Tuesday Challenge - structure, structure, structure

Yes, I'm getting my query package together. It is zooming right along. I have a plan and a girl with a plan is a good thing. Bu.......t! Part of doing this is to write several synopses and in doing that I stumbled upon - no, I didn't stumble upon it - a structure cheat sheet was given to me by  Miriam Forster from Dancing with Dragons, who got it from The Dark Salon - Alexandra Sokoloff - a great site!
I immediately saw it as a great device for beating my synopsis into order. And it has been - I've been quite swoony with it, actually. In doing it (what? you ask) - in filling in the details I have realized that my novel does have quite a solid structure. But it isn't exactly in the same sequence that is outlined in the narrative structure that Alexandra lays out. My mid-point reversal isn't quite at my mid-point and perhaps I have two of them - and the enemy or obstacle is more within than without and uh...the black moment isn't black enough. So I'm tinkering in my mind with the structure of my plot.

I'm sure you all will understand when I say that I don't WANT to be tinkering with the narrative right now. Unh...unh. I want it done and dusted - put into a tidy package and sent off to those who will see it.
In the middle of this I realize one of the trigrams of the I CHING - #64 - Before Completion

 

No. 64,   Before Completion:
“Before Completion. Success.
But if the little fox, after nearly completing the crossing,
Gets his tail in the water.
There is nothing that would further."

           Yesterday's final changing line said, " . . the turning point is at hand. . . .  If she moves forward, good fortune will follow."  [Huang]. 

     And today's future reading says, "You need to move carefully --- like a little fox crossing an ice-covered river."  But you do need to keep moving.

         This is the last hexagram in the I Ching, but it does not signal an end.   It describes "the condition before transition."  [The Image]
 

           ". . . it  could suggest that you are not prepared to see clearly what must be done and take the final steps into the future. This may be a fear of the emptiness that sometimes comes after achieving a goal, or, on a more primal level, a fear of death.  . . .  All aspects of life and human affairs must come to an end and begin anew.  The awareness and acceptance of this is the richness of the human experience."  [Wing]

The Challenge today, dear readers, is to look at your plan with some dispassion - in my case I must not think I'm at the end when there are still danger signs (ice is tricky near the shore). I will keep moving but I will not let my self-imposed dead-line get in the way of my goal to have kept at this novel until it is the best it can be before letting it out. Is there anything in your plan (either your overt or secret plan) that needs adjusting to reflect the circumstances? Perhaps you've decided that you will write in first person because someone said you should for your first novel and yet? Or you have kept to a device, a convention of a genre even though you think, secretly, that it is works against YOUR story?

*special thanks to National Geographic and Pics-site.com for the picture

Now I must get back to work with dear Gwen by my side. For it is writing Tuesday and a rainy cold old day it is too.

Tuesday Challenge - beyond concepts

A short challenge today - I'm over at the Burrowers going on about the Northern Gateway Pipe-line controversy. Do visit...

This is a two-part exercise. The first is to sit quietly and calm your mind. When it is calmed down a bit from all its discurviness, I want you to listen. As you listen you will hear noises, for instance when I do that right now I can hear the sound of Gwen dusting off her mocs, taking out papers, my sweet patootie coughing and moving towards his den, the snow falling (nah, I can't hear that) but as I do it - I start stories - why is Gwen dusting off slippers when by their very nature they are for keeping the dust off her socks? Papers? Isn't she going to write on her computer - doesn't SP have any work outside today? And so forth. In this exercise, let go of the meaning of the sounds, try and hear them without thinking about what created them. If you'd rather do this, soften your gaze and see the forms of what is in front of you without attributing their purpose to them, as if you just landed on the planet - oh black thing, rectangular, soft grey thing through shiny clear surface, etc...

2nd part - take this to your work. Describe something by its seeable reality or hearable reality - without letting us know what it is. This is hard. We want to tell a story with every sense we experience. Keep trying until you are satisfied - then send it off to me if you like!
Here's a photo I took using the same method. It's called a Miksang shot: whoops, can't do that because of my computer woes - maybe later today I will...

Tuesday Challenge - pushing through research

Researching the background of one's novel can be exhilarating by times, or it can be tedious. Sometimes I wonder when I am lost in some web library of information and misinformation on residential schools for Aboriginals in the south-western corner of Alberta, why I bother. Or I go into such a deep and convoluted jungle of fact and whimsy that I cannot find the path back to my own work and the relevance of one thing to another. Or I find something out, unknown to me at any rate, which makes me think I have to take the whole manuscript apart to make it good and true.
Today I turned to The Modern Library Writer's Workshop by Stephen Koch. On his chapter entitled Finishing, Koch discusses how late one might continue researching.

Keep on researching until the last day. According to his wife, Katia, this is what Thomas Mann did. "When he was working on a book, he immersed himself to an extraordinary degree in the relevant subject matter, learning all he could right up until the book was finished. he got hold of everything worth knowing on the topic, collecting a mass of material, but as soon as the book was finished, he forgot it all again. He was no longer interested in it." Late research will function like all crowning touches, its relevance and usability, even at the last minute, will be instantly clear, leaping out at you. Indeed, some of the very best research of all is just such "last-minute" research, precisely because your sense of what is relevant now has a pitch of completeness and sensitivity it has never had before."

I find this tremendously encouraging. I am still left with questions, of course. How does one know what is "everything worth knowing on the topic" and how did he get "hold of" it? This was aeons before  google - it was slogging through actual dusty tomes, searching shelves and catalogues, talking to people by WRITING to them and hoping in a week or so you would hear back. Ye Gads.
Anne Lamott in her book Bird by Bird has a slightly more folksy take on research. She calls it 'Calling Around' for one thing. She believes that most humans love to be asked questions about what they know and you should bravely pick up the phone and call these people. Of course, you have to know what they are expert in first. "Hey Uncle Phil, know anything about wild plants in the prairies? No? Uh, know anyone who does?"
In Stephen King's On Writing, I finally found something about research. I say finally because King didn't put in so much as table of contents let alone an index so I had to use my intuition as to where it might be. Luckily I've read this great book about a zillion times so it finally showed itself. King says that research is a specialized kind of back story.

And please, if you do need to do research because parts of your story deal with things about which know little or nothing, remember that word back. That's where research belongs: as far in the background and the back story as you can get it. You may be entranced with what you're learning about flesh-eating bacteria, the sewr system of New York, or the I.Q. potential of collie pups, but your readers are probably going to care a lot more about your characters and your story.

King ends with this warning: "Just don't end up with the tail wagging the dog; remember that you are writing a novel, not a research paper. The story always comes first."

Today's challenge is to look at your wip and honestly assess what you may have fluffed over that needs to be more thoroughly researched. If you are in the early parts of a story then you may just need to think about what areas you are going to need to research. If you are revising, like me, you may still have some markers holding a place needing research, or you may need to bury your research in the back story and not hit your readers over the head with it. Wherever you are and whatever type of book you may be writing, have a look at your research with a cold eye.
I'll do the same.
These two pictures are of a Pow Wow I went to two summers ago, researching for my book, True.

Tuesday Challenge - if you can practice while distracted you are well trained

I'm very distracted - my younger son is in town for the holidays - my elder son is still working out the kinks in his family - I have clients who are in a state of crisis - my house is messy and folks are coming to visit who haven't been before and who I don't know well (and you know what that means) - the tree is up and that make me feel much the same as when my nails are freshly polished - like everything is prone to insecurity.
When I sat down on my cushion this morning and drew a Lojong slogan card to contemplate it said 'If you can practice while distracted you are well trained'. Right.
Today, before my youngest son comes, and before I make up yet another shopping list (food), and before I check out the two sets of gifts yet to give (Canadian Babes gathering and Gomish- go here to find out about this holiday) I am going to work on my novel. Although chaos is reigning supreme I will practice my craft - I have an idea that I want to get down while it is hot in my brain pan.
Today's challenge is to carefully and fearlessly examine what excuses you come up with to not practice your craft. When you do that - decide that you will say the following words out loud:
"Even though I am distracted by X, I will sit down and write (draw, paint, create) for an hour. I will ignore my distractions by gently bringing my focus back to my work. All my distractions will wait for me or hopefully get lost!"
Let me know how it goes...

Tuesday Challenge - the books we keep close

What books do you keep close to your writing? If you're like me you might have Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird, Stephen King's On Writing and about a dozen more writing books. You probably have a good dictionary, Fowler's Modern English Usage and Strunk & White's Elements of Style.  Perhaps you have a thesaurus and maybe even a rhyming dictionary. But I bet you have some other books too. Magical books that you keep on hand just for the vibe they radiate. Here are mine - A Dictionary of Symbols by J.E. Cirlot, Brewar's Dictionary of Phrase & Fable, Barbara Walker's The Woman's Dictionary of Symbols & Sacred Objects, Joseph Campbell's The Hero with A Thousand Faces, and the I Ching.
Tomorrow I turn 60 and some of these books will be opened and perused - the I Ching, The Hero with a Thousand Faces undoubtedly and perhaps all of them, as I look for portents and signs as how to go forth with this next decade.
The challenge for today is to take one of your magical books and open it up. Shake the dust off it and peer into it for guidance. I once shared a home with a law student. My other room-mate and I often found him lying in bed, asleep, with a heavy tome laying against his face. He said the knowledge would seep down into his brain and perhaps it did as he did become a lawyer. I believe that occasionally, despite his example, we must look into the books that we hold dear. Why do I keep these near - it can't be just the magic of them?

I opened The Hero with A Thousand Faces this morning. It fell open to the chapter entitled 'The Return'. If you know his work on the hero's journey (and what Star Wars' fan doesn't?) you will recognize The Return as an essential part of the journey.After you have accomplished the quest you must still return with the goods. Often the hero refuses this part of the journey - at least initially. Included among these are the Buddha who was tempted to not communicate his awakening, and several saints of the Christian sort, who died in ecstasy. Do I get this? It means that when you finally get to your bliss state you hang out there, chatting with the angels and drinking mead or mimosas or whatever the nectar of the gods is. Returning is the act of bringing your hard won booty to the world. It isn't enough to hide out in your garret, thrilled to bits with your wonderful prose. You MUST bring it to the world or it is all for naught and you've only fed your ego.
The return is almost as fraught as the initial going forth. Think of Orpheus and Eurydice. Who could imagine that you could rescue your love from the netherworld? But he almost did - at the end his backward glance, his human frailty giving a sad ending to a glorious story.
Today I will think of The Return and what it means in the context of my novel. I will consider where my protagonist has refused The Return and when she gets it, making sure that I have both of these clearly explicated. How about you? What magical book are you going to open today? What will you take from it?

Tuesday Challenge

As the New Year approaches the mind goes to goals - to opportunities missed or challenges left undone. I will wait for the actual new year before challenging you to make a new list of goals but today's post will be a getting ready for the same.
Your challenge is to write down every thought you've had around your creativity that includes  regret, remorse, jealousy or envy. Write it all down in gloriously petulant fashion. It could look like this:

1. My third grade teacher made me mouth the words in the choir because my voice stunk.
2. I didn't get any grant proposals accepted at Canada Council.
3. One of my friends just published her third book.
4. I didn't enter any competitions with my work because I decided there was no point.

You get the idea. Now the second part of this challenge will be to look at each of the items on your list and decide what you can do about it NOW. And by now - I mean right now or in the following weeks. For instance for the 3rd one, I could call my friend and ask her out for lunch, on me, and ask her if she would be willing to tell me about her experience of getting where she is today. I could look up competitions that seem workable and make up a competition schedule for the new year. I could find out when Canada Council is next taking proposals and get back on that horse. I could join a choir. You get it.

Now go! Here is a picture of my granddaughter singing in her choir. Hannah's the one with the hair band and no glasses - right in the centre.

Tuesday Challenge - counting our blessings

For today's challenge I have dipped into  Write for Your Lives by Joseph Sestito.  Sestito is a Buddhist and writes about how Buddhist teachings can inspire creative writing. From the chapter called Using Your Precious Human Life to the Fullest  he writes about developing our sense of auspiciousness. To do this he suggests that we get in touch with how lucky we are to have arrived in our particular situation. He goes further and suggests that we write down everything from the most general auspicious details of our situation (I would say that I was born in a favoured and wealthy country at a time that is good for both women and men etc...) and our particular blessings (I met various people who mentored me in enlightened ways). You can do this for whatever particular spiritual practice you may have or just for your sense of meaningful existence. As a writer please go on to list those things that gave birth in you to that discipline - i.e. -

• I have a partner who supports my writing even when it is a financial burden. 
• I have a friend who is a published writer and generous with her help. 
• I have a strong network of writers on the web who have created a community of encouragement. 

You get the idea. So, write up your list and put it somewhere you can read it daily. I would like you to read it daily for a month - slowly and with careful intention. If you meditate you could put it on your cushion so it is part of your practice. You might put it over your writing desk or even on your fridge. Don't be shy with it - or self-conscious. If someone sees it what might they think? That you are grateful for your precious life, that is what. After you have done this for a month keep it handy for any times you slip back into lethargy or feel baulky about your practice as a writer. As you work through the next month feel free to add to your list as ideas arise. 

What do you count as a blessing in your writing life?

Tuesday Challenge - a monologue

Sometimes a writer needs to give his or her protagonist a good long monologue. There is too much to be said  or the passion of the speaker demands the pause that a monologue creates. This is difficult to do well but wonderful when it works. It can carry so much of the story and of the character. For many reasons this is a tool that is good to have in your back pocket. For those of us who got our chops down writing for theatre it is a natural but for people who come to writing through short stories and novels - a bit of a leap.

Your challenge today is to write a monologue of at least three pages. Don't forget to include the interruptions - those pauses while the speaker moves, picks up a glass and takes a sip, forgets himself in reverie or gazes out the window. These interruptions will make the rhythm of the piece, so do spend some time with it. And remember that the voice and the gestures are all intrinsic to who the speaker is. The purpose of this is to learn ways to let your character make long speeches that aren't boring or stilted. Do I need to remind you to read it out loud? I thought not.

Let me know how it goes.

Thank you to John Gardiner's iconic book The Art of Fiction for this exercise.

Sense and Sensibility - the Tuesday Challenge

Here we have three words - Sense, sensible and sensibility. I've put in the Oxford Dictionary meanings for the three for your perusal. In all honesty I haven't included everything - for instance there is a scientific meaning of sense that isn't helpful. 

Sense : noun:1 a faculty by which the body perceives an external stimulus; one of the faculties of sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch:the bear has a keen sense of smell which enables it to hunt at dusk2 a feeling that something is the case:she had the sense of being a political outsider3 [mass noun] a sane and realistic attitude to situations and problems:he earned respect by the good sense he showed at meetings4 a way in which an expression or a situation can be interpreted; a meaning:it is not clear which sense of the word ‘characters’ is intended in this passageverb1 perceive by a sense or senses:with the first frost, they could sense a change in the daysbe aware of (something) without being able to define exactly how one knows:she could sense her father’s anger risinghe could sense that he wasn’t likedSENSIBLE - adjective
1 done or chosen in accordance with wisdom or prudence; likely to be of benefit:I cannot believe that it is sensible to spend so much2 (of an object) practical and functional rather than decorative:Mum always made me have sensible shoes
Origin:
late Middle English (also in the sense ‘perceptible by the senses’): from Old French, or from Latin sensibilis, from sensus  (see sense)                                                                                                                                                                                          
Sensibilities :noun 

[mass noun]

1 the quality of being able to appreciate and respond to complex emotional or aesthetic influences; sensitivity:the study of literature leads to a growth of intelligence and sensibility(sensibilities) a quality of delicate sensitivity that makes one liable to be offended or shocked:the scale of the poverty revealed by the survey shocked people’s sensibilities

I bring these dictionary meanings in for two reasons. The first is because I love to go a-hunting in the dictionary - checking out the original meanings of words - especially common words that we might use without thinking. The second is because I want you to have a firm grasp on the root word 'sensible' for this week's challenge. Please refer to the origin of the word - which I've placed in a peachy colour intended on having you remember with Proustian delight - the feel of peach fuzz to the fingertips, the faint perfumed scent arising from the peach, the delight of that scent morphing into sweetness on the tongue and the barely perceptible sound as the peach morsel is swallowed.

Today's challenge is to take a piece of your writing in which you are having difficulty. Ignore the difficulty - you may be having a structural problem or a character who won't behave - and apply your sensibility to the scene. Go WAY overboard. Just load it up with as many sensory details as you can. Be insane with it. Don't worry - this is play and you cannot fall off the world. When you're finished you can reign it in. But for now - explode those sensory details. Revel in it. Trust me.

Here is a piece of cheese-cake for my sister, Jude! It is her birthday today and for the next month we are twins. Yay! Hope you have a swell day my deary-deary-deario!

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The Tuesday Challenge - enriching the setting

I have an image in my mind from my trip. When I go to visit my step-mum I attend a water exercise class in her building. I went Friday morning and, as usual, I wasn't disappointed. The pool is surrounded in windows and there are plants inside and out. There are skylights and the November light hitting the water and the lovely women of an age provoked a transcendent moment in my heart. I so wished I had brought my camera so that I could share that - the way the light lay like honey-comb hexagons, the women's arms moving through the water, the looks on their faces as they tenderly took care of their bodies - the birds gathering on small bushes outside the windows, the custodian looking through the window and counting for maximum occupation rules, the conversation that trilled from the sublime to the bizarre, the laughter, the intention. And then there was the feelings in my own body - the water was so warm and delightful, the smell was not chlorine but some salty thing they use and there were spots where, if you stood there, you would feel a draft from the air exchange.
The Challenge today is for you to find a piece in your story that needs an enrichment of setting. Perhaps you have it all in your mind but you haven't quite gotten it across yet. Or perhaps you need to feel your way as to why you might have chosen a certain setting - a diner in a small town - the way the napkin holder is flanked by the ketchup bottle and the salt and pepper; the city garage where your protagonist is hiding from a murderer - the car with the dust and the words 'wash me' on it; the story-telling tipi with the light coming in making strange shadows on the canvas. Go into it in exquisite detail -see what your memory can conjure up or if possible, go find the location once again. This is not the time to hold back - over do it, you can draw it back later. Now is the time to make that setting as rich as possible - use all of your senses. Did you know that was the proper meaning of the word 'sensible'? It was. It didn't mean dry and pragmatic and logical - it meant acting from what your senses told you.
Write fat - get it all in and make sure you use all your senses and then you can edit thin and get just the right amount of setting in. Push it for exactly the correct words to evoke the image you first had in your mind.
I don't have pictures here yet - but I will later. Gwen's here and I must write!

Here are some pictures but you can also go over to my other blog - Living the Complicated Simple Life to see many more!

Tuesday Challenge

Greetings All Dear Readers!

Today is the first day of my new Challenge series - not a thing is new but the day it is presented on. This will be my 68th challenge! Here is the first one I wrote: 

I challenge each and every one of to a duel! Nah, I don't. I've decided that Friday will now be Challenge Day on this blog. I will challenge my readers to do something different each week and you all can let me know how it goes (or not - you are free of course to ignore challenge day but you'll be missing out on lots of fun).
Here is today's challenge - a walking quest. Yes! Get off your duffs and walk somewhere in your neighbourhood or near where you work. This can be a short walk but you are to bring back something creative. If you are writers you can bring back an image, an overheard conversation or perhaps even the genesis for your next work. If you are fibre artists - look for something to inspire you in a way that you haven't worked before - photographers, visual artists - same thing. If you see yourself primarily as a householder or work where creativity does not flourish - use your inspiration to create a table setting, a letter to your old aunt, a fridge poem, a desk shrine, or as the seed of a prayer or contemplation. Do not restrict your inspiration to nature, there is much in the constructed world that could be inspiring. Look beyond what the things are (a sunset, a plastic bag blowing down the street, a mother's hand touching the hair of her child) to what you see without laying those ideas on them ( a splash of red orange, a dancing form, the texture of lines intersecting). Above all - allow yourself to be surprised by the moment.
I look forward to your responses...

That is how I began on Feb.5, 2010 - a year and nine months ago...

Here is today's Tuesday Challenge -

This one is taken from Joseph Sestito's wonderful book Write for Your Lives - it is about recovering the process of writing - the why, in our bodies, of writing. Before your next writing session I want you to sit quietly and imagine something that you do in which you experience flow. Something in which your mind and body are so synchronized that you are able to turn off the inner judge and just experience the joy of the doing. Maybe it is skiing or riding a horse. Perhaps it is when you knit or walk your dog. Close your eyes and vividly imagine you are doing whatever it is you do to get into this state. Bring your mind to every sense - what are you smelling, hearing, tasting, touching, seeing? Make it as vivid as you can and realize that this is something, as a writer, that you are probably pretty good at - imagining a state of mind! As soon as you have really got that feeling in your cells, open your eyes and begin writing. If you find yourself getting all tight again, close your eyes and go back to that state. Your nervous system will thank you and so will your writing!

I achieve flow when taking photos. So that's where I'll be going...
Tell me how it goes and what helps you keep in the best state for writing.

The Friday Challenge is Moving!

Yes - after giving it much thought, I feel the Friday Challenge needs to move to another day. But when you all ask hungrily? Uh....I have decided Tuesday as Tuesday is my writing day with Gwen. I thought of being scientific about it and seeing when most people went ablogging but no...   Now I have to decide what to call the Friday Challenge - I think I'll still label it that so people can find them all together when they go looking...but....why make this difficult - it will be the Tuesday Challenge. Jeesh.

so for you folks who did show up - here is the last Friday Challenge on Friday:


I'm gonna sit right down and write myself a letterAnd make believe it came from you
I'm gonna write words oh so sweetThey're gonna knock me off my feetA lotta kisses on the bottomI'll be glad I got 'em
I'm gonna smile and say "I hope you're feeling better"And close with love the way you doI'm gonna sit (right) down and write myself a letter(and make believe it came, though I know it's not the same)And (I'll) make believe (that) it came from you
Yes - that is what I want you all to do. I want you to write yourself a letter. In it, I want you to tell yourself why you have chosen the life of a writer and what you want to accomplish with your work. What stories you have in you to share and how you hope your words will lift others up, or amuse them, or shock them, or whatever your dreams for your work are. I want you to write words 'oh so sweet' they'll knock you off your feet. Sign it 'my wiser knowing self' and put it in an envelope and with your name on the front. Put it on your desk or pin it to a bulletin board near where you work and whenever you get low and down - pull it out and let your words knock you off your feet. For where are you when you're knocked off your feet? Why, you're on the sweet good earth - a great place to be.
Knock em dead and see you on Tuesday for the first of the Tuesday Challenges.

Friday Challenge - letting your writing lead

My NaBlo posts are in the form of letters to my journal about my revision process. Along the way, I'll include Home-Made Revision Workshop posts, and my Friday Challenges.




Dear Journal,
I've been thinking about something the past few days. Oh yes, I've had plenty o'thinking time. I did revise one chapter yesterday - have three to go - and I was not happy. It is the old pow-wow chapters again. They were muddy right from the beginning - I've struggled and struggled and you know what? Struggling is a bad sign. Sure, we're all going to have bogged down bits, but if they continue to be problematic then there is a point when one has to stop spinning one's wheels and have a good HARD  gentle look. So that's what I'm going to do today. I know that things happen in the pow-wow chapters that have to happen but maybe they don't have to happen there. Or in the same way. 
How I approach this is going to be the meat of the Friday Challenge. I'm not going to go into my manuscript all savage and destructive - ripping and tearing (cutting and dumping). I'm going to believe that my writing has some intelligence and that if I go in very gently and listen to it - look at the shape of it when it is on track and see what it tells me about the story. The thing is - the chapters I like have a certain rhythm and the ones I don't like - well, they don't have that rhythm - they are sharper, harder, more expository than I'd like. The chapters I like are somewhat slow, they gather slowly like rain clouds - they don't storm across the sky. The other ones are staccato, quick and shiny. I'm not sure I'm capturing this but that will be the exercise. 
For the Friday Challenge - find a piece of writing that isn't going the way you'd like, that you are struggling with, and instead of bulldozing it - see what it has to tell you. Go gently here and there, asking it if it needs a different location (either in the world of your book or in the novel), another character, or less hurly burly, or more hurly burly. I'm going to think that this obstacle-laden struggling part of my book is like my back right now - telling me to slow down and listen to it - not medicate it but to see where it is functioning best. 
While you do this, keep asking your writing what it needs to be true. Allow yourself to be surprised by what it might tell you.

And I'll see you tomorrow.    (photo taken in Cape Breton near the ferry at St. Anne's)

Dear Journal - a Friday Challenge

Oh dear. It's Friday so I need to write a challenge and it is the 7th day of NaBlow so I need to write a letter to my journal...anything else happening? No - it isn't the first Wednesday so I'm good for insecurity for another three and a half weeks - OK - I'm ready to go now.

Dear Journal,
I know I'm supposed to be writing you about my revision but I'm not going to today. I'm writing you about the care and feeding of a writer. And it will include the Friday Challenge.

Friday Challenge: print the following Care & Feeding of a Writer hand-out and give it to a loved one. If you are between loved ones, give it to your inner Parent Ego-State. Don't worry if you don't know what this is - your inner Parent Ego-State knows.

The Care & Feeding of a Writer

If you are the loved one of a writer (or the P E-S) then this is for you. Taking on a Writer is an onerous but exciting process. Congratulations on your bold endeavour! This short hand-out will help you in the days ahead so you can best enjoy the capricious nature of your Writer and keep them healthy and relatively sane. Here are four tips for you:

1. Without letting the Writer know you are nosing about (they are extremely sensitive and protective of their work) find out which stage the writer is at with their current project. Are they appearing dishevelled, distraught and a bit smelly? They are probably writing their first draft. If they growl when you mention that they are writers in front of guests - they are definitely writing their first draft. If they are gloomy, abstract and self-critical, they are in revision. If they are mumbling, eating and drinking bad substances and randomly shrieking - they are waiting to hear back from an agent or publisher.
2. If they are in first draft mode - make them snacks that have lots of protein but don't look like real food - walnuts, chunks of cheese, steak bits, chicken wings are all good choices. Put these on trays outside their writing lair. Exercise at this point will be refused. Pacing will have to do.
3. If they are in revision mode - make sure you take them out for a daily walk. Encourage physical exercise by mentioning the exercise traits of established writers. Make it up if you have to. Meals must be established during this phase as well.
4. If they are in waiting mode - accompany them to the bar and let them rant for hours about the stupidity of the publishing world. If they are drinking alcohol during this phase - try and at least make it Bloody Ceasars or Marys so they get some vegetables. Drag them to writerly events so they can blow off steam with other writers.

Friday Challenge - dreamtime

Now that I've been crafting the Home-Made Revision Workshop for all of you who are doing that - I really want to focus the Friday Challenge on the bigger artistic picture. My imagination is that we are all together during the week, attending with great precision to our work, taking little breaks to eat and chat and then going back at it. On Fridays, a larger group joins us. Some of them are writers, some are visual artists, and some are creatives, pure and simple. Fridays is for getting out of our writing cubicles, walking in the world, and seeing why we do what we do.

This Friday (or the Friday of your life you can do this, which may well be a Saturday or a Wednesday), I want you to walk. Notice what you notice with your senses - what you taste, smell, how your legs feel moving through space, the colours of the leaves and weeds and the sounds of the critters, or neighbours (or neighbours who are critters). After your mind has settled with this practice, I want you to walk dreaming. By that I mean I want you to dream about some project you are working on, or hope to work on, and how it lives in the world. Perhaps you are working on a mystery and in it, you have a teen who is challenged in some way - in a wheel chair, deaf, or autistic. Maybe your mystery doesn't star this person - but nonetheless they are present. And you show them overcoming this adversity, and surprising their friends and family, by doing something no one thought they could do. Then you might imagine a teen reading this, or an old person, or a depressed middle-aged woman. All of them experience a lift in their hearts and spirits when they read this. Imagine that it allows them to rise up to meet some challenge in their own lives.

Yes, fiction can change people. So can songs - a friend of mine going through a terrifically horrendous time, was saved from taking her own life when she heard the lyrics sung by Rita McNeil - Rise Again. I have been raised up by paintings - ineffable images that cheered my dark mood, or at least let me know I wasn't alone. Sometimes it might be a meal that a friend lovingly puts together, with all elements designed to please and warm. Imagine your work creating this gap in some one's suffering and know that I'm not talking fuzzy kittens here. Your work could come from a dark place in yourself - might be complex and the farthest thing from cheery AND it could still cause another's heart to ease.

Red Deer by Barbara Berry 

We have this painting in our home and I can tell you that it changed my life and continues to.

I know, I know - this is corny. But why do you write or paint or create music or design buildings or envision any project? Do you not want to help create enlightened society? I believe you do. So dream it first - visualize it, so your very being will be reminded as to why you struggle with your art.

Friday Challenge - take a mini-holiday

Sure, I know. Holidays are done. If you didn't get one in this summer because you had to work, or you had no dough, or well...just because...maybe you're a bit cranky. Or you took a holiday but it rained the whole time, or you missed your chickens ...maybe you're a bit blue. Or you took a holiday and it was everything you ever wanted in one...the sun shone, the porpoises leapt, the museums amused..but it was over to soon and....maybe you're a bit nostalgic. Well, here at Crazy Jane's, we have just the antidote. I want all of you, dear readers, to take a mini-holiday. It could be an hour, it could be a day, it could be a weekend. Go somewhere near where you live but that you never go to. Maybe it is too touristy, too kitchy, or just too home-grown for you to appreciate. But not for this challenge it isn't!
Here are some ideas - if you live in a city that has a ferry - take it to the other side. Walk around and look at that other side (in Halifax that would be Dartmouth), stroll the streets like it is the most exciting place you've ever been. Have a tea in a teashop that you've never paid attention to, or in a fancy schmanzy hotel that you're scared of entering. Anyone can have tea!!
If you never go to your local museum or art gallery - go! Look at what's there with an unjaundiced eye.If you have more time, head out to the country, to the hills, to the beach, to the farmland, to the dales...go to a upick and pick whatever is pickable. Do a corn maze. Go antique shop rambling. And through all of it, keep your good writer's eye and ear working. Listen and look at what happens when you take yourself into the expected as if it were the unexpected. Believe me when I tell you - you'll be surprised.
If you can stay overnight somewhere do it in a type of lodging you wouldn't normally use. If you're a b&b type, find a funny little motel, or even a dodgy downtown hotel. Maybe you can go camping, or rent a trailer. Check it out.
Then bring it all home and pour it into whatever you're writing, or rewriting. Maybe you're doing sci fi - well, find out what it feels like to be an alien. Perhaps you're doing a cozy - do you spend much time in small villages? Perhaps you're writing about a place you can't get to, like I am. Well then, all places have some things in common - diners, locals, auctions, store owners - doesn't matter if it is Calcutta or Detroit - there are commonalities. Go! Now!

Friday Challenge - writing in the present moment

I'm reading the new Michael Ondaatje - The Cat's Table. What to say...what to say? I love every moment I'm in his mind. Every moment. I would like to read it like a writer - take it apart and see how he does his magic - but no. I certainly do not want to do that. I want to be lost in his story.
The Cat's Table is more episodic and memoirish than most of his other books (The English Patient, Divisadero) - less dense with poetics but I am gone gone gone when I'm reading it.  Here are two lines that I could live in for a century or two - it is when the 11 year old protagonist slips out on the deck of the ship he is on. He sees his older cousin, Emily, talking with a man against the rail. Are they talking or kissing? We don't know.

"I saw the man move the strap of her dress and bring his face down to her shoulder. Her head was back, looking up at the stars, if there were stars." 

If there were stars! If there were stars! If I wrote that one line, I'd be a satisfied writer. I would. It says everything.

I move more quickly through the book than I would wish. I don't read it outside of my bed. I read it in the morning before I meditate, sipping my coffee (or of late, hot water and lemon, as I am on the 17 Day diet) and slipping into the world of an eleven year old boy crossing the ocean from Sri Lanka to England without a guardian.

Then I come downstairs and look at my work and maybe, just maybe, despair a bit.

So, I turn to Write for Your Lives by Joseph Sestito - Improve Your Creative Writing with Buddhist Wisdom. I've encouraged you to get this book before - and I will again. It isn't a nuts and bolts book like Stephen King's On Writing, or a soul-satisfying encouragement like Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird. But, when your confidence flags and you don't know where to turn - you can't beat it.
In Sestito's book I have a bookmark. It is one of those charming magnetic ones with a pelican on it. I am  foolishly fond of pelicans. The place I've marked is in a chapter called 'Writing in the Present Moment'.
Today I'm going to take one of six possible instructions on how to do this - it is:

3. Mark Your Time - in Sestito's book, he advocates writing or revising for two hours a day. There are lots of reasons for this but you'll have to read his book to find them out! When you are attempting to do process-writing as opposed to outcome-writing, then it is extremely helpful to pay attention to the time you've set aside. Mark it somehow (I use mytomatoes.com with its 25 minute blocks until I've accomplished my 120 minutes). While you're in that time - drop all your attention to other things - dedicate yourself to the actual process of writing or revising - without any attention to the outcome. When you have thoughts like "I wonder if this is a saleable book?" or "I'll never get how to plot.", gently remind yourself that right now - for these two hours, you are enjoying the process you are in - free of goals. The effect of this strategy is profound. You will remember WHY you want to write. You will get into the groove of the metaphor, the deliciousness of language, the thrill of a story...

Go on - I dare ya!

Friday Challenge - prioritizing

Dear Readers,
When I thought of this challenge, all sorts of bugs and other insects flew around my brain pan, making a terrible racket - buzzing and chirring their wings. First of all, I fell off my own wagon - the one I built with no outside influence - the one where I was going to repost a month of OLD Friday challenges  - tomorrow was to be the last day, as I started on August 10. I fell off last week sometime. I'm quite sure no one noticed for several reasons. The reason I was doing it, partly, was because I wanted to devote all spare time to my revision. Well, there goes another big buzzing in my head! That meant I wasn't getting around to seeing everyone else INCLUDING the gazillion new people from the Campaign.  And I missed the first challenge on that. Also, I wanted to write something for the project Alex  started - the insecure writers' support group -here - but I didn't. And then it was my mum's birthday and I always like to remember her in my posts. And then I had that funny idea yesterday about writers' university and...and....and.
Do you see a problem here?
The problem, for me, is that there are too darn many exciting things happening in the blogosphere - things that demand my attention. So, my challenge, dear readers, is to ask all of us to prioritize. Let's see, how can we do this? If this isn't a problem for you - well you can just skip the challenge, as always. That would be doing the challenge in a weird way because you would be deciding that this isn't an important thing to do and that, my friends, is prioritizing. Let's make a list of things that will tell us if a project is important to tackle.

?'s to Ask around New Projects


1. Does this project fit into your overall purpose in life? (eg - I think Alex's does because I'm a therapist as well as a writer and I can see that this is a good way to move through resistance)

2. Do you have enough time to do it the way you want to, or will it become a nagging, energy-sucking bug in your brain pan? Have you actually figured out the time it will take? (eg - I think the Campaign will be OK, as long as I don't feel I have to do it hugely - if I can contain my own ambition around it)

3. Why do you want to do this? Do you want to do it? (for instance, I could easily get sucked into doing another NaNoWriMo but I absolutely know that it isn't for me- my only reason to do it would be because my pals are and it might be fun. Those aren't good enough reasons.)

I think those are all the questions necessary - take your list of projects and run them through the list. Now, this list for my purposes only included the blog projects but it could be expanded to include any ole thing you get caught up in - 'yes, I'll make cookies for your class' ; 'I'll knit squares for Robyn's project'; ' I'll start another mystery before I've revised the last one'. You get the idea AND so do I.

Mentors - A Friday Challenge

I have been incredibly blessed when it comes to mentors. In all aspects of my life I have been thrown in the path of generous and loving teachers. At first I was self-conscious, not able to ask for what I wanted, but a few experiences caused me to realize that to find those who will lovingly, intelligently and confidently instruct one, is a treasure beyond pearls and rubies. Now, when I find someone who can help me on my path, I overcome my shyness and boldly ask for what I want.
I have also been given the opportunity to mentor others and I have tried with all my heart to give them what is needed, prudent and helpful to give. Sometimes this is time, sometimes instruction, sometimes modelling.
My mentors have varied in their approaches and I think, if I contemplate it, all have given me what I desired or needed, in the right way. If I needed gentleness and consistent kindness, at certain times in my life, I would find someone who had carloads of that. If I needed a firm hand and sometimes a sharp tongue to wake me up, then I've found that person. With some of my mentors I've gotten to a place where I've itched under the harness - felt I had grown beyond the mentoring, if not the mentor. When I was younger this was decidedly uncomfortable, but now I see it as a natural evolution and I am able to move into the next phase with more ease and less aggression. Some of those that have mentored me have gone on to be my peers -we've joined forces in one way or another, and that is also true of some of those that I've mentored.
With my spiritual life, I have just made a formal request to become a student of a Tibetan Rinpoche (teacher). It took me many years to come to this decision and I know that all of those years were important ones. This is not something one leaps into - it is a mentorship that doesn't quit in this lifetime, no matter how uncomfortable it gets. There is a Buddhist saying that when the student is ready, the teacher will appear.
I am ready to have a teacher with my writing practice. I've had several over the years, especially my dear pal, Gwen. I've had others who have been informal mentors and teachers but now I want someone who will really guide me on this next part of my path as a writer.
And so, dear readers, here is the challenge should you choose to attempt it. I will be doing it this weekend:

Friday Challenge:
Find yourself a good and quiet place to sit. Best not to have any distractions - close the door on your family and take your phone off the hook. Have a piece of paper handy and a pen or pencil. Sit quietly until your mind calms down. When you feel that your thoughts are stilling, ask yourself these questions: What sort of mentor do I need in my life to help with my writing practice? (as always, feel free to put in your discipline of choice) Do I need someone who has the same practice but is ahead on the path or someone who is not necessarily a writer but an excellent coach or teacher? What qualities am I looking for? (be careful to look for the qualities you NEED as opposed to those you want)
Contemplate these questions for five or ten minutes. When you are done write down some of the answers that have come to you.
Now go on sitting with these questions: What might stop me from recognizing my mentor? (some answers might be shyness, arrogance, lack of confidence, fear, age)  Where might I meet this mentor? Is this person already in my life?
After five or ten minutes write down some of the answers that have come to you.
And finally, ask yourself these questions: What can I do to overcome the obstacles that stop me from finding or approaching my mentor? What small thing can I do this week to meet my mentor?
And write these down on your paper.

Do let me know if you have a mentor for your writing practice and how you came upon them. Is your relationship formal or informal? Do you mentor anyone?

Falling down or Up - the Friday Challenge

My Friday Challenge is late today. I slept in. Not drastically late but until 8:30 - about two and a half hours past when I usually wake-up. 'And why is that?'my dear readers ask. Because, last night, on my way up the stairs to the bathtub which was filling with lovely lavender laced water, I tripped on my pants. It was one of those moments - my toe caught in the edge of my hem and I stumbled, cracking my shin as hard as it could be cracked without breaking, on the stair. My sweet patootie was in the shower and so didn't hear my cries and the step-dot was in her room, in a surly mood as she had been reprimanded for coming home late without letting us know, and in all fairness, probably had earphones on. I crawled up the rest of the stairs and into my bathing room. I took my clothes off and thought that a nice hot bath would be just the ticket when I noticed the GOOSE EGG on my leg. I watched it swell, people! Really. Horrified I hobbled into the bathroom next door where the SP was  happily scrubbing up and got his attention. He looked - his eyes popping out of their sockets when he saw my leg. "Can you move it?" he asked. I did and showed him. He said "it isn't broken. Go lie down immediately and I'll fetch ice and pain-killers" And he did. The pain was extraordinary. I tried working with it and noticing that it got worse if I felt sorry for myself and was really bearable when I cut the dramatics. I thought about how I feared physical pain but how it was always better than emotional pain, somehow. It has a reason and presumably one that you don't need to feel guilty about. And it is less awful than the moment or moments before you receive the blow  - when you are anticipating it.
Finally, I fell asleep - the SP having gone to the bed in the basement as his sleep is very precious and he didn't want either of us disturbing each other.
Today it is all fine. Really - a bit of lump and bruise on my shin - can't sit my meditation cushion like I usually do (like sitting a horse) but other than that - no problem. And I've been thinking of the reasons for and the lessons out of falling down (or up really) that I can take.  I was in a hurry. I wasn't in the moment on the stairs - I was already imagining the delight of the warm fragrant water and reading my book - my favourite thing in the world. And I've been working with anger - mine, all mine. I've been trying to see the edges of anger, the justification for it and how it jumps in when perhaps, I should be feeling sad, or scared instead. I've been trying not to leap into my righteousness about those who 'do me wrong' but instead get gentle with it. See what it is dependent on and therefore its ultimate emptiness. I had no one to get mad about when I tripped up. Just me and there didn't seem to be too much room for that. I also thought of how we have this moment - in my case, a moment of imagining a visit to emergency - the things I'd been looking forward to that I wouldn't be able to do if, indeed, I had broken my leg. I thought of when my SP fell at work a number of years ago - how one false move could have many many ramifications - how he'd had to not work for months and how long the healing took and then how it still (the pain) comes back. And how fragile we all are. And tough. In the same instant I had these thoughts. Everyday I chant the words 'death comes without warning' and know that means all sorts of death - death of a hope, of a plan, of a friendship. That we are all changing, shedding, growing and decaying at all times. That on Friday I didn't think about the fragility of an important person, dear Jack Layton, and on Monday I could think of nothing else. That I thought my daddio would live forever even while I wished him a good and quick death.
My challenge today is for all of us to examine something that has happened in the past little while - doesn't have to be a big deal thing - tripping certainly wasn't - and see what it is comprised of. Then check out your writing, if that is what you do, and see how you can use the myriad of possibilities from each action to enhance your story. If you don't write - then think about it in terms of what you plan to do next!