What would happen if you dug through your memories looking for your soul’s journey? You would find moments of joy, shot through with brilliance. You’d find unspeakable pain and grief and despair. You’d find sweet intimacies, wrenching doubt, steadiness, and regret. You’d find meaningless suffering and profound synchronicity. Most of all, you’d find mystery. Who are you, really? What’s your life’s […]
Holding Our Stories to the Light Read More »
It takes a village to raise a child, and, judging from acknowledgement pages and how my writing group has saved my ass innumerable times, it takes a village to write a book. In addition to the obvious participants (your writing teachers and colleagues, your beta readers, your agent or publisher or local copy store clerk), we’re
The Village in Your Book Read More »
Why is creativity so nourishing? Why on a busy trip does an hour with watercolors settle my daughter’s nervous system? Why do ten minutes of journaling launch my day well? How did a simple circle dance, repeated over a weekend, deepen trust and add bounce to the steps of retreat participants? On a walk through a rough part
At the Heart of Creativity Read More »
I’d like to make a confession. On Sunday mornings, I sit in church internally spinning out a reactive, biting critique of the service, how hollow and performative it is, how the sermons charge us to do justice and love kindness and walk humbly without ever addressing how, feeling mightily superior about the vibrancy of my prayer
Creative Bypassing: Grist for the Mill Read More »
Unsurprisingly, these days I’ve been pondering the word “release”. Prisoners are released from jail, butterflies are released from cocoons, classified documents are released to the public, singers release their latest albums, and when we weep or rage we release emotions. My favorite definition of release is “to allow something to move, act, or flow freely”;
When the Creative Beaver Dam Bursts Read More »
As I begin the bizarrely self-referential work of releasing The Release, I’m test-driving the teachings I put forward there. Can I really find increasing freedom as I send this book into the world? Can marketing and publicity really be life-giving? Can I sustain writing’s energizing, personally enriching exchange with mystery—the gift economy of the creative process—as
The Courage to Ask for Help Read More »
Do you ever feel self-conscious on the page? A shout-out to the Brevity blog for publishing these reflections on stumbling our way to consciousness through writing. When my partner Emily teaches traditional circle dance to a group of newbies, they go through a predictable progression. First, they stride easily into the class, unaware of their
What can dancing teach us about writing? Read More »
On a weekly basis, one client or another will tell me, “If I wind up on my deathbed without finishing this project, I’m seriously going to regret it.” This population of writers is, admittedly, peculiar; they share an intense enough degree of passion, compulsion, or vocation about writing to pay me good money. Or perhaps they seek
Years ago I coached a Buddhist priest in the development of his memoir. Unlike most beginners, Sensei V (as I’ll Christen him) cranked out a crummy but exceedingly workable rough draft in no time flat. Plagued by none of the usual hang-ups (self doubt, insecurity about “not being a real writer,” despair at how terrible his writing
“Let it go! Let it go!” Read More »
As I write, Gwyn’s at the piano practicing a Beethoven Sonata, repeating trills, stumbling on scales, figuring out fingering. Distracting as her mistakes are, I find myself amazed that, after ten years of parental supervision, Gwyn is finally capable of cultivating for herself the joy of puzzling out a piece. Gwyn’s not naturally talented, but
Cherishing the Measureless Read More »