but then you make your own decisions. That's empowering! Your work is your own. Tell your story the way you want to tell it.
Are there spots in your life where if you trusted you had the tools you could make all your dreams come true? What else needs to be nurtured? And, writers, how else can we trust that our work is the very best it can be?
Monday, November 26, 2012
Friday, November 16, 2012
Declare What You Desire
I was heading out to yoga today thinking about the people in my life. (That includes the characters in my books.) The big difference between the two? I can make my characters behave in ways I see fit.
Having said that, I want to be surrounded by like minded people. What I mean is, you don't have to like the same books I do or have the same social and political beliefs I do, but I do want to interact with others whose spirit is open. People who see the world through a glass half filled. When I'm with someone I want to be wrapped in their positive attitude. Not slimed with their negative energy.
I declared to the Universe this morning I wanted to meet more people like me. Guess what? The Universe heard me. I love when this happens! In class today, a woman I'd apparently met at a school function recognized me. (Good thing because I am the worst at recognizing other people. It's bad.) We started talking. Grabbed tea together afterward and voila! I made a new connection. Her energy felt positive. We might even hang again. No matter what happens I know the Universe heard me and sent me someone for that moment.
Whatever you wish for in your life, talk with your higher power. Maybe you'd like a new career, a new friend, a better attitude. The Universe will send it to you, but you must be open and ready for it. Sometimes our wishes don't show up in ways we expect, but the wishes still come true.
What are some things you desire?
Having said that, I want to be surrounded by like minded people. What I mean is, you don't have to like the same books I do or have the same social and political beliefs I do, but I do want to interact with others whose spirit is open. People who see the world through a glass half filled. When I'm with someone I want to be wrapped in their positive attitude. Not slimed with their negative energy.
I declared to the Universe this morning I wanted to meet more people like me. Guess what? The Universe heard me. I love when this happens! In class today, a woman I'd apparently met at a school function recognized me. (Good thing because I am the worst at recognizing other people. It's bad.) We started talking. Grabbed tea together afterward and voila! I made a new connection. Her energy felt positive. We might even hang again. No matter what happens I know the Universe heard me and sent me someone for that moment.
Whatever you wish for in your life, talk with your higher power. Maybe you'd like a new career, a new friend, a better attitude. The Universe will send it to you, but you must be open and ready for it. Sometimes our wishes don't show up in ways we expect, but the wishes still come true.
What are some things you desire?
Monday, October 1, 2012
Skip the Flashback
I'm reading a book right now that inspired me to share my thoughts with you about flashbacks. I'm leaving out the author and title.
I'm a huge fan of mysteries and thrillers. And not just books. Movies and television too. When you tell me the story is about a woman who's been abducted, I say, "someone took her? Let's find out what happens NEXT."
Explain to me why authors feel the need to use flashbacks sprinkled throughout the story like stale bread crumbs to show characterization? I want to discover the characters, decide if I like them or not, through the actions they take AFTER the inciting incident. Not before. I'm not a big fan of what our hero did when he was 12. That's for the author to know. I watch a character come to life when he or she is forced to make a choice under pressure. If my hero is an adult, his choices at 12 have about as much pressure as a three day old latex balloon filled with helium.
Yet, these very books make the top of the best sellers list. Is it because most readers enjoy looking through the kitchen window from the outside? Are they saying with each turn of the page, "I can watch all the nasties that lie around the kitchen floor and clutter the table. No one will ever know how I sit and watch you because I'm outside and you're inside with the lights on." Maybe deep down in places we don't like to admit exist we all have a little dark side.
Let's not take away the fact that many, but not all, authors have a way with prose. Their words dress up a page like evening wear. The words catch the light and make us gasp for breath. We put a fluttering hand to our hearts and say, "if only..." Pretty words aside, do you know what I say to most flashbacks? Who cares?
Show me how the hero's world is rocked and leave out what he did when he was 12. Unless he's 12 NOW. A good author can make me care about our hero without telling me every detail of the hero's upbringing. Robert McKee says, "why a man does a thing is of little interest once we see the thing he does. A character is the choices he makes to take the actions he takes. Once the deed is done his reasons why begin to dissolve into irrelevancy."
In other words, the fact the hero's father took him to the baseball game when he was 12 and made him leave that game early has nothing to do with the fact his wife is missing NOW.
Your thoughts on flashback?
I'm a huge fan of mysteries and thrillers. And not just books. Movies and television too. When you tell me the story is about a woman who's been abducted, I say, "someone took her? Let's find out what happens NEXT."
Explain to me why authors feel the need to use flashbacks sprinkled throughout the story like stale bread crumbs to show characterization? I want to discover the characters, decide if I like them or not, through the actions they take AFTER the inciting incident. Not before. I'm not a big fan of what our hero did when he was 12. That's for the author to know. I watch a character come to life when he or she is forced to make a choice under pressure. If my hero is an adult, his choices at 12 have about as much pressure as a three day old latex balloon filled with helium.
Yet, these very books make the top of the best sellers list. Is it because most readers enjoy looking through the kitchen window from the outside? Are they saying with each turn of the page, "I can watch all the nasties that lie around the kitchen floor and clutter the table. No one will ever know how I sit and watch you because I'm outside and you're inside with the lights on." Maybe deep down in places we don't like to admit exist we all have a little dark side.
Let's not take away the fact that many, but not all, authors have a way with prose. Their words dress up a page like evening wear. The words catch the light and make us gasp for breath. We put a fluttering hand to our hearts and say, "if only..." Pretty words aside, do you know what I say to most flashbacks? Who cares?
Show me how the hero's world is rocked and leave out what he did when he was 12. Unless he's 12 NOW. A good author can make me care about our hero without telling me every detail of the hero's upbringing. Robert McKee says, "why a man does a thing is of little interest once we see the thing he does. A character is the choices he makes to take the actions he takes. Once the deed is done his reasons why begin to dissolve into irrelevancy."
In other words, the fact the hero's father took him to the baseball game when he was 12 and made him leave that game early has nothing to do with the fact his wife is missing NOW.
Your thoughts on flashback?
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
LET GO
I was speaking to a woman the other day and she said something that got me thinking. She believed if she let her son play football on the Jewish holiday something bad would happen to him. (Obviously, she was Jewish.)
Wow! She really believed that. Don't get me wrong, I can be superstitious too. I knock wood for good measure. If someone pays my children a compliment I say, "God bless them" under my breath. I come from a long line of Italians. Superstition is their middle name! But this woman was allowing fear to make a decision for her.
She's not alone. Fear is the leader in many people's lives, but it doesn't have to be. In Donna Farhi's Bringing Yoga to Life she states: "While pain is inevitable, suffering is not. By clinging to our existentialist viewpoint, we take a bad situation and make it worse by trying to wrestle it to the ground..."
What does fear stop you from doing? Are you not writing that book that you always wanted to? You wrote the book, but you won't query it or you won't let someone read it. Or you are a published author, but you don't have the career you dreamed of. What's holding you back? Afraid to put your heart on the page? Afraid to speak in public about your stories? Perhaps, you're afraid to succeed.
And if you aren't one of my writer friends, how does fear keep you in chains?
Donna Farhi has another good quote: "If you are very, very careful, nothing bad or good will ever happen to you."
The idea of being so afraid to live, to allow fear to control your choices, that you miss out on many, many good things in life should be the very thing that scares the living day lights out of you. Not football on a Jewish holiday. Get my drift?
How do you stop fear from controlling your choices? Well, I'm no expert, but I know you have to learn to let go, to surrender. In yoga, we learn about quieting our minds, grounding ourselves in the present moment, not to resist what is happening in our lives, but to embrace it. It takes practice, lots of practice, but it can be done.
I invite you again, as I did in my last post, to be fearless today. Holding onto fear for dear life is not your only choice. You can choose to let go.
Wow! She really believed that. Don't get me wrong, I can be superstitious too. I knock wood for good measure. If someone pays my children a compliment I say, "God bless them" under my breath. I come from a long line of Italians. Superstition is their middle name! But this woman was allowing fear to make a decision for her.
She's not alone. Fear is the leader in many people's lives, but it doesn't have to be. In Donna Farhi's Bringing Yoga to Life she states: "While pain is inevitable, suffering is not. By clinging to our existentialist viewpoint, we take a bad situation and make it worse by trying to wrestle it to the ground..."
What does fear stop you from doing? Are you not writing that book that you always wanted to? You wrote the book, but you won't query it or you won't let someone read it. Or you are a published author, but you don't have the career you dreamed of. What's holding you back? Afraid to put your heart on the page? Afraid to speak in public about your stories? Perhaps, you're afraid to succeed.
And if you aren't one of my writer friends, how does fear keep you in chains?
Donna Farhi has another good quote: "If you are very, very careful, nothing bad or good will ever happen to you."
The idea of being so afraid to live, to allow fear to control your choices, that you miss out on many, many good things in life should be the very thing that scares the living day lights out of you. Not football on a Jewish holiday. Get my drift?
How do you stop fear from controlling your choices? Well, I'm no expert, but I know you have to learn to let go, to surrender. In yoga, we learn about quieting our minds, grounding ourselves in the present moment, not to resist what is happening in our lives, but to embrace it. It takes practice, lots of practice, but it can be done.
I invite you again, as I did in my last post, to be fearless today. Holding onto fear for dear life is not your only choice. You can choose to let go.
Monday, August 27, 2012
Fearless
What does it mean to be fearless? Is it literally, without fear? Mirriam-Webster says fearless means "free from fear." But couldn't it also mean being afraid and doing or facing that thing anyway?
I think of being fearless as being brave and one can be brave and scared at the same time. Go ask a police officer, fire fighter or a parent. It's not the same kind of bravery, but ask an author. They have to brave and are definitely afraid at the same time.
I invite you to be fearless today. Not to live without fear, but to act in the face of it.
Monday, August 20, 2012
You Are The Teacher
Yoga teachers will say they are more a guide than a teacher. Your body and mind should dictate your practice for the day. Your yoga teacher will cue poses for you, but it's up to you to decide how hard to push or not. I knew this logically, but it wasn't until recently that I actually "got it." Everything came together like a perfectly tuned orchestra. My teacher gave the cues to the class, my body told me how far to go. Cobra became Up Dog. Bridge became Wheel. The practice was mine and mine alone as I glided from one pose to another.
It made me think about all of the "rules" in creative writing. Writers hear all the time in workshops to write the story that's in their hearts and not worry so much about the rules. No truer words have been spoken. Those "rules" are really guidelines to help you put your heart on the page and write the story you were meant to write.
Sure, some things have to be on the page. Conflict. Scene goals. Point of View. Speaker tags. You can follow the rules of writing and orchestrate a novel or story, but if you focus solely on the rules passion will be missing from the page. Just as a yoga pose can be stiff or painful or not on the edge enough if you follow only the cues.
Our hearts and our main characters are the guides in our stories. The rules of writing are simply the guidelines. When we throw caution away and trust that we know our craft that beautiful, magically story will come together. The story everyone will want to read.
Who is your teacher? What guides you?
It made me think about all of the "rules" in creative writing. Writers hear all the time in workshops to write the story that's in their hearts and not worry so much about the rules. No truer words have been spoken. Those "rules" are really guidelines to help you put your heart on the page and write the story you were meant to write.
Sure, some things have to be on the page. Conflict. Scene goals. Point of View. Speaker tags. You can follow the rules of writing and orchestrate a novel or story, but if you focus solely on the rules passion will be missing from the page. Just as a yoga pose can be stiff or painful or not on the edge enough if you follow only the cues.
Our hearts and our main characters are the guides in our stories. The rules of writing are simply the guidelines. When we throw caution away and trust that we know our craft that beautiful, magically story will come together. The story everyone will want to read.
Who is your teacher? What guides you?
Monday, July 23, 2012
No Excuses
We hear excuses all the time, don't we? I'm too busy, too late, too early, too tired. Don't like to drive in traffic my sister called, whatever.
Writers wrestle with excuses daily. My muse is gone, I don't have enough time, when the kids go to school, when I retire, after I do the laundry. The list of excuses goes on and on.
I have my own fair share tucked neatly in a canvas bag. "I need a vacation, if I could just get a day off I'll be able to handle it, too tired, blah, blah." The Universe heard me loud and clear recently and wanted to let me know I didn't need those useless excuses.
On my way to the food store I ran through my usual list. "Too tired, need time off, tomorrow will be better." While checking out, the cashier noticed I left a jar of vanilla in the cart after I'd put all my groceries on the belt. Embarrasing. Did I look like I was trying to walk out with the vanilla? My response, "I'd forget my head..."
She said, "After I had my kids I'd lost my mind."
This is where the Universe comes in. The cashier next to us said, "Have you heard of Dr. Wayne Dyer?"
Have I heard of Dr. Dyer?! He's fantastic. (If you aren't familiar with him, go look him up.)
Universe Provided Cashier said,"You need to read his book No More Excuses."
It was as if lights flashed, horns blared and a loud voice echoing over the PA system was saying, "Hey, you at register 19, listen up."
The Universe is trying to tell me something. I think its I'm capable now. Everything I need I have in this moment. My muse is always with me. I have all the energy I need. My mind is just fine even without the vacation.
I haven't read Dr. Dyer's book yet, but I will. No excuses.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)