Well, friends, my decades-long obsession with revision has reached a new extreme. I’ve shamelessly messed with another author’s work. Is this even allowed? When my mother died, her study group was preparing to read Teilhard’s Divine Milieu. I picked up her beat-up paperback copy just as I began a two-year formation program in contemplative Christianity. One day my teachers […]
Celebration on the Altar of the World Read More »
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 »
For how many years now—twenty? thirty?—I’ve quoted Anne Lamott’s snarky bit of writing advice, gleaned from Bird By Bird: “You’ve got to write a shitty first draft.” I teach it to students and recite it to myself (even as I write this!) as a balm against revulsion at my mess of bad prose and half-baked
The Rough Draft Self Read More »
“You’re really enjoying writing these days,” a friend recently said. She was mirroring back to me my enthusiasm for my current project, a middle grade novel sprinkled with fantasy that occupies my mornings and then travels with me into the rest of my day like an invisible jungle gym for the heart. I desperately want
Creative Discomfort Read More »
We’re in the throes of deep revision and the only way out is through.
Deep Dive into Chaos Read More »
In our product-driven, results-oriented culture, we like to think creative work gains worth by its impact on an audience. Liz’s story illustrates that who we become for having done the creative work is an equally important “product” with significant “results.”
Adding to the “Sum of the Universe’s Order” Read More »
The unpublished memoir definitely exerts a subtle but important influence on me.
The Aliveness of Completed Work Read More »
This capacity to understand ourselves as in and of one another, shot through with divinity, and sourced in our beloved planet, is available to everyone. It’s deeply comforting. And it’s the only starting place for the healing we—and our planet—need.
Not Other Than Earth Read More »
Whatever we’re given by inspiration we must augment with effort and then release to move and heal and connect and transform the wider world.
Writers, This Is Our Moment. Read More »
The fundamental, foundational dialogue in any story is the relational exchange of creation.
Writing as a Dialogue with Creation Read More »