New Home Forums Monthly Challenges November 2017 Greenfire Stories: Nov. Challenge

64 replies, 7 voices Last updated by  Judy Brenneman 6 years, 3 months ago
Viewing 15 posts - 46 through 60 (of 65 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • #63336

    Judy Brenneman
    Adventurer
    @judyb

    Possibly a manifesto, with thanks
    Friday Nov. 24, 2017
    1515 words

    Feels like the rest of the world (well, the U.S. anyway) is either sleeping off yesterday’s feast or is in the midst of frenzied shopping (including my usual Friday clients), so it’s an opportunity to write (instead of waiting until the middle of the night, as has been the case recently), so that’s what I’m going to do, even though my Inner Calvinist thinks I should be doing billable time. Fortunately, she’s so exhausted from holiday work that she isn’t putting up too much of a fuss.

    I made it through Thanksgiving, despite having only five hours of sleep the night before. Leftovers stowed, soup pot simmering, kitchen cleaned, everybody taken care of and company gone home—I even called my mom and chatted for a little while. Then (of course) I fell asleep on the sofa while Ted (my husband) was messing around with old recorded TV shows. Woke a couple of hours later and went to bed, fell asleep again, woke at 2:00 a.m. (unpleasant side effect of eating too much pie—but trust me, the pie was worth it), back asleep until 5:30 or so. That’s the longest stretch of sleep I’ve had in weeks, and I should be full of energy, feeling well-rested and all that, but I’m not.

    The weariness permeates everything. In the background, I hear my therapist reminding me that when I don’t take time off from work (including all the family/home work), and I don’t take time for myself, that’s when depression comes crawling back in. Weariness is bad enough; I don’t need its awful cousin depression to visit, too.

    So I’m remembering that I have choice in what I do. That writing, both the writing I am doing to move my eCourse development forward and the writing I do for myself (both rambling explorations like this one and the writing I think of as “my creative work”), is higher priority than cleaning the kitchen. And although I must always get client work done (aka “billable time that pays the rent”), that does not make it more important than this work, this writing, that I am doing at this moment.

    I’m also aware that even after giving myself permission to do this work, it’s still hard for me to get going, to keep the pen moving. So much easier to say, “I need to earn money, so it’s more important to do client stuff, and the client stuff is due by end of next week, I really need to work on it, get it done first. I’ll do my own stuff after that.”

    That’s the scheduling part of my Inner Calvinist trying to trick me into forever delaying work that keeps me sane (my I.C. doesn’t really believe in crazy; if you’re crazy, it’s because you’re not working hard enough), work that will (I believe) pay off financially in the long run (maybe even in the medium run, just not in the by-next-Wednesday-when-my-client-writes-me-a-check run).

    It’s also easier to write/edit the client’s work. I can see so clearly what needs to be done and how to do it, and it’s just easier most days to do that.

    But even on days when it seems clear what needs to be done for my own work and how to do it, it’s still harder. I am amazingly creative—at ways to interrupt myself, to disrupt my own thought, to generate excuses!

    Self-awareness helps. Self-coaching (aka, “practice what you preach”—follow the advice I give to my writing coaching clients) helps, too.

    That’s in large part what I’m doing now—the advice is “keep your pen moving, see what shows up on the page”—and, except for a brief moment when I refilled my water glass, I’ve kept my pen moving. I’m not overly impressed with what’s showing up on the page so far, but there’s still ink in the pen, so I keep going.

    I think what I want to write about—and what I’m avoiding (and hence the difficulty getting started and the need to enforce the rule about keeping the pen moving, no stopping) is this realization I had yesterday when I woke so early.

    It was too early to get up, too early to put the turkey in the oven, so I laid there trying to fall back asleep, and an awareness of something I’m thankful for that I didn’t realize I was thankful for drifted through my semi-awake self.

    It was this: I’m thankful my husband has been out of work for almost 18 months.

    The reason I’m thankful isn’t because I don’t want him to work—I would appreciate more income. But that’s not the point.

    In our family, I’m the entrepreneur, okay dealing with the unpredictable nature of being a tiny business, an itty-biz, as Naomi Dunford calls them, or a solopreneur. Ted prefers a steady gig. And that’s always been okay. We’ve had some lean and scary times, but we’ve made it through. Because of the demands of his work and the kinds of jobs he’s had, my schedule is the one that needed to flex, and it always has. That’s made it easy (or easier) over the years to delay or set aside business and creative projects to accommodate family needs.

    Superficially, this looks like the traditional marriage, were hubbie works full-time and wife does a bit here and there to bring in a little extra, but it’s much more complicated than that (complicated enough that I don’t want to get side-tracked into picking it apart here).

    Since Ted left his previous job and decided to be retired at least for a little while (he was 64 when this happened), and our son is grown, on his own, and doing well, it opened up the chance for me to focus on my business much more than ever before.

    And I had to focus on it, because I was now the sole breadwinner; although we have a modest nest egg, it’s not nearly enough to support us for the rest of our lives (assuming our lives are as long as we hope for).

    So all this has been exhilarating, occasionally terrifying, often exhausting, and thanks to several large client projects, profitable.

    And what I realized lying there in the early dawn of Thanksgiving Day is that because I don’t have the financial safety net of my husband’s monthly paycheck, I have not had the luxury of procrastination.

    If I want to build my business, if I want us to have the income that results from doing good work, I can’t let my usual distracted and overloaded self fall back on those easy excuses of, “Oh, this other thing is more important, I’ll get to my stuff later, and I don’t need to figure out how to generate more business or more income or get the marketing stuff done this week that I said I’d do, because there’s always tomorrow (or later), and that paycheck from Ted’s job will magically materialize in the bank account, so even if I screw up, money will be there.”

    It feels awful to me when I write this down, because writing it down makes it real.

    I didn’t think these things consciously—and Lord knows, I was working hard through all those years—but I do think part of the challenge I have had with my business was the willingness to let it go because it was convenient and easier to do that, than it was to defend the boundaries that would give me the time and space to work and to insist (to my self) that I could do better than just okay, in terms of business growth and success. It was easier to use my husband’s focus on his work (which had significant challenges, too) as my excuse for not pushing myself in the direction I wanted to go.

    And now, I don’t give myself a choice. I do the work. I keep my butt in the chair, and I write. I do the client work that pays the immediate bills—work that I do enjoy, and that is in service to my clients—but I don’t use that or anything else as an excuse for dodging or delaying the tasks that allow my business to grow and evolve.

    Looking back over the last 18 months, I know this new attitude has been in place for almost all that time, but it wasn’t until yesterday that I understood how it was connected to my husband’s job status. It wasn’t until yesterday that I realized that I owed him tremendous gratitude—for something neither of us realized was a gift.

    In recent months, he’s begun to get restless, maybe a little bored. I wouldn’t be surprised if he decides to look for some projects to get involved in (he’s a software engineer and systems analyst; there is work to be had). I’m okay with that—it’s always nice to have some extra income.

    But it won’t change my determination to keep moving my company—and myself—forward.

    No excuses.

    #63403

    Laura Koller
    Adventurer
    @laurakoller

    @judyb – Once again I think you and I must be linked somehow.  I hear you on the weariness and how that can drag you down.  And that it’s not just work-work but family-work and home-work that can exhaust us.  And then you noticed this unexpected place for gratitude and it was so transparent and beautiful how you expressed it.  Ironic, too, because of a story I read yesterday in a book called 18 Minutes by Peter Bregman (have you read anything by Bregman?  You might enjoy his writing and perspective).  Bregman relates a Buddhist story about a poor farmer whose horse runs away (“What bad luck!” “Maybe,” he responds) and then returns with several other wild horses (“What great luck!” “Maybe,” he responds).  A few days later his son was trying to tame one of the wild horses when he was thrown off and broke his leg (“What bad luck!” “Maybe,” he responds) and then a week later the army comes through the village to draft all the young men and, seeing the broken leg of the farmer’s son, they leave him in peace (“What wonderful luck!”  “Maybe,” responds the farmer).  The thing is that while we may judge our successes and failures at the moment they happen, how they fit into the big picture is not always so clear or predictable.  So often we fail to see the joys in our setbacks, and likewise the setbacks in our joys.  And that’s what I noticed about your husband’s story – that you were able to see this silver lining that couldn’t have been possible had things happened differently, had your husband not been out of work for so long.  Could things have been just as good or better had he not lost his job?  Maybe.  It’s not easy to know for sure.

    I also love the fact that even though you and I are at different stages of life (you an empty nester and me buried in boys), we seem to have so many similar experiences and themes that run through our lives.  I feel like I could sit down to coffee with you and we would have so much to talk about.  In a culture that schools our children by their ages and not their talents, it’s easy to forget that people have far more in common than the year they were born.  I love that I can learn from your experience and maybe even try to make different choices because of your insights.  That’s one of the purposes for reading, isn’t it?  To learn from the experience of others and assimilate that into the way we lead our own lives.

    Anyway, I hope you keep that renewed sense of work boundaries and self-importance, because hearing the way you express it makes me more determined to achieve something similar in my own life.

    P.S. How goes NaNoWriMo?  Is that still on the agenda this month?

    #63476

    Judy Brenneman
    Adventurer
    @judyb

    @laurakoller – thanks, and yes, I suspect we could sit down for coffee and talk like old friends (probably for days {grin}). I think we should meet in London and @mars can join us, too 🙂 I’m not familiar with Bregman – will have to check him/the book out – but I have heard that story before. It helps remind me that it often takes a bit of time before we know what’s a blessing and what’s a curse; mindfulness is always telling us to pay attention to what is, right now, and while I agree with that for the most part, it’s the totality of experience (paying attention to now, and remembering then, and recognizing patterns that might predict what’s next) that lets us recognize that right now might not be what we think it is, in terms of good or bad luck. And of course I automatically put this in story terms, something like totality of experience is story we learn from, or we discover/create meaning by putting the experience into a story.

    re: Nanowrimo – meant to answer your earlier question about that but got sidetracked–so: I have never done the *entire* 50,000 words with the last couple of days, but I have done it within a single week. My typical pattern is to futz around the first week, getting maybe a few hundred words a day, the occasional 2,000 word day, then I have a conference that sucks up a week but I try to sneak in at least some writing, and then usually the Friday after Thanksgiving, deadline-itis sets in and I write like crazy to get through to the end.

    I tried to keep up with both nanowrimo and the eCourse November challenge, but realized it wasn’t going to happen–almost all my spare writing time is going to the challenge, and it’s tending to crowd out the story idea I had anyway, plus I’m enjoying the Nov. challenge writing and feeling pretty good about it. So I have declared myself to be a nanowrimo rebel this year (well, declared to myself; I haven’t updated my nanowrimo novel page yet), doing a combination of fiction, nonfiction, and creative nonfiction. I am pushing myself to write something for the challenge every single day since Bradley threw down the inky gauntlet (which I think I have done, tho I’d need to double check to be sure), and, like nano, I’m learning things about writing and writing process that are good things for me to learn, in addition to what I discover for the eCourse itself. (I learn something new every year I tackle nanowrimo, and same is true this year with this combined nano-plus-challenge writing).

    Speaking of which, I’d better pull out my notebook and start scribbling; technically, I suppose I could count this reply as today’s post (I’m closing in on 500 words already), but I want (and need) to do a separate post, too; feels like that is me keeping my promise to myself.

     

    #63495

    Judy Brenneman
    Adventurer
    @judyb

    Rules v. Assumptions
    Saturday Nov. 25, 2017, ~1060 words

    Long day, lots of ideas but I’m tired, couldn’t think of anything specific I wanted to write about tonight, so I thought I’d start with a list of possible topics (all those ideas) but ended up writing stuff that goes in only one of them. This is very incomplete, but it’s about a topic that I’ve been thinking about for a long time.

    There’s an article idea I’ve been mulling for over a year now, on the difference between rules and assumptions. We do certain things (or don’t do certain things) because we believe there’s a rule in place that tells us to do that certain thing (or not).

    But often, it isn’t really a rule; it’s an assumption. And the assumption is so strong, so firmly believed, that it has the strength—the feel—of a rule.

    Stories that support this idea include Jen Louden’s story about a workshop she attended where the instructor blindfolded a volunteer, and the volunteer had to move something from one place to another on a desk. The audience members had to call out instructions to help her. What the audience saw but the volunteer didn’t know is that there was a mouse trap in the center of the desk. If the audience couldn’t help her navigate properly, she’d catch her hand in the mousetrap.

    At some point, Jen called out a question: Is it all right to tell her?

    The instructor blinked in surprise and said no one had ever asked that before; she’d never even thought about it. But there wasn’t a rule against it, so sure, go ahead.

    “There’s a mousetrap on the table, right in the middle, near your hand!” Jen shouted.

    I try to image myself in Jen’s place; I would probably have made the same assumption: somehow, it feels like cheating if we tell the volunteer exactly what she needs to know. That’s partly the set-up—it feels like a guessing game, and if we tell the volunteer that there’s a mousetrap two inches to the left of her hand and if she raises her hand six inches, she’ll avoid it, it circumvents the game—except that it isn’t a game in that sense.

    Another story is of a good friend who attended a workshop that had something to do with personal empowerment. The instructor challenged everyone to karate chop a wood block. The instructor didn’t have any training in this technique, but she’d been using it as a kind of coups de gras in her workshops for a long time.

    My friend has never practiced martial arts, and she is a practicing Quaker. She avoids conflict whenever possible.

    The way the instructor set the exercise up didn’t seem to allow for refusal. She radiated confidence in her method. (The rule is, I’m the confident leader, so do what I tell you. The assumption is that a confident leader knows what she’s doing and can be trusted.) The entire feel of the room was that if you whacked the wood, and especially if the board broke, you had achieved some transformation, proved the instructor right, or validated the instructor’s belief, which felt like the instructor’s belief in you. The instructor did say that you didn’t have to do this, but it was clear from her tone that she’d be disappointed if you didn’t at least try.

    “You can do it!” she crowed.

    Chop the block: it feels like a rule. The underlying assumption was that you would fail to be transformed if you didn’t karate chop the wood.

    So my friend stood up with everyone else, and she hit the wood with the side of her hand, as instructed.

    The wood did not break. My friend’s hand broke.

    She spent the next day in the ER, her hand the size of an overgrown grapefruit. She had to cancel the class she had been hired to teach—a class on handspinning and knitting; she needed her hands to do her work.

    She registered a quiet complaint with the instructor; both the instructor and the government agency responsible for hiring her denied culpability. Neither admitted to any liability, not only threatening my friend with legal action if she pushed the matter, but ignoring their responsibility for my friend’s expensive hospital time and lost income.

    The rule was that if the instructor warned that injury was a possibility, even if that warning was insincere, the instructor was not liable; too bad for you. The instructor said no one else had ever been injured; her rule was that no injuries could happen; her assumption was that if there hadn’t been any injuries so far, there never would be. Her assumption was that the benefit of the promised transformation would outweigh any risk. The benefits would be so amazing that even if you were injured, you’d believe it was worth the pain. The assumption was that people would be immune to instructor pressure and peer pressure, or that if such pressure was positive, enthusiastically delivered, and worked for everybody else, then it was your fault you got hurt. The rule was, do this or be ostracized, and if you’re injured, it must be your fault, because it sure isn’t ours.

    Perhaps less dramatic but no less important are rules and assumptions in our interp stories. We assume certain words are too hard or that certain phrases might offend. We assume people don’t want to hear sad stories, or stories with lots of conflict (what is a story without conflict? NOT a STORY!). And we treat these assumptions as if they are rules and commands from some unknown deity who must be obeyed.

    “Write at fourth grade reading level”—a rule based on the assumption that people don’t read complicated stories (they do) and the assumption that “fourth grade reading level” is a consistent and well-defined formula (it isn’t). Rules like whether or not to use the “Oxford comma,” that infinitives should never be split, that animals should never (or always) be personified, that exhibit labels should never have more than 100 words, that interp writing should never include slang—the list of rules (all based on assumptions, some good, some bad, and some just puzzling) seems endless (or maybe just 1,146 pages long, which is the page count of the current edition of the Chicago Manual of Style).

    #63508

    Laura Koller
    Adventurer
    @laurakoller

    What powerful examples!

    It reminds me of the assumption that preteens don’t read 400 page books – an assumption totally busted by JK Rowling and many others.

    By the way, thanks for the input about reviewing vs editing drafts during a meeting. I’ll have to keep your suggestions in mind. And get myself a copy of your book sometime. After this month, you’ve got me hooked.

    #63615

    Judy Brenneman
    Adventurer
    @judyb

    How Much Is Enough?

    Sunday Nov. 26, 2017
    ~632 words

    I am having one of those days when I’m being productive and at the same time not knowing how much is enough and questioning whether I can ever do enough to get to where I (think I) want to be.

    Because I’m behind on client work, I’ve spent a huge chunk of yesterday and today on that—a two-hour client meeting plus I wrote summaries for 30 chapters and pushed myself to get them all done by this evening. I felt really great that I accomplished all 30 summaries, then crashed briefly when I remembered that these summaries are only one section of a very long form the publisher requires, and I have more sections to do, and two more forms of similar length to do (some of the info will transfer, but not all), and it’s due by Friday. And it is not the only thing that is due by Friday.

    So even though I’ve racked up some nice billable time and done some good and necessary work, it doesn’t feel like enough. And it doesn’t feel like I’ll ever catch up, will ever have done enough, will ever feel like I have actually finished something and can stop.

    I did take a nice break with my family today, lunch followed by Christmas tree shopping, and although I was able to set aside the “you should be working” voice in my head, the voice that says I should spend more time with my family (and have the tree already decorated and the invitations for our annual Solstice party sent out) is nattering in my ear. For the record, my family is fine with me working today, and they really don’t care when the tree gets decorated. They’ll begin decorating when I begin decorating, or maybe when I tell them to begin. This isn’t about them and their demands or expectations; it’s about the unnecessary extra pressure I put on myself.

    Even knowing that, I still fret. I read as many of the November challenge posts as I can, and I want to respond to everyone—there are such great ideas and hopes and plans here, a wonderful richness that helps me sort through my own thoughts at least as much as it triggers ideas and feedback that I want to contribute to those posts. I want to help, to participate, to be involved in the conversation, and I can’t keep up, and it makes me fret about how I’m going to handle this type of thing in my own eCourse. I’m teaching writing; my students will need to write and share their writing. Maybe not 500 words every day, but a lot, and I don’t know how I’ll be able to keep up. Tiny class size? Probably not profitable. Giant class size? Can’t keep up without letting go of my freelance work and/or my private coaching clients, and maybe not even then. Briefer feedback? (Can I do that? as in, am I *capable* of being brief?) Less hands-on? Ignore my desire to incorporate the personal touch? Limit it somehow?

    I have a picture in my head of what the theme for my classes looks like. I think of it as the environment, the world in which the class exists. I see the castle, from manicured gardens to moat, towers, grand hall, and gift shop. I see the initial course modules and how to structure them (for the most part). But I don’t see how to manage the workflow, the “workshop/feedback” part of things.

    And maybe I’m worrying for nothing; maybe this will sort itself out, and I’ll figure out how to define what’s enough, what’s appropriate, what’s the right level of help, where the line is between enough and too much.

    #63712

    Laura Koller
    Adventurer
    @laurakoller

    @judyb – Do we share the same brain?  I’m considering the “holding space” concept today and I’m doing my best to hold each space for only one thing.  So first thing it was my bubble (take the dog for a walk, put in my writing), then it was the family bubble (get kids ready for school, deliver them there, and then participate in the annual Turkey Trot at the twins’ school), and then it was the first clinic bubble (pass back labs, chart on all patients since it’s a small clinic), and then I stopped back at home for a lunch-and-throw-the-ball-to-the-dog bubble.  Now I’m at my second clinic and I’m pausing before I leap into the next work bubble of the day and round on the midshift patients.

    Here’s the thing – When I’m able to focus my attention on only one thing, I’m remarkably calm and efficient.  I can tell myself “It’s not time for that now.  There will be time for that later.”  It’s like there’s a beginning and an end to every task.  Maybe the task won’t be finished, but once I’ve finished my work on it – for now – then I can put it behind me and move my attention to the next thing.  It’s about setting boundaries and it feels incredibly powerful and empowering.

    Here’s an article by Peter Bregman that mirrors my own experience: How (and Why) to Stop Multitasking  (I know, I know – you don’t need more reading material.  I couldn’t help myself.)

    How does this apply to your situation?  Somehow, I’m sure of it.  I think you and I have both been exploring the theme of boundaries in our writing this month.  I think this fits in there somewhere with figuring out what’s your job and what’s not your job and how to hold space for the things you want to prioritize, you are most uniquely qualified to do, and give you the most joy.  And somewhere along that path we learn to figure out what doesn’t make that list.  And if it doesn’t make the list, it doesn’t make the list and you can share that boundary with others.

    I totally get you with the reading everything that others wrote, both here and for your eCourse students.  I struggled with that when I was a junior high English teacher for several years.  I had to ask myself – when 150 students complete a homework assignment, do I need to review it in detail or can we just review it together in class and I can check that it was completed?  What is the purpose – to practice the skill or for me to review it?  And when 150 students hand in their short story assignments, how carefully do I need to read their work?  I got to the point of using a rubric to outline expectations and then I asked students to do a self-assessment before handing in the assignments – and then it was more me confirming they had earned the grade rather than me deliberating it 150 times.  Did I read the stories?  Yes – I skimmed some and I gave others a more thorough reading.  But the truth is that it would be nearly impossible to deliberately read 150 stories, do my lesson planning, be present for my students, and have any kind of life outside of school for the next two to four weeks.

    So I think you have to ask yourself a few questions, too.  What is the purpose of the writing?  And what is your role as the teacher?  Can others fulfill part of your role as the teacher?  And even though some people may seem to be able to do it all, it’s likely they’ve made their own choices – either by intention or default – and those choices may be different than the ones you make.

    Dear God – have I just written this much?  I have to draw my boundary and get back to work.  But I am working at intentionally carving out space for when I can read and respond to GEA (just blew it here) and when I’m going to actually work on my project and not just hang out here with the rest of you (I’ve been blowing it there) and I’m going to set some time limits (because time is not an unlimited resource) and then I will either make more deliberate choices within that time frame, or I will not and face the consequences for my actions.

    You are good enough.  You just have to give yourself credit and recognize that no one person can do it all – even amazing you!!!

    #63769

    Judy Brenneman
    Adventurer
    @judyb

    @laurakoller – SO grateful for your response–those questions are exactly what I need to hear — and find answers to. Many thoughts right now, and a brain too tired to process them, so I’ll save that for another day. But THANKS 🙂

    #63772

    Judy Brenneman
    Adventurer
    @judyb

    Behind the Scenes, Creating a Writing Workshop, Nov. 27, 2017
    ~854 words

    I have spent over six hours doing client writing today (plus attended a Most Excellent Coaching Call–thanks @bradleytmorris), and right now, I am fried and my eyeballs feel utterly desiccated, so instead of writing the brilliant essay I came up with this morning, I rewrote an essay from several years ago, testing it to see if it is still valid (I decided yes) and to see if it applies to the eCourses I want to develop (and the answer is also yes). I haven’t nailed down specifics (e.g., on how to create and maintain safe space within an eCourse and its associated community), but getting my brain to think about this (especially combined with the info from today’s coaching call) is beginning to shake loose some ideas that I think will work. But for now, here’s the essay (it’s about 850 words, give or take).

    Creating a Writing workshop, Part 1: Where our plucky narrator discovers safe passage in a postcard

    It was an unremarkable postcard, bland no-color card stock, no photos or clever illustrations. The crack and peel label with my name and address tilted just off center, a red and slightly bleary nonprofit postage indicia the only color aside from black ink.

    I no longer remember what drew my eye long enough for the card’s message to register, but register it did: a 4-day writing workshop in Moab, Utah, with sections for poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction.

    I’d never been to Moab.

    I had a first grader whose energy consistently outstripped my own.

    I had a fledgling freelance business, tech writing and marketing communications mostly, with insane and unending deadlines.

    It’s only a day’s drive to Moab, and I was more than overdue for a “mom vacation.” I hadn’t had a day—heck, I hadn’t had an hour—to myself since November 6, 1984, when my son was born. (He quit taking naps at 3 weeks. The baby books advised, “Sleep when your baby sleeps,” and I thought that meant when your baby was awake, you should be awake, too. I pretty much quit sleeping until he was five.) I didn’t write poetry and I hadn’t written fiction since high school—but creative nonfiction? I wrote ad copy—creative and nonfiction; surely that counted.

    I checked the calendar, delegated the worst of the deadlines, notified the husband, reassured our son (Me: No, you will not starve. Son (wailing): But Dad burned water! Husband: Son, that’s why God invented restaurants.), and sent in my registration.

    My determined sense of adventure—okay, my bravado—got me as far as the cabin door on the first day of the workshop. I remember standing in the doorway, wondering what in blue blazes I was doing there. A dozen people were gathered on the mismatched assortment of chairs and sofas forming a rough circle that looped out from the fireplace. I recognized some of them from the night before, at the guest author reading. As I sidled into a spot near the corner, the woman nearest the fireplace asked me what it was like to stay in Edward Abbey’s cabin. “Whose—what?” I couldn’t remember who Edward Abbey was, let alone think about “his” cabin. It was his cabin?

    (Later, the ranch owner confirmed that Edward Abbey had, indeed, lived in the cabin where I was billeted. Much to the disappointment of my workshop-mates, I did not see his ghost nor channel his writing.)

    After introductions, Ken Brewer (our workshop leader and later, Utah’s Poet Laureate), explained the review process we’d use—a process I still use, with minor variations, in my own workshops, with other writing groups, and, modified to work with email and other electronic wonders, with far-flung clients.

    I didn’t know it then, but Ken was doing something far more important than explaining how to efficiently critique our work. He was creating a safe space, a place where no matter how skilled or scared or new or accomplished you were, you could share what you’d written. You wouldn’t be ridiculed or castigated or laughed out of the room. No one would roll their eyes and tell you to find something else to do with your hands. It was the first inkling I had that creativity is a sacred act, worthy of being cherished and nurtured.

    By sacred, I don’t mean everything we create is perfect or hits the mark we are aiming for or never needs editing. A well-done critique helps us identify how to improve what we’ve created, often pushing us to be even more creative. A poorly done critique shuts down our creativity, threatens to silence us, sends us scurrying for cover.

    No one at that first workshop labelled themselves “nature writer” or “memoirist.” I don’t remember anyone even mentioning genre beyond the broad (and somewhat hazy at times) distinctions between fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry.

    What I remember most is writing in a safe haven, where I discovered that writing itself can be a safe haven. I remember walking through the cabin door every morning for four days to sit by the fire with a dozen people who willingly risked sharing the words that appeared on their pages, who risked sharing their stories that showed us all that we are not alone, and that our stories are worth the risk of writing.

    Key takeaways I build into my workshops (including eCourses)

    There’s joy in “letting loose”—writing freely for the fun of it, to discover what will show up on the page, and the delight of seeing what others create. “Letting loose” translates directly into better skill as a writer, regardless of the type of writing.

    When I returned home, I discovered that the things I’d learned in the workshop applied to every writing project I encountered, whether it was client work or a personal essay. Creativity and writing craftsmanship extend far beyond the official focus of a particular workshop or class.

    Creating a safe place in which to create, take risks, and share feedback is crucial.

    #63908

    Judy Brenneman
    Adventurer
    @judyb

    What to pray for, to any nearby deities who may be listening

    Nov. 28, 2017, ~740 words

    Another day spent in lovely productivity on other people’s projects. I check my time sheets and progress reports; I will be able to pay the bills this month, and I breathe a little easier. I am weary, but trust that this weariness will not consume me. I have so much more to do, so much more that I want to do. A faint echo in my head reminds me that I always want to do so much more, but (according to the voice) I never do. You won’t stick with it, the voice whispers. You won’t finish–you probably won’t even make it to the halfway point. I rise from my desk, stretch, decide to take a break, but instead, I sit back down at my desk. This time, I will not quit. This time, I will find a way to push through. I’ve done it with other people’s projects (we call it “the slog,” that middle part of a project where you start wondering why in heaven’s name you got into this in the first place, but by now, you’re so far along that it would take just as long to go back, so you keep going, because if you slog long enough, you will eventually get to The End—except for your own projects, your own creative work, the voice sneers; you never make it to the end, you hardly ever make it halfway). My inner adolescent flares up; she’s standard issue teenager, rebellious and angry just for the sake of being rebellious and angry. She throws down the gauntlet, challenges the sneering whisperer.

    The gauntlet looks a lot like a pen. I dip it into the ink of a new season, a new project, a new year.

    Let the motivation last this time, I plead silently to any nearby deities. The new exercise plan, business plan, life plan. The renewed commitment to volunteering, recycling, bike riding instead of driving, even when it’s cold. The unfinished screenplay. The eCourse.

    Motivation swirls around me like a gentle snowfall. I turn in its swirl, my hands outstretched in supplication, hoping to catch bits of it, like catching snowflakes. Each one unique, every one beautiful, so many to choose from!

    Perfect crystalline particles float gently past. A few alight in my palm. Exquisite! But before I can examine them closely, they melt, drop away like tears, evaporate as if they never existed at all.

    No matter; it hasn’t all vanished. I’ll scoop some up from the ground.

    I dig my hands in and discover that what began as delicate and easy to catch has become thick mush. The weight of the mush has compressed the lower layers into nearly solid sediment. My hands are freezing, my arms tired from digging, but I’m determined, certain that the perfect bit of motivation is there. All I need to do is pull it up. Then I’ll have all the motivation I need to do the great things I want to do this time.

    I get through the hardening sediment and discover a thick clear layer slick as ice. My fingernails scrabble on its surface, unable to gain purchase. Motivation that cannot move: what good is that? I am not having fun. This is too hard. It takes too long. I don’t know how to get through the ice. I want to quit.

    And then this thought wiggles its way into my brain:

    Motivation moves me, but inspiration sustains me. Motivation cannot last without inspiration.

    Inspiration is the breath of creativity. I fill my lungs with the wonder of snowfall. I breathe in the delight of new experiences and the camaraderie of friends and family. I sample passing breezes of disparate ideas, suck in great gulps of music and theatre and art. I inhale stories, all kinds of stories.

    I breathe it all in, and it swirls within me, becoming a steadily burning fire. Each breath refuels the fire, and I discover that my hands now extend in offering, not supplication. Inspiration triggers this desire to act; I am motivated because I am inspired.

    Inspired, I can sustain the actions I am motivated to perform. Inspired, I can inspire others through my actions.

    Inspired, I can change the world. We can change the world.

    I send a new prayer to any deities, near and far: This time, let me be inspired.

    #64092

    Judy Brenneman
    Adventurer
    @judyb

    Where You Stand Makes all the Difference
    Nov. Challenge Nov. 29, 2017
    ~740 words

    Zipping along the narrow road, flat plains and farmland like sheets of rumpled paper all around me, the sun barely up, I lean, anticipating the curve that curls around a weatherworn house. A blink, a shimmer of blue—a pond, maybe a lake, and I round the curve and there’s another, a vast expanse of what must be water, a reservoir of sorts except that it can’t be (where’s the dam? where’s the river? why isn’t the water cascading across the road?), and as I accelerate out of the turn and the angle between me in my van and the sun in its sky shifts, I realize what I’m seeing isn’t water at all, but long stretches of blue plastic strips in tight parallel rows.

    I’m so surprised, I turn around and park at the edge of the farmhouse’s packed dirt drive and stare. I grab my camera and stalk the edge of the field (ever mindful that this is rattler territory, too), snapping photos from high angle and low, close-up and off-to-the-horizon. The plastic—it’s black, not blue—is about a meter wide. Fist-sized holes punch a perforated line along the length of each strip’s center. When I stand up and look down, it’s clear that this is a freshly plowed and planted field, though nothing’s sprouted yet. When I crouch and scan across the surface, it’s plastic and dirt next to my feet, something rough-hewn halfway out, and beyond that, shimmer-accented dark, capped by sky. The lake lives halfway between these two postures, a mirage of earth and ingenuity and sunrise.

    What I see—and my understanding of what I see—depends on where I stand. Depends on my Point of View.

    In literature, we think of POV in terms of person, often called the viewpoint character. For example, first person is from the POV of a particular character, usually the protagonist. In first person, the only information available is what that person knows, thinks, and experiences—and shares with us.

    Third person comes in several flavors. Two common ones are limited third person, which, like first person, is from the point of view of one specific character but uses “he” or “she” instead of “I”; and involved or omniscient author, which is the voice of the storyteller who knows everything that’s going on with everyone, everywhere.

    Some fiction and a lot of nonfiction, including interpretive writing, is second person: the writer is speaking directly to the reader. Most of what I write in my newsletters and in these November challenges posts (and likely what I’ll use in most of my eCourses) is second person—I’m talking directly to you; you is second person.

    In living history interpretation, first person refers to an interpreter or actor performing in the role of an historical character. The performer—whether in a formal, scripted, staged presentation or a more informal, even improvisational, performance—speaks and acts from the point of view of the character he or she is representing. The second person living history interpreter—even if in period costume—is a liaison between the history story and the contemporary audience, providing context and information that the first person historic character cannot know.

    We can think about POV and viewpoint characters in other ways, too. What happens if you explore your riparian story from the POV of a trout? A mayfly? A towering cottonwood? A feathery seed? A hawk? A finch? The sole of a wader? The spinning reel of a fishing pole?

    Even if using such uncommon points of view aren’t suitable for your situation—perhaps they wouldn’t match the tone or style—thinking about them often leads to surprising discoveries and fresh approaches to the material. Knowing how the world looks when you’re the seed hidden inside the lodgepole pinecone, hoping and waiting for the fire that releases you, opens up one set of perspectives and possibilities. Seeing the world from the POV of the fire as it rushes the mountainside opens up another set.

    So next time you launch into your story, take a moment to think about where you stand. Glance over your shoulder. Get out of the car and walk around. Put yourself—and your readers—in a new place.

    The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new landscapes but in having new eyes.
    –Marcel Proust

    #64153

    Laura Koller
    Adventurer
    @laurakoller

    @judyb – Wow, since your first post this month your writing has really resonated with me.  I could write another 500+ words based on each of the entries you’ve shared here with us.  I felt transported when you described motivation as a snowfall and inspiration as a breath of air.  I could picture those intangible objects as something I could see with my eyes and feel with my hands.  I felt suspended in time.  And the point of view writing – what a great story to segue into your lesson.  The thing I’m left wondering is what those plastic strips are there for.  Is that like the weed-free fabric I can put in between my flowers so there’s (supposedly) not so much maintenance involved?

    Last, I’ve continued to think about your post on assumptions vs. reality.  It reminded me of assumptions we make about parenting our kids.  That kids have to wear pajamas to bed at night and put new clothes on every morning – I can tell you that my morning routine has been simplified because one of my 5-year-olds dresses himself every bedtime for the following day, and the laundry loads have been minimized because my oldest sons sleep in their boxers.  That your kids have to be fully dressed to socks, shoes, and coats before they get in the car – it’s helpful when all of those items are in the car but one time-saving measure (aka threat or act of desperation) is to finish the dressing process during the commute or after arriving.  Or how about the assumption that your child needs to be fully dressed to attend daycare – I once walked my child into the daycare center wearing nothing but a diaper (oh, the looks on the teachers faces!) and proudly announced that all of his clothes were in the diaper bag.  So yes, in my own life I’ve come to realize that recognizing assumptions and asking questions about them can be helpful, liberating, and even entertaining.

    By the way, this week I was listening to “The Four Agreements” during my work commute (thus blasting the assumption that I have no time available to read books) and the third agreement is “Don’t Make Assumptions” and describes how we make all kinds of assumptions because we don’t have the courage to ask questions and express what we really want.  As soon as I heard that I smiled and thought of you and your stories.

    Thanks again for sharing!!!

    #64175

    Bradley Morris
    Mountain Guide
    @bradleytmorris

    How has your month of writing gone Judy? What have you discovered and/or created?

    How’d your 50,000 words go on top of this?

    #64191

    Judy Brenneman
    Adventurer
    @judyb

    Winding Down?
    Nov. challenge Nov.30, 2017, ~1060 words

    I can’t quite tell if I’m winding down or winding up.

    I’ve spent all my spare moments today reflecting on this experience of the November challenge—how it’s been similar in a lot of ways to nanowrimo, even though the pieces I’ve written haven’t been chapters in the classic sense—though they are essentially linked essays, for the most part.

    I’ve pushed myself the way I used to push myself for nano, too—the last couple of years, I cranked out pages of words for National Novel Writing Month but padded my word count by adding in some of the client work and business marketing stuff I did during those Novembers because (so I told myself) I didn’t have time and energy to push the “real” nano project. That was true and not true. The true part is that I did end up with tough deadlines and other craziness that got in the way of writing. The not-true part is that other things always get in the way, and in other years, I managed to write well beyond the 50k mark, even with the disruptions.

    This year, I wrote scenes for my nanonovel until the coaching call when Bradley announced the November challenge. Then I switched to November challenge writing only, though that wasn’t what I intended at the start. I knew this was the November to push myself again, and I intended to do both.

    But that isn’t what happened. Within a week, I abandoned the nano-novel and focused entirely on the November challenge writing. I realized that part of this switch was time—there really are only so many hours in a day—but it was also a function of what was drawing my interest, what I was enjoying, because (all talk of lessons you might learn from challenges and such aside) the real purpose behind nano for me, especially this year, was to write for the sheer joy of it. To play with language, to create outrageous over-the-top descriptions and metaphors that made no sense, anything I could do to push myself as a writer. As someone who often has to throttle back ideas to meet the needs (assuage the fears?) of many clients, I felt as if I’d lost part of myself in this last year. Nano was a chance to find that part of myself again. What I figured out fairly quickly was that my brain was not happy switching between bits of bizarre fiction and longer essay-type drafts that I was writing for the challenge. My brain *was* happy writing the essays.

    I wanted to try the November challenge to see if it would help me transition back into active involvement in creating my own eCourse. I stalled out ages ago, and both work commitments and my own frustration with my eCourse’s structure (I wasn’t happy with it) contributed to the stall.

    And the November challenge has helped. It’s forced me to think about the work I’m doing and the work I have yet to do, including eCourse development. It’s forced me to slow down and think things through a bit better. It’s forced me to speed up—there’s a building momentum when I write on the same topic (more or less) every day, and although I don’t think I’m getting these posts written and typed a lot faster, I am getting started a lot faster. That’s partly the momentum and partly reinforcing a habit that had been dormant for a while—but it’s also partly due to the fact that the way things have worked out this month, most days, the only time I’ve had (or allowed myself to have) to write is late evenings, and if I don’t settle quickly and get my pen moving, I will fall asleep. I can’t write and post if I’m asleep, and (so far, anyway) I can’t sleep while my pen is moving. Of course I’m also groggy enough (especially tonight, our last one of this challenge)s that I’m not sure what I’m saying makes sense. I’m not even sure I’ll be able to read my handwriting when I type up these scrawled notes.

    I like the fact that I was able to push through fatigue and deadlines and my various responsibilities and obligations to write and post something every day since that coaching call. I like that at least half (maybe more) of my posts are essays in disguise (i.e., drafts) that with a little editing will become newsletter articles, which means I will be able to get a newsletter done monthly, if I want—something I’ve never managed before. I like the fact that I reminded myself that I can still work past the fatigue and past my Inner Calvinist who nags so much about how only directly billable client work is worth my effort. I like that I feel more connected and engaged with both the GEA overall and with several participants who are with me at this (rapidly moving) campfire we call the November challenge. I like that I’ve figured out a few more pieces of my eCourse’s structure, just by writing and writing and writing.

    There are two other things I especially love about the November challenge experience, and they are tightly linked. The first is all the amazing and fascinating things others have written, from “here’s my project idea” to “this is my life.” The second is that despite my exhaustion tonight as I write these words, the challenge has re-ignited my enthusiasm for my eCourse work. Pushing myself to write is part of that, but getting excited and intrigued by the work ad challenges so thoughtfully expressed by other November challenge folks wakes up my brain, reminds me that this is challenging in all kinds of ways for all of us, and that no matter the difficulties, we are doing it anyway—and the world will be better for it.

    I don’t think I can keep up this everyday pace for my eCourse, but I can continue it, less frequently, and use it to push my eCourse along. In writing, figuring out what to do or what to have your characters do, or when trying to decide what to cut or edit, it always comes down to “What serves the story?”

    The November challenge served my story, and the story is better for it.

    #64284

    Bradley Morris
    Mountain Guide
    @bradleytmorris

    Judy, it has been such a pleasure having you come back to the campfire and to share your PASSION, which is writing, with the rest of us. Every entry I’ve read, I have been delighted to see you shine through. It’s also been wonderful to have you on our weekly coaching sessions. I think you’ve got a great course idea and now it’ just time to WRITE out your curriculum and put the pieces together. Channel ALL of that writing energy into your scripts, lessons, hand-outs, etc and you’ll be done before March. Trust me, it’s easier than you think. It just takes the time and you have proven that you can write a lot in 30 days 😉

    I now challenge you to write a lesson everyday. Even if it’s just an outline.

    Be sure to click over to the “CHALLENGES” page and submit your request for reward. You’ve earned it.

    Way to go Judy   😀

    Excited to see more of you around the campfire.

Viewing 15 posts - 46 through 60 (of 65 total)

You must be logged in to reply to this topic.