Writing Season

Fall is not about pumpkin spice.

Now that I have your attention . . .

For me, Fall signifies a prelude to my beloved Winter. Once Halloween passes, it’s a literal and figurative rush toward the holidays: choosing new side dishes for Thanksgiving; the madcap month of baking and watching Christmas movies (yes, even some Hallmark selections) in December. Then Winter Solstice kicks off the few precious weeks of my favorite season of hygge, that also includes my birthday.

A few years ago, I tapped into the idea of living more in tune with the seasons instead of the Roman calendar. I loved the idea of not disquieting my Winter with the manic energy of New Year’s resolutions, starting my new year in Spring’s time of rebirth, working diligently through Summer, and harvesting the fruits of my labor in Fall.

But even with that new rhythm (which was a vast improvement), something still felt off for me. Call it something as simple as temperature. 

Generally speaking, I don’t enjoy the heat of summer, especially where I live in the San Fernando Valley. When others are doing all sorts of outdoor activities, I’m comparatively inactive (except for walks on the beach when I can get there).

 When cooler temps arrive, I come alive. I resume my 5K walks again. I bundle up (yes, we can have chilly nights in Los Angeles) and write on my balcony with my outdoor lights twinkling over my head.

I’ve also realized that while I love to be cozy and drink hot tea and cocoa by the gallon, Winter is not a restful season for me in the way some might prescribe it to be.

Rather, the quietude makes Winter the absolute best time for me to write. So, this December I’ll be baking fewer cookies, but preparing them with a lot more joy, and re-watching only my favorite Christmas movies, so that come Winter Solstice, I’ll be ready to launch my Writing Season. When’s yours? I’d love to hear, and if I can help you find it, let’s talk!

Primal Creativity

What a concept!

The first time I heard this term, it shot straight to the core of my heart space like a shooting star. My fellow wild woman creative Sharla June spoke of it at a gathering of the women’s group I was part of as a state we return to when we’re able to shut out distractions and mental noise.

But there’s something deeper at work here . . .

Primal: essential; fundamental; original; basic and powerful; connected with the origins of life; characteristic of the earliest time in the existence of a person. In other words, something that has always been with us, that has always been part of us.

How thrilling and exciting then to realize that primal creativity is something that we’ve always had access to—it’s part of everyone.

And it’s exactly how writing makes me feel, when I’m engaged with my writing practice on its purest most authentic level—when I’m just letting it all flow from my heart and soul, not concerned in its primitive form about the outcome (because that’s what editing is for, and that’s another subject).

It’s a zone I drill down to, where I’m free to create whatever I want, to write the stories my heart needs to tell. I’m surrounded by light and color. It’s an atmosphere teeming with ideas and possibilities.

How do we access it? There are many ways to get out of our own way and become a conduit for creativity, a scribe for our soul. And it’s different for everyone.

What does it look like for you? How do you plug into it? How do you get there? I can help you answer those questions. Reach out today to see if we’d make a good team.

And check out my upcoming workshop for women and non-binary individuals this October! Magical Realism: Pathway to Primal Creativity. Click here to learn more and register.

I’m a writer of magical realism, a mentor to women writers of all ages, and a story magic archaeologist. I hold an MFA in Creative Writing, and I live in Los Angeles with my husband and our two Imp Muses (cats) Stanley and Sofia. Join my mailing list for a free touchstone session in support of your writing practice!

www.writeranne.net ⁎ anne@writeranne.net ⁎ Twitter @wildwriteranne ⁎ Facebook Wild Woman Writer

"A Poem Lovely As a Tree" - Part Two (the wounded writer series)

In Part 1 I shared how, at the very start of my creative journey as a writer, my grade school teacher all but accused me of plagiarizing a poem I wrote, and then confiscated it from me. 

This is Part Two of that story.

 At this point my sense of failure obscured the seed of rage that wouldn’t fully bloom until much later in my adulthood, when I finally began to realize my self-worth as an individual and a writer.

I of course reported the incident to my mother. While I hoped that she would march into Mrs. Bloom’s classroom the next morning and demand my poem back, my teacher never faced any consequences that ever knew of. But I waited patiently until the end of the school year.

Mrs. Bloom dealt her final blow on the last day of school. I waited until all the other kids had cleared out. The halls were empty. Classroom windows and doors were open so the air could circulate. A warm, early-June breeze whispered into the hallway and rustled the discarded papers that never made it into a book bag or the trash.

I walked to Mrs. Bloom’s classroom where she sat at her desk, preparing to start her own summer vacation. I approached her with much more trepidation that I had all those months ago, and she greeted me with all of the same ire and irritation she had before. I asked her to return my poem with a reminder of her promise to me. She said: “Oh, I don’t have it anymore.” I heard “Why are you bothering me, stupid girl! Why would I have kept your worthless poem?”

Did I implore Mrs. Bloom to look for it? Maybe. Did she? I wonder. It’s entirely possible that my wounded memory blotted these parts out.

No, disappointment doesn’t even begin to cover it. This experience was a triple threat to my confidence and sense of self-worth: first Mrs. Bloom questioned my integrity by doubting that I had penned the poem; then she committed theft by confiscating my poem; and in the end she further betrayed my trust in her by carelessly tossing it and failing to return it to me as promised.

I’m not without empathy, which has actually been an important part of the healing of this wound. Because whatever creative wound that thwarted Mrs. Bloom’s desire to become a poet is what embittered her and motivated her destructiveness. 

As for my mother, God only knows how hard it must have been for a single, divorced woman to raise and care for me, much less wage war on my behalf over a poem. 

I chose to keep writing. Not long after I lost my poem to Mrs. Bloom (I was unsuccessful at recreating it beyond the first two lines), I wrote my first book in the third grade. My first three books, actually, and my mom was a great help and support—she typed the pages of one, sewed the binding for all three, and took me shopping for colored contact paper for the covers. I won a Young Author’s award for the first one, and I still have them on my bookshelf.

I also chose to write through every creative wound I endured in the years since then, and there have been many. But each one holds a hidden gem; each creative wound has shown me a new facet of my worth and strength, and each has served to confirm who I am and what I do.

Are your creative wounds holding you back in your writing practice? Let's talk.

I’m a writer of magical realism, a mentor to women writers of all ages, and a story magic archaeologist. I hold an MFA in Creative Writing, and I live in Los Angeles with my husband and our two Imp Muses (cats) Stanley and Sofia. Join my mailing list and receive eligibility for a free touchstone call in support of your writing practice.

www.writeranne.net ⁎ anne@writeranne.net ⁎ Twitter @wildwriteranne ⁎ Facebook Wild Woman Writer

"A Poem Lovely As a Tree", Part 1 (the wounded writer series)

A poem lovely as a tree . . .

I trusted my grade-school teacher implicitly and completely. Didn’t we all?

Mrs. Bloom was not the breath of spring that her name implies. She was a hard woman, sculpted by the sharp edges of her rules and regulations. It was difficult to find joy in her classroom, as still as we were made to sit in our seats and as straight as we had to line up at the chalkboard to recite whatever poem she had assigned us to memorize. Will I ever be grateful that one such assignment was Trees by A.A. Milne? Not exactly. I’ll never forget those first lines, though: “I think that I shall never see, a poem lovely as a tree.”

Yet it was with huge joy that I approached her at the end of class one day, clutching a poem that I’d labored over in the days before. I can still feel the smile on my face when I approached her, and Mrs. Bloom’s clear displeasure at seeing me standing next to her desk didn’t dampen my excitement. 

I don’t remember her verbal acknowledgement, or her inquiry as to what it was I wanted from her, only that she stood, and that I told her in the messy way of a young person that I’d written a poem, and that I wanted to show it to her.

She took it from me, and I know I kept grinning with innocent hope much the way Ralph did in A Christmas Story, as he waited for his teacher to read his essay about what he wanted for Christmas that year.

If you’re one of the handful of people on the planet who hasn’t seen that movie, I’ll try not to spoil that scene too much by saying that Ralphie’s teacher missed the point. It was never about what Ralphie wanted for Christmas, or dare I add, how well it was written. At that age, it was about his sense of accomplishment, how he communicated his ultimate Christmas wish.

Not only did Miss Shields miss the point, so did Mrs. Bloom—wildly and destructively. She looked up from the paper she held with my poem neatly written on it. I’m sure I met her cynical gaze with the eager anticipation I still felt.

My poem was simple, and painfully full of rhyme, as are the early attempts at poetry of many kids. From what little I remember, it probably wasn’t very good (I mean, the first two lines were “Her name is Queen Elizabeth, Queen Elizabeth is her name”)—but again, not the point.

“Well,” Mrs. Bloom began (and I held onto a shred of hope for a moment longer not that she would say that it was a good poem, but that she would validate the effort), “it’s pretty good—if you wrote it.”

I can think of so many ways to describe how I felt in that moment. Like someone had dragged the needle across a vinyl record of my favorite song. Like I’d just wiped out at the roller rink knees first, and the kid next to me skated over the fingers of the hand I’d used to break my fall. Some would say I’m being too dramatic (“why not just say you were disappointed?”) Because for a creative person, especially at that age, it’s not just disappointing—it’s soul withering. . . dream crushing. You get the idea.

“I’ll just hang onto this for now,” Mrs. Bloom continued. “You can have it back at the end of the school year.”

Find out what happens next in Part 2.

In the meantime, are your creative wounds holding you back in your writing practice? Let's talk.

I’m a writer of magical realism, a mentor to women writers of all ages, and a story magic archaeologist. I hold an MFA in Creative Writing, and I live in Los Angeles with my husband and our two Imp Muses (cats) Stanley and Sofia. Join my mailing list and you will be eligible for a free touchstone session in support of your writing life.

www.writeranne.net ⁎ anne@writeranne.net ⁎ Twitter @wildwriteranne ⁎ Facebook Wild Woman Writer

22, Then and Now

 A couple of weeks ago, during my final session with my writing/career coach, he gave me the parting assignment of writing a letter to my 22-year-old self. He suggested this based on a story I told him in the session.

I had just graduated from college and taken my little sheltered Ohio-born-and-raised-self to New York City. It wasn’t like I would be panhandling for my first gig. I went from a protected life at college to one in the Big Apple: I was staying on a friend’s couch in her luxury high-rise apartment at 72nd and Third. And I had a lot to learn.

Among my first lessons: wear sneakers for walking and whip out the dress shoes upon arrival to the job interview, temp assignment, whatever.

On the heels of that lesson was learning how to decode the want ads. They all made administrative work sound exciting and full of possibilities for advancement. I had responded to one before I even arrived in the city, and I had an interview! I was stoked. Sure, I knew I probably wouldn’t land the first job I interviewed for, but I still felt confident. And then I answered a few dozen more want ads just like it. Eventually, I did land my first gig at a university in their public relations department, which seemed like a good fit.

But before I landed that job, I had another quite significant interview of sorts. It was set up for me by my friend on whose couch I was crashing. She was a Black female executive at Avon, no small feat in those days. The meeting she arranged for me was with one of her colleagues, another Black female executive. 

I was really excited. I thought I could at least get my foot in the door. I had a 3.5 GPA; I had professional recommendations; and I had my friend. But maybe I was expecting too much because I didn’t even get a toe in the door.

The executive I met with coolly shook my hand and settled into her leather chair behind her desk. The arrogance rolled off her like mist off of dry ice. I thought I was prepared for this “information interview.” But she only needed one arrow of inquiry and it found its mark.

“What do you want to do?” she asked in an exasperated tone, as she glared at my resume. “I mean, you have this degree in Communications. So what to do you want to do? Public Relations, Corporate Communications? . . .” I muttered something about being open to any of those. “Well, they’re all very different.”

My memory of the rest of what she said in that short meeting is a little foggy. But I am clear about the feelings I was left with afterward: that my degree was too broad; that I was stupid for not having a plan, and for coming into the meeting without one; that I should have had my future all figured out at the ripe old age of twenty-two.

Immediately following my last session with my coach, I felt excited about the idea of writing a letter to my 22yo self. I began to compose the letter in my head from the wizened me, strong and confident. But life happened, and by the time I was ready to sit down and do the assignment, I didn’t feel much like tackling it anymore. I was in a funk. But I also realized that I was basically getting that same question from a couple of people, albeit without any of the arrogance I’d experienced before.

An unexpected work opportunity came my way recently. I thought a lot about whether or not to pursue it, and I decided to go for it. I wanted to talk to some professional friends in the industry about one aspect of the work. They were positive, but both mentioned how great it would be, especially if this was a career path I wanted. What this felt like to me was another version of how great it would be, as long as I had figured out what I wanted, and this was the sole path I wanted to take.

And then I realized that, in a way, I have no more “figured things out” than I did when I was 22. And that’s downright depressing. I started composing a new letter in my head: “I got nothing for you, kid. It doesn’t get much better no matter how much you try.”

Having watched and then started to read Tiny Beautiful Things, I found myself wishing I could just write a “Dear Sugar” letter. I felt like she would have something better to say to my 22yo self than I did at that point.

Lo and behold, that night when I picked up the book again, near the end was a chapter with a letter from a girl who asked just that: “What would you tell your twentysomething self if you could talk to her now? Love, Seeking Wisdom.” Holy cow. The synchronicity sent a warmth through me that immediately dispelled the coldness of the expectation that I should have it figured out by now. Sugar’s reply was just the reassurance I needed.

It's good you’ve worked hard to resolve…issues while in your twenties but understand that what you resolve will need to be resolved again. And again.

Thank God!

The useless days will add up to something. The shitty jobs. The hours writing in your journal. The long meandering walks. The hours reading poetry and story collections and novels . . . these are your becoming.

Wow! There was also this bonus section that touched on the recent disintegration of a friendship that had also been weighing on me:

You cannot convince people to love you. This is an absolute rule. No one will ever love you because you want him or her to give it. Real love moves freely in both directions. Don’t waste your time on anything else.

And finally:

Don’t lament so much about how your career is going to turn out. You don’t have a career. You have a life. Do the work. Keep the faith. Be true blue. You are a writer because you write. Keep writing and quit your bitching. 

BOOM. Thank you, Sugar. That is exactly what I wanted to say to my 22yo self before I went careening down the heinous and inauthentic vortex of what I should have figured out. Bonus: it’s also what I need to remind myself of right now, even as ripe with experience as I am. Because I’m still on my adventure. And that’s okay. Love, Me.

***

If you’re a writer in the second act of your adventure too, I’d love to hear how it’s going for you. Reach out to me at anne@writeranne.net.

Coming Home to Your Writing

 

photo by PhotoReith at Pixabay

We've been talking this week about the energy of renewal and harnessing it in our writing practice.

As my husband and I finished editing the audio sessions for my upcoming release today, hearing it all got me pumped. It's going to be great!

This workshop experience creates a space in which you can not only cultivate the seeds of a new story (or replant one you started long ago), but it's also a space in which you can strengthen your writing practice to support your goals for working on the project beyond the workshop and into the summer.

I want to share a quick story about how one writer friend of mine did just that. She picked up the original remnant of a novel she'd started after she'd fleshed out another version based on poor feedback. She told me that returning to the 10,000 words of her original novel felt overwhelming and impossibly heavy. Her situation is very much tied to a creative wound, which is another subject I'll be talking about in a free event coming up later this year.

Others of you have told me that what blocks you in this same situation are distractions, the weight of personal trauma, inertia, and too many life obligations. These blocks can all be traced back to the same source: a faulty connection to our writing practice, to our art.

I said to my friend that returning to the original 10,000 words of her novel—in other words, the story her heart wanted to tell—would feel like coming home. She sat with this idea, and a few weeks later she told me "I'm ready to write!" Her eyes sparkled, and she was plugged into her sense of renewal. She was ready to re-grow the seed of her novel into a beautiful new tree. She's ready to write this summer.

That's what the Writing As Renewal experience is all about—creating that space to bring a new story to life (or to reincarnate an old one) and setting you up to grow it big and strong.

Tomorrow, the door to that energy of renewal will be open! Not only will you have the portability of audio lessons, but they're evergreen, which means you'll have permanent access to the materials to follow at your own pace and return to as often as you'd like.

Word to the wise: you'll want to get in on the ground floor before special pricing and bonuses disappear on May 24th.

In the meantime, keep well, keep writing, and stay tuned!

Roadblocks to Renewal

So here we are at the tail end of spring, and the brink of summer--a season of activity. And for writers, what's better than a summer spent writing? Recently I've talked with you about the energy of renewal that spring brings and harnessing that in your writing practice. It's such a perfect time to cultivate the seeds of fresh stories, or to give new life to those you've buried or set aside.

photo by Positive Images on Pixabay

I've heard from some of you about how challenging it can be to engage in this way. One of you writes, "What's most challenging for me with my writing project(s) is continuing or picking up my work through the bumps and interruptions in my life. I suppose I'm not swimming alone in a revolving flux of idiosyncratic secondary characters and distracting self-defeating jargon." That is so powerful! Not only is this an accurate portrayal of how life tries to besiege our writing practice, sometimes on a daily basis, but this writer nails it by calling out how we're not alone in this predicament. This distraction can also present as the feeling of not having enough time, or even a general malaise and lack of motivation, as another writer friend of mine is struggling with. It can also present as the tremendous weight of grief or other trauma that we're enduring as part of life.

I actually want to design some kind of live virtual writer's gathering specifically around grief and trauma later this year, so stay tuned for that.

But for now, let's hone in on working through these and any road blocks. At the crux of these roadblocks is really one thing—our inner connection to our work, and to our process and practice. When that connection is strong, nothing gets in the way for very long. When we re-enliven this connection, we'll take the time to write, even if it's only five minutes at the end of an exhausting day. Our excitement to do our chases away the malaise of boredom and inertia. We'll even be able to write as we wade through the deep waters of grief and trauma, because as the first writer who shared her thoughts with me so wisely put it, "that's where all the Spirit Guides like to hang out." So true, my wise and wild woman writer friend!

The good news is that anyone can access this connection at anytime—right now, today even! It really just starts by taking a few minutes to listen to your writer's spirit, and then writing what your soul tells you to write.

In my Writing As Renewal experience, we'll move gently into this space of access and renewal and build on it, bringing these stories of our heart to life!

I'll share one more post with you before I launch this experience on May 21, in which I'll give just a few examples of how others have vanquished these road blocks to writing and plugged into that connection to their writer's spirit and those stories waiting to blossom and grow.

As always, I'd love to hear how you're resonating with your sense of renewal. You can leave a comment here, or reach me by email at anne@writeranne.net, or give me a shout out on social media.

I also invite you to join my mailing list to receive a FREE guide on story magic!

Talk to you soon!