My Very First “Writer” Interview!! Over on the website Interviews from the Void, I had the honor of chatting with Arthur McCabe about a whole bunch of interesting writing stuff. It’s a sign of how inept I am at professional marketing and blogging that I only just thought today of mentioning this on my own …
When’s the last time you did anything to refill your creative well? Making art is active, and focused, and intentional, and draining. Tapping into your creative mind is tiring, though many of us don’t notice that we’re fatiguing until we’re lying face down like a stick of butter that’s been left out on the counter in August. Try scheduling activities into your life that will nurture your creative spirit.
Countless talented artists wander into the creative forest with good intentions and never make it out again. They get lost, hit that moment of doubt and despair, give up, and die.  The thing is, getting lost is a hazard of living a creative life. In some ways, getting lost really is inevitable, because the creative path is not well-travelled. I’d argue that if you’re doing things right as an artist, you’re blazing a new trail through the deepest, darkest woods of your own psyche.
Every morning, I wake up, get the coffee beans ground, get the water heating, and then I sit down and write for an hour. At the end of that session, I check my “session target” bar in Scrivener, and a satisfied warmth suffuses my brain. I’ve discovered a couple of things about writing first thing …
Writing is like baseball. Most of the time, you recognize the pitch coming in and you manage a solid single when you swing at it. Occasionally, you strike out. Every once in a great while, though, you hit a grand slam. Or, if you’re new at it, like me, you dream about hitting a grand …
I’m usually pretty good at handling the plot bunnies when they take up arms and attack. At least, that’s what I’ve always told myself. Upon reflection, however, I’ve reason to question that. Trish Marie Dawson wrote a funny little blog post on this topic (I grabbed the drawing from her article). Check her out, folks. …
I’ve got a thirty-minute break before my next parent-teacher conference, so I thought I’d use this time to do some writing. I know I won’t be able to get any meaningful creative writing done, sandwiched as this moment is between long and stressful blocks of trying to calm down nervous parents and stressed-out students. My …
The Debate Rages On: Is NaNoWriMo a good thing or not? Emotions run high when this question is asked. I mean, folks get seriously heated. Fans of NaNoWriMo start heating the tar and gathering the feathers whenever someone suggests that maybe NaNoWriMo isn’t the best thing ever. Critics of NaNoWriMo sharpen their pen nibs in …
Creative Insecurity: Creative people of all types tend to be insecure folks, I think. Creative folks are bold, daring, maybe a little crazy. They push the boundaries, lean into the unknown, risk failure. But because of that, they occasionally run afoul of moments of doubt and insecurity. Unfortunately, those are the moments that, from a …
At some point between 369 BCE and 286 BCE, western philosopher Zhuangzi (Chuang-tzu) wrote what is commonly known as The Butterfly Dream Parable. Here’s an excerpt: “Once upon a time, I, Zhuangzi, dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes a butterfly. I was conscious only of my happiness …