Hogmanay

Just read that there's a holiday, in Scotland, I think, called Hogmanay. And it's today, last day of the year. The purpose of Hogmanay is to clean up after the old year, literally to clean house. Well, I've done a few things: unpacked my bags, anyway.

I do like the idea, and am somewhat inspired to bring new order. But it will take me a lot more than a day.

I expect it takes more than a day for everybody. Perhaps the purpose of the special day is to get us all inspired to start once again.

Happy Fresh Start to you.



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Checking In

Still on the road, and at a borrowed computer which I have to give up in minutes. I'll be home again tomorrow. And will soon have much more to say--about Bhutto, fear, courage, our ongoing challenges.


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About Benazir Bhutto

A story I wrote about my encounter with Benazir Bhutto was published today in my local paper, the Raleigh News & Observer. It's an essay and a loss I feel strongly about. I hope you'll read it. In any event, I say again here: I wish her spirit godspeed.


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Cool D.C. Lodging

Well, I wasn't going to blog this week, but there's a computer online three steps outside my hotel door. I'm staying in a hotel in D.C. at the edge of Georgetown. I always find cheap digs, and this has led me to some novel experiences. This one is a delight.

The hotel is the Allen Lee, across the street from the GWU's fraternity and sorority houses. It looks like an old-fashioned dormitory itself. And I was fortunate enough to get the room that opens onto the lobby, (thus the computer outside my door.)

The room itself is the truly fun discovery. First, it is irregularly shaped, to put it mildly: it has 17 walls, the bathroom has ten. And the room extends away from the building like a pier, on a block that ends in a corner. So I have traffic passing on three sides. And sidewalk voices, etc. Not everyone would like it, to be sure. I find it to be like sleeping next to the ocean







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The Eve of Good Things

Merry Christmas to you, if you're a celebrator of Christmas. Whatever you celebrate, I wish you well at this year's end. And I'll be back in action here just before the first of the year.


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Flying Dude...and Holiday Fun

All over the world people are trying to figure out how humans can fly like flying squirrels.

This is not a joke. A New York Times article says that half a dozen organizations are doing serious work on this challenge--and a link to YouTube shows an astonishing demonstration. If you feel you're working on something risky and impossible, have a look at this guy sailing over snowy peaks and no-doubt-startled skiers while wearing a wing suit.

The wing suit is the basic equipment, and it looks both scifi-ish and a bit priestly. This suit ideally turns a person into a human glider. Which sort of puts my day to day risks in perspective.

Update from last night's party (I resolved in yesterday's post to party serenely through the holiday season, without necessarily being "on" all the time.)

Well, the party was elegant, terrific, and fun. Was I serene? I thought so. I later asked my psychologist husband, without explaining why, how things looked from the outside. He said, "Intense. I just figured you'd gone hypomanic" for the occasion.

That suits me just fine. Serene on the inside, festive on the outside.


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A Bold Party Strategy

Tonight's the first in a four night stretch of socializing. Holiday stuff. It'll all be fun once I'm into it. Can be a bit daunting in advance.

I heard a phrase today about someone else's strategy in such situations: "call on your inner extrovert."

I actually come off as an extrovert, or so I'm told. I may need to call on my inner introvert, and not be in high gear the whole time. I think I have just written my way to a plan. (Writing does so often clarify the thinking.)

So that's it. I go forth to party serenely.


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Reclaiming Your Creative Courage

Check out this helpful article on "Reclaiming Your Creative Courage." It has some ideas tucked in that I haven't run across. One of these is to take inventory of your dream projects and mark off the list any that you've definitely decided against. That allows for better focus on what you are going to do. This might be part of this year's New Year's resolution, which I take quite seriously.


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An Opportunity for Inspiration

Here's an appealing take on the holiday experience from Judith Wright's More e-zine:

"I used to think that my holiday had to be encompassed in one 'perfect day' or that I had to re-create my family’s traditions impeccably. But I’ve learned to embrace the holidays as a season and a spirit, and not as one single tradition or event. I’ve learned that when I’m not open to the spirit of the season, then everything feels like a dreaded to-do list rather than an opportunity for inspiration. When I remember to touch the spirit, my preparations become sacred, loving acts."


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Shopping

Well, traffic and conversation have quieted here at PPBB. I suspect that most of us are doing quite a few holiday errands just now: chasing down a Creepy Crawly Bug Maker for the four-year-old nephew, etc.

While it's simply necessary to produce the longed-for toy for the wee boy, I also like to see how I can put my own individual spin on the events of this time of year. (One year our Christmas tree was an easel--the three-legged teepee kind--wrapped in lights. That was great at night, very odd when unlit.)

My feeling is: whatever I come up with is unlikely to be any weirder than a Creepy Crawly Bug Maker.

And all of this is, after all, supposed to be a celebration, and fun.


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A Creativity House, and Rollerblading

Here's an interesting press in the UK that specializes in books on creativity: Ablex Publishing.

Some sample titles: The Person behind the Mask: Guide to Performing Arts Psychology and Improvised Dialogues: Emergence and Creativity in Conversation.

I find the idea of creativity and emergence in conversation appealing in itself. Although I can't say that I like the idea of self-conscious conversation.

I think it's also true of writing and, no doubt, any art that both free inventiveness and lack of self-consciousness are needed.

I learned this in a visceral way once while rollerblading. Every time I had a thought about how well or badly I was doing, or how I looked, then I stumbled. Otherwise, smooth sailing.

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"Negative" Emotions

An old print ad for Ban deodorant has caused me to ponder.

It suggests, with an amusing picture for each, some items we might like to get rid of:

Ban Insecurity
Ban Stereotypes
Ban Angst
Ban Self-Doubt
etc.

For some of these, mental health professionals (and Buddhists) might suggest that we let them be and simply watch them float in and away.

I've found that thoughts/emotions I try to get rid of tend to stick and grow. At the same time, sometimes I can stop a thought when it first rises: just "don't go there." This is a matter of some import to me, since I have a form of OCD that's more "pure obsessive," as it's called.

What do you think? What has your experience been?


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The Passive Part of Creativity

A lovely essay I came across in an old thrift-shop New Yorker (June 16, 1977) extols the pleasure and power of pausing and letting something happen, of yielding to the natural rhythms of processes.

Letting bread rise is the obvious example. Or pregnancy.

Letting an idea cook also has much to be said for it. Or letting a draft sit until it's possible to see it fresh. (I have so far found the latter physically impossible.)

What was most interesting about this piece by Noelle Oxenhandler is how sensuous and whimsical she made the experience of what could be called waiting.

Sensuous: the simple matter of letting a newly-washed floor dry..."to lie on my back in the grass watching the clouds, my wet mop beside me, while inside the house th ewater shapes dried on clean, lemony wood floors."

Whimsical, following the odd impulse: A young blind man was gathering strength for action in the French Resistance movement against the Nazis. In spite of his sense of urgency, he felt he should first take dancing lessons. "What courage," she writes, "to dance on the brink of war, on the threshold of Buchenwald. To give oneself the time to evoke or to exorcise whatever inner forces were needed or stood in the way of action. And how difficult--except with hindsight--to see this as courage."


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Physical Tension

Some weeks back I mentioned here that I was using a hypnotic induction on Increasing Your Physical Presence, a product of an English business called The Confidence Club. I'm doing this so that when the time comes for me to rule the world, I'll be ready.

The directions call for listening to the CD two or three times a week for the first month. I've just completed week three.

The first time I listened I didn't remember most of it afterwards. (That may have been the most effective go-round.) Now I've heard it enough times that I'm familiar with the words. And one line that jumped out at me last night was "tension relies on fear of the future."

I've never been especially attracted to the idea of being entirely relaxed; it has always seemed slouchy and draggy in my mind. But coding tight shoulders as fear of what's going to happen takes all the virtue out of it. Which may mean that I'll finally relax--a little, anyway.

I'm not sure how I'll know if there's a change in my Physical Presence. No one has commented yet on my unusual growth in charisma. But I'm expecting it any day now.

And, by the way, if you click on the link in the previous sentence, you'll find a put-into-practice now set of tips from none other than The Trump Blog. No reason not to try both approaches. We all need to be prepared to be rule the world; the moment could come any day now.



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Blake's "Forests of the Night"

A friend just got a tiger tattoo for his 60th birthday.

Which of course brought to mind the William Blake poem:

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?....

Blake is asking of the tiger: who made thee? He's writing about where we came from and where we're going, as well as the power and beauty of the animal.

Sometimes when I teach a writing workshop, I ask people to figure out what one question all their writing is trying to answer.

Blake's question is my question, the search that drives my books. "In what distant deeps or skies/Burnt the fire of (our) eyes?"

Do you know the question that drives your art? Is there an image that embodies that question?

I don't plan to get a tattoo, but I do like seeing my question clearly before me as I follow a story into the forests.



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This Man Knows How to Handle Setbacks and Keep Going

SPEECH BY AL GORE ON THE ACCEPTANCE
OF THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE
DECEMBER 10, 2007
OSLO, NORWAY

Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Honorable members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Excellencies, Ladies and gentlemen.

I have a purpose here today. It is a purpose I have tried to serve for many years. I have prayed that God would show me a way to accomplish it.

Sometimes, without warning, the future knocks on our door with a precious and painful vision of what might be. One hundred and nineteen years ago, a wealthy inventor read his own obituary, mistakenly published years before his death. Wrongly believing the inventor had just died, a newspaper printed a harsh judgment of his life’s work, unfairly labeling him “The Merchant of Death” because of his invention – dynamite. Shaken by this condemnation, the inventor made a fateful choice to serve the cause of peace.

Seven years later, Alfred Nobel created this prize and the others that bear his name.

Seven years ago tomorrow, I read my own political obituary in a judgment that seemed to me harsh and mistaken – if not premature. But that unwelcome verdict also brought a precious if painful gift: an opportunity to search for fresh new ways to serve my purpose.

Unexpectedly, that quest has brought me here. Even though I fear my words cannot match this moment, I pray what I am feeling in my heart will be communicated clearly enough that those who hear me will say, “We must act.”

The distinguished scientists with whom it is the greatest honor of my life to share this award have laid before us a choice between two different futures – a choice that to my ears echoes the words of an ancient prophet: “Life or death, blessings or curses. Therefore, choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live.”

We, the human species, are confronting a planetary emergency – a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential even as we gather here. But there is hopeful news as well: we have the ability to solve this crisis and avoid the worst – though not all – of its consequences, if we act boldly, decisively and quickly.

However, despite a growing number of honorable exceptions, too many of the world’s leaders are still best described in the words Winston Churchill applied to those who ignored Adolf Hitler’s threat: “They go on in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all powerful to be impotent.”

So today, we dumped another 70 million tons of global-warming pollution into the thin shell of atmosphere surrounding our planet, as if it were an open sewer. And tomorrow, we will dump a slightly larger amount, with the cumulative concentrations now trapping more and more heat from the sun.

As a result, the earth has a fever. And the fever is rising. The experts have told us it is not a passing affliction that will heal by itself. We asked for a second opinion. And a third. And a fourth. And the consistent conclusion, restated with increasing alarm, is that something basic is wrong.

We are what is wrong, and we must make it right.

Last September 21, as the Northern Hemisphere tilted away from the sun, scientists reported with unprecedented distress that the North Polar ice cap is “falling off a cliff.” One study estimated that it could be completely gone during summer in less than 22 years. Another new study, to be presented by U.S. Navy researchers later this week, warns it could happen in as little as 7 years.

Seven years from now.

In the last few months, it has been harder and harder to misinterpret the signs that our world is spinning out of kilter. Major cities in North and South America, Asia and Australia are nearly out of water due to massive droughts and melting glaciers. Desperate farmers are losing their livelihoods. Peoples in the frozen Arctic and on low-lying Pacific islands are planning evacuations of places they have long called home. Unprecedented wildfires have forced a half million people from their homes in one country and caused a national emergency that almost brought down the government in another. Climate refugees have migrated into areas already inhabited by people with different cultures, religions, and traditions, increasing the potential for conflict. Stronger storms in the Pacific and Atlantic have threatened whole cities. Millions have been displaced by massive flooding in South Asia, Mexico, and 18 countries in Africa. As temperature extremes have increased, tens of thousands have lost their lives. We are recklessly burning and clearing our forests and driving more and more species into extinction. The very web of life on which we depend is being ripped and frayed.

We never intended to cause all this destruction, just as Alfred Nobel never intended that dynamite be used for waging war. He had hoped his invention would promote human progress. We shared that same worthy goal when we began burning massive quantities of coal, then oil and methane.

Even in Nobel’s time, there were a few warnings of the likely consequences. One of the very first winners of the Prize in chemistry worried that, “We are evaporating our coal mines into the air.” After performing 10,000 equations by hand, Svante Arrhenius calculated that the earth’s average temperature would increase by many degrees if we doubled the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.

Seventy years later, my teacher, Roger Revelle, and his colleague, Dave Keeling, began to precisely document the increasing CO2 levels day by day.

But unlike most other forms of pollution, CO2 is invisible, tasteless, and odorless -- which has helped keep the truth about what it is doing to our climate out of sight and out of mind. Moreover, the catastrophe now threatening us is unprecedented – and we often confuse the unprecedented with the improbable.

We also find it hard to imagine making the massive changes that are now necessary to solve the crisis. And when large truths are genuinely inconvenient, whole societies can, at least for a time, ignore them. Yet as George Orwell reminds us: “Sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield.”

In the years since this prize was first awarded, the entire relationship between humankind and the earth has been radically transformed. And still, we have remained largely oblivious to the impact of our cumulative actions.

Indeed, without realizing it, we have begun to wage war on the earth itself. Now, we and the earth's climate are locked in a relationship familiar to war planners: "Mutually assured destruction."

More than two decades ago, scientists calculated that nuclear war could throw so much debris and smoke into the air that it would block life-giving sunlight from our atmosphere, causing a "nuclear winter." Their eloquent warnings here in Oslo helped galvanize the world’s resolve to halt the nuclear arms race.

Now science is warning us that if we do not quickly reduce the global warming pollution that is trapping so much of the heat our planet normally radiates back out of the atmosphere, we are in danger of creating a permanent “carbon summer.”

As the American poet Robert Frost wrote, “Some say the world will end in fire; some say in ice.” Either, he notes, “would suffice.”

But neither need be our fate. It is time to make peace with the planet.

We must quickly mobilize our civilization with the urgency and resolve that has previously been seen only when nations mobilized for war. These prior struggles for survival were won when leaders found words at the 11th hour that released a mighty surge of courage, hope and readiness to sacrifice for a protracted and mortal challenge.

These were not comforting and misleading assurances that the threat was not real or imminent; that it would affect others but not ourselves; that ordinary life might be lived even in the presence of extraordinary threat; that Providence could be trusted to do for us what we would not do for ourselves.

No, these were calls to come to the defense of the common future. They were calls upon the courage, generosity and strength of entire peoples, citizens of every class and condition who were ready to stand against the threat once asked to do so. Our enemies in those times calculated that free people would not rise to the challenge; they were, of course, catastrophically wrong.

Now comes the threat of climate crisis – a threat that is real, rising, imminent, and universal. Once again, it is the 11th hour. The penalties for ignoring this challenge are immense and growing, and at some near point would be unsustainable and unrecoverable. For now we still have the power to choose our fate, and the remaining question is only this: Have we the will to act vigorously and in time, or will we remain imprisoned by a dangerous illusion?

Mahatma Gandhi awakened the largest democracy on earth and forged a shared resolve with what he called “Satyagraha” – or “truth force.”

In every land, the truth – once known – has the power to set us free.

Truth also has the power to unite us and bridge the distance between “me” and “we,” creating the basis for common effort and shared responsibility.

There is an African proverb that says, “If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” We need to go far, quickly.

We must abandon the conceit that individual, isolated, private actions are the answer. They can and do help. But they will not take us far enough without collective action. At the same time, we must ensure that in mobilizing globally, we do not invite the establishment of ideological conformity and a new lock-step “ism.”

That means adopting principles, values, laws, and treaties that release creativity and initiative at every level of society in multifold responses originating concurrently and spontaneously.

This new consciousness requires expanding the possibilities inherent in all humanity. The innovators who will devise a new way to harness the sun’s energy for pennies or invent an engine that’s carbon negative may live in Lagos or Mumbai or Montevideo. We must ensure that entrepreneurs and inventors everywhere on the globe have the chance to change the world.

When we unite for a moral purpose that is manifestly good and true, the spiritual energy unleashed can transform us. The generation that defeated fascism throughout the world in the 1940s found, in rising to meet their awesome challenge, that they had gained the moral authority and long-term vision to launch the Marshall Plan, the United Nations, and a new level of global cooperation and foresight that unified Europe and facilitated the emergence of democracy and prosperity in Germany, Japan, Italy and much of the world. One of their visionary leaders said, “It is time we steered by the stars and not by the lights of every passing ship.”

In the last year of that war, you gave the Peace Prize to a man from my hometown of 2000 people, Carthage, Tennessee. Cordell Hull was described by Franklin Roosevelt as the “Father of the United Nations.” He was an inspiration and hero to my own father, who followed Hull in the Congress and the U.S. Senate and in his commitment to world peace and global cooperation.

My parents spoke often of Hull, always in tones of reverence and admiration. Eight weeks ago, when you announced this prize, the deepest emotion I felt was when I saw the headline in my hometown paper that simply noted I had won the same prize that Cordell Hull had won. In that moment, I knew what my father and mother would have felt were they alive.

Just as Hull’s generation found moral authority in rising to solve the world crisis caused by fascism, so too can we find our greatest opportunity in rising to solve the climate crisis. In the Kanji characters used in both Chinese and Japanese, “crisis” is written with two symbols, the first meaning “danger,” the second “opportunity.” By facing and removing the danger of the climate crisis, we have the opportunity to gain the moral authority and vision to vastly increase our own capacity to solve other crises that have been too long ignored.

We must understand the connections between the climate crisis and the afflictions of poverty, hunger, HIV-Aids and other pandemics. As these problems are linked, so too must be their solutions. We must begin by making the common rescue of the global environment the central organizing principle of the world community.

Fifteen years ago, I made that case at the “Earth Summit” in Rio de Janeiro. Ten years ago, I presented it in Kyoto. This week, I will urge the delegates in Bali to adopt a bold mandate for a treaty that establishes a universal global cap on emissions and uses the market in emissions trading to efficiently allocate resources to the most effective opportunities for speedy reductions.

This treaty should be ratified and brought into effect everywhere in the world by the beginning of 2010 – two years sooner than presently contemplated. The pace of our response must be accelerated to match the accelerating pace of the crisis itself.

Heads of state should meet early next year to review what was accomplished in Bali and take personal responsibility for addressing this crisis. It is not unreasonable to ask, given the gravity of our circumstances, that these heads of state meet every three months until the treaty is completed.

We also need a moratorium on the construction of any new generating facility that burns coal without the capacity to safely trap and store carbon dioxide.

And most important of all, we need to put a price on carbon -- with a CO2 tax that is then rebated back to the people, progressively, according to the laws of each nation, in ways that shift the burden of taxation from employment to pollution. This is by far the most effective and simplest way to accelerate solutions to this crisis.

The world needs an alliance – especially of those nations that weigh heaviest in the scales where earth is in the balance. I salute Europe and Japan for the steps they’ve taken in recent years to meet the challenge, and the new government in Australia, which has made solving the climate crisis its first priority.

But the outcome will be decisively influenced by two nations that are now failing to do enough: the United States and China. While India is also growing fast in importance, it should be absolutely clear that it is the two largest CO2 emitters — most of all, my own country –– that will need to make the boldest moves, or stand accountable before history for their failure to act.

Both countries should stop using the other’s behavior as an excuse for stalemate and instead develop an agenda for mutual survival in a shared global environment.

These are the last few years of decision, but they can be the first years of a bright and hopeful future if we do what we must. No one should believe a solution will be found without effort, without cost, without change. Let us acknowledge that if we wish to redeem squandered time and speak again with moral authority, then these are the hard truths:

The way ahead is difficult. The outer boundary of what we currently believe is feasible is still far short of what we actually must do. Moreover, between here and there, across the unknown, falls the shadow.

That is just another way of saying that we have to expand the boundaries of what is possible. In the words of the Spanish poet, Antonio Machado, “Pathwalker, there is no path. You must make the path as you walk.”

We are standing at the most fateful fork in that path. So I want to end as I began, with a vision of two futures – each a palpable possibility – and with a prayer that we will see with vivid clarity the necessity of choosing between those two futures, and the urgency of making the right choice now.

The great Norwegian playwright, Henrik Ibsen, wrote, “One of these days, the younger generation will come knocking at my door.”

The future is knocking at our door right now. Make no mistake, the next generation will ask us one of two questions. Either they will ask: “What were you thinking; why didn’t you act?”

Or they will ask instead: “How did you find the moral courage to rise and successfully resolve a crisis that so many said was impossible to solve?”

We have everything we need to get started, save perhaps political will, but political will is a renewable resource.

So let us renew it, and say together: “We have a purpose. We are many. For this purpose we will rise, and we will act.”


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Cross-Pollenation and Mythic Imagination

First, the pollenation business.

A Google Alert arrived in my mail saying that another site had written about this blog. I clicked on that link and found myself at Mystic-Lit, where the writer of the day, Billie Hinton, was listing people, places, and processes that help her write fiction. Billie was kind enough to list this site, and while I was there at her post, I checked out some of the others on her list.

Now comes the mythic imagination part. Did you know there's a Mythic Imagination Institute that has an intriguing website and has put on at least one event that James Hillman describes as "a spiritual Spoleto Festival"? (Thank you, Billie, for this info.)

Here's a bit from the About Us page:

Our purpose is to enliven the imagination. Imagination is the root of empathy, innovation, problem solving, art, and science. Our way toward imagination cultivates the ground from which it springs: the observation and understanding of nature and human nature. This understanding exists universally in myths, folktales, sacred stories, and wisdom stories. It exists within the structure of story itself. It speaks through the images within the stories.

Once a while back my horoscope in the local weekly Independent told me I'd be better off if I viewed my life in more mythic terms. At first I didn't understand that. Now I think I do.

The question of when one's agent will return one's call becomes less aggravating when it's all part of "the hero's quest." Or when I read the Joseph Campbell quote on the Mythic Imagination site today: "We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, in order to have the life that is waiting for us."

The Mythic Imagination site/institute/e-magazine encourages seeing art and every person's life in mythic terms. For me that turns performance-pressure down and the fire-to-write up, which is very good for the outcome and for the pleasure and ease of the process.


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The Holiday Dilemma.

We're now in the serious holiday shopping season. And I'm not one who decries the commercialization of Christmas.

In fact, I grew up in a retailing family, clerking at my parents' clothing business, and in the '70's published an Op-Ed piece in The New York Times about my good memories of "Christmas at the store." (The argument of the piece was that nostalgia's better when it's real and honest, not Currier & Ives.)

But nostalgia aside, the holidays are for many us (me, for one) pressureful--an extra set of deadlines. What to do about this? It takes some spunk to single-handedly go against the great wave that says have it all done by the 25th.

I'd like to be able to give a Christmas present at any point during the year. And have it all done up in Christmas paper and ribbon, never mind that it might be August or April. Do you think I'll ever do that? Would I really like it? Don't know.

But some new variations on the ways to celebrate would be an interesting experiment. I'd love to hear your stories here.


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Creativity Research

"...Interest in creativity has never been greater, with a special division within the American Psychological Association devoted to the empirical study of the arts, four different journals centered around the study of creativity, and several major annual awards given out to outstanding creativity researchers."

This nice summary of a growing field comes from a description of the ebook Creativity Across Domains: Faces of the Muse.

Increasingly, I'll be reporting here on particular bits of creativity research, and how we might apply them.



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Wide-Angle and Zoom

Photographers aren't the only artists who use the techniques and tools that alternately widen and narrow the scope of vision.

We all know that the practice of looking closely is the foundation of writing as well as of the visual arts, seeing what's there rather than what's expected to be there.

It's also true that a wide almost focus-less view has great power. Some years ago I took a mindfulness course in which each participant went out for a solitary meditative walk with the assignment to maintain a view of 180 degrees. That's the entirety of a field of vision to consciously take in without scanning item by item.

This wide view provides an entirely different feeling than than that of simply staring down the road, or at the book, or whatever. It literally gives a big picture, instantly places me and my concerns in a larger context.

This morning, coming to a small rise in the highway on my way to my office, I found that my view had gone wide without my deciding for it to. Within my vision was not only the sweep of interstate traffic but the Raleigh skyline on my left, and a stretch of industrial yards and sheds, as well as a forested area of trees gone mostly brown or bare. No longer was I traveling in a tunnel from country kitchen to city desk. Neither was I looking at a sequence of objects, a visual list: car, car, crane, scrap of tire....

The result was not so much to make me feel small (a sensation I don't like) but to make me feel a significant part of a large enterprise, full of resources and infinite possibilities. I was no longer merely on I-40; I was on a planet.

Paradoxically, this felt--dare I use the word?--ennobling, rather than diminishing.

To glimpse the vast scale, rather than think of it in the abstract, takes a damaging kind of pressure off of me, that wearying and absurd sense that I'm the major tent pole. At the same time I see in that wide-open moment that I have a job to do in holding up my end of things.





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Writing from the Unconscious

Yesterday I received an email that gave me much puzzlement and delight. The complimentary close was either a Freudian slip (fraughtian?) or charmingly original--or both.

The message ended: "Bed well," followed by the signature.

I think perhaps Be Well was what was consciously intended. I'm not sure.

But I do know that the best tidbits in my own writing slip in unbidden and surprise me. I'm always grateful when I later recognize them.

Well, in truth, they weren't unbidden.

What I mean is they were unstrived for, because in this matter direct striving doesn't do any good. They're simply gifts that arrive at the portal of the writer who stays at the job, keeping a rhythm of writing and resting, writing and doing the mindless physical tasks that let the material keep cooking....


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"Fun! ... The New Core Value"

Inc. Magazine for entrepreneurs (and surely that category includes artists) has dedicated a recent issue to making work fun. "Give your company a merriment makeover," the cover advises.

I rediscovered writing as fun last month when I took a two week vacation. In the second week, I began writing an essay that I wanted to write, whether there was a market for it or not. I mentioned this at the time. I had a gloriously fun time writing it. No sense of deadline or meeting market requirements. No sense that I had to finish it. It refreshed me for returning to work on my larger years-long projects.

That essay may or may not see the light of day. The New York Times magazine "Lives" editor liked it very much but said that the piece, which is very timely, came in too late for their schedule.

Even so, I'm delighted that I wrote it. It's one of the pieces I'll look back on with delight. I'll think at least get it into an anthology somewhere some day. It made me a good contact at the Times magazine. And it excited me again about my other writing.

The founder and CEO of a $76 million company (somewhat larger than my writing enterprise)described in Inc. a fun thing he did that was linked to an important purpose. He told an employee whose health was at serious risk that if he'd lose 70 pounds, then the whole management team would dress as superheroes for a day, without explaining their costumes to customers, staff, or anyone at all.

With that enticement the man lost the 70 pounds and Jonathan Bush, creator of Athenahealth, wore a top-to-toe Batman costume while giving a presentation to a huge business prospect. He said never a word about why he'd dressed that way. The company got the customer. "You can take fun pretty far," Bush says, "before it stops serving the mission."

What are some ways that a writer can have fun and refresh the creative juices? Examples:
*reading someone else's wonderful work
*taking a break
*writing with a friend
*taking part in a group effort, like the 20+ author "story" that emerged from a beach weekend I attendeded
*writing faster...or slower
*take on a challenge...like the NaNoRiMo project, where each writer turns out a draft of a novel in 30 days
*write a bit of whimsy that you're sure no one will ever want
*dig deeper, deeper into an already rich character
*write a sketch from the point-of-view of the next person who crosses your path
*throw a kink into the story you're working on (you may be surprised to discover that it's integral)

Got ideas? What has worked for you?

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Breaking into Fashion

Ruby Fowler, age 88, didn't like the clothes she was finding when she went shopping, reports AARP Bulletin (publication for us oldsters over 50.) So this retired New Zealand schoolteacher started her own clothing line, with $3000 in capital. She calls it 45+ Frocks for the Mature. Perhaps when she's older she'll start a new label for the aged.


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Don't Get in Her Way

People magazine reports that Sen. John McCain's 95-year-old mother is traveling the country in a van with his mother and daughter, campaigning for him to become president. In the course of the campaign effort, four years ago (when she was 91), she was driving to L.A. and realized she had only 300 miles to go and thought: well, I can make this today. Shortly afterward, she was pulled for driving 118 mph. If this woman would watch her speedometer, she could be a model of vitality for us all.


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Inspired Idea

There's a store in California's San Fernando Valley called Creative Courage. It's a combination art gallery/gift shop/art studio. Here's how resident artist Lupe describes it:

"You know those cool funky stores that you only find while you're on vacation, well I wanted to bring that close to home. Creative Courage is an artistic haven....If you don't find what you're looking for we will help you make it in our Art Studio."

The backroom studio is equipped for customers making mosaics, collage, decoupage, etc.--a fully rigged-out puttering lab.

Great idea Lupe had. I wish it were closer to my home.



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Mystic-Lit

Do go and visit this new blog called Mystic-Lit. The heart of the idea is, of course, writing fiction that somehow involves the spiritual. But that is broadly defined. It's also simply about writing:
*a self-declared obsessive's issues with "in" versus "into"
*the curious matter of events and people in one's novel-in-progress starting to
turn up in one's life
*reversion clauses in book contracts
*the deer in legends as a symbol of call to adventure

The very idea of "mystic lit" calls to me. It's what I write. God speaks aloud in my first novel Revelation and a mystical experience of Hinduism guides a pivotal event in Sister India. My novel-in-progress and biography-in-progress are both about visionaries. I even take part in a monthly lunch meeting to discuss metaphysical subjects which we call Mystic Pizza.

Seven writers--one a day--are writing at Mystic-Lit. I'll be an occasional guest columnist. I hope you'll take part in or visit that conversation as well as this one.



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A Brainstorming Game

What's the lesson in creative courage to be found in this image? I'll bet there are many. Any ideas?



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Cut Loose

A lot of folks think of Bradford pear trees as stiff and brittle, rather formal; and there's some truth to that. Yet at this time of year the prim and rather delicate Bradford pear cuts loose like no other leaf in the forest, setting a lovely example.




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Accepting The Gifts on Offer

When I was younger, I wasted a lot of time trying to prove myself, not taking advantage of all the resources available to me. The kind of stuff I turned down...well, the details are too embarrassing to recount. I was a horse you could lead to champagne and she still wouldn't drink.

In retrospect, the gutsier thing would have been to focus on what I was trying to accomplish and use the resources available to do it.




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Paint with a Loose Arm

Ms. Nature doesn't hold back.












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Telecoaching

The splendidly encouraging Lisa Gates at Design Your Writing Life is beginning two new sessions of group telecoaching: one for writers and one for anyone else. The idea is to get your writing or other project/career/dream in motion.

Try a free introductory call in December to get a taste of the group telecoaching process:

Tuesday, December 4 at 5 p.m. PST
Friday, December 7 at 12 Noon PST

Complete information on the two groups is available here:

Group Telecoaching Info

Lisa is especially good at being practical and specific with her suggestions. The first week of the curriculum is on "getting real about time and space."




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Gutsy

This weekend my husband and I went home to my mother's for Thanksgiving. She had recently been diagnosed with shingles, which ranges from quite painful to excruciating.

She'd decided the best approach to having this (and it can last either a few weeks or as long as the rest of your life)was to take the medicine, delay her planned foreign travel, and otherwise ignore it. So she went on with her usual in-town engagements: parties, concerts, church, soup kitchen, duplicate bridge, house guests, groceries, hauling the trash to the curb, etc.

She's 85. One of my sisters-in-law says she has "mental discipline." I think she's gutsy.




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Cause of Recent Bad Mood Discovered

Well, it turns out that sipping sweet tea (caffeinated) from fast-food establishments from early morning until late night is not good for the mental health.

The amount of tea had sort of crept up on me. I did know that I was buying it by the gallon.

It took a doctor to tell me that caffeine is a depressant and undoes the good that serotonin-encouraging drugs do.

By the gallon!!!

And so on Tuesday I went off the stuff. I cut down to a modest cup of home-brew in the mornings...and no more. Practically cold turkey--in keeping with the holiday.

The transition hasn't been as bad as I'd expected: I wake up with a headache, take a couple of Tylenol and then in twenty minutes I'm okay. At some point, the headaches will likely stop.

In the meantime I've discovered faintly-flavored water. Pas si mal, as the French say. Not so bad.

And I'm relieved to discover the ridiculously simple cause of the blues that kept threatening to recur.



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Sexiest Deep Thinker

Here's a bit of wisdom from a quite unexpected source: People magazine's Sexiest Man Alive issue.

Actor Wentworth Miller (Prison Break) wins the title of Sexiest Deep Thinker with his answer to the question: how would you title the movie of your life?

He would call it Increments. That's the word his father said to him each morning as he left for school. What that meant was that every test, paper, and dab of homework is part of "the final grade."

I don't like to think that I'm working for a grade; in fact, I want to eradicate that thought. But I do know what he means in another sense: all the little bits are part of the outcome.

It's the same idea that the world's funniest writing writer Anne Lamott expressed in Bird by Bird: you can only take on the project of documenting a jillion birds by dealing with them one at the time, "bird by bird."





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Guilt-free Thanks

My Thanksgiving thought: Do something WONDERFULLY DIFFERENT this holiday.

So I ask myself what that will be for me....And after much pondering conclude: I will HARBOR NO GUILT this Thanksgiving for any of the gifts/advantages that have come to me.

In fact that's probably a prerequisite for experiencing gratitude.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all.




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Comedy Therapy

Another good idea floated in for dealing with the frustrations and lows that seem awfully common in our line of work:

"I do comedy therapy. I spend a lot of time, an hour here or there,
watching something like the Our Gang/Little Rascals comedies or Leave it
to Beaver or Andy Griffith. I do this for several days in a row. It can
work magic."





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Writing on the Side

I just shipped off a small essay I wrote last week when I was on vacation. I hit the Send button with such satisfaction. It was an absolute pleasure to write.

I don't always find writing an absolute pleasure.

What was distinctly different this time was that I was under NO PRESSURE from myself or anyone else. I was doing it as play, because I had something very particular to say, and to divert myself from the remainder of my now-famous bad mood.

The feeling of satisfaction reminded me of something I once heard from a devoted outdoorsman. At the end of a day of hiking, he loved to take off his backpack and go for a walk.

Now I know what he meant. It's doing the thing you love, unburdened and fresh once again. It's re-energizing.







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The Small-Dog Solution

Having a book in progress is like having a cat purring in your lap-- that thought came to me while writing the previous post, and it stayed in my mind.

Then this weekend, I discovered that sitting with an actual miniature dachsund named Moonshine in my lap was even better than having a metaphor in mind.

Several people have recently suggested time with an animal as an antidote for a sinking spell. I hadn't actually planned to try that one, since I do it every day already. My husband has a sheepdog (a Bouvier) and a mastiff-like dog who outweighs me (a Kangal) and I spend a fair amount of time reading and patting.

I now also see the delight in lapdogs (the sensible non-nervous type). Moonshine sat in my lap for hours at a friend's beach house this weekend. The experience was amazingly soothing. After a while I asked her "human companion" novelist/memoirist Lucy Daniels if she ever wrote with Moonshine in her lap. She does it a lot, I learned.

I can see writing while holding a little dog as a great way to avoid getting myself tied up in a knot, or swearing at the computer, or a number of other characteristic pitfalls. For some reason, sitting with that little warm dozing creature was entrancing. A deep trance is good for novels and pretty much everything else.

Thank you, Moonshine!






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An Inspiring Example

Thursday night I attended a reading by novelist Angela Davis-Gardner in honor of the re-release of her two first novels, one of them published 25 years ago.

Angela is a tremendously talented writer. And she has gone through the usual struggles getting her work into print.

And now she has been hit by "literary lightning." Not only did she get a contract for her newest, Plum Wine, (now out in paperback) but she received, all in one swoop, republication deals with major publishers for her first two novels, and a contract for a fourth (due in January.)

Now the struggle is simply to write fiction on deadline, rather than the more typical efforts of writers.

Her work deserves this attention. These are wonderful books. (The other two titles are Felice and Forms of Shelter.)

And I love this story of finding the pot of gold. It can happen.






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Working on Vacation

In spite of my avowed two-week vacation, I slid back into writing yesterday. I was indulging myself, since I was feeling pretty low; it seemed to be the only thing I wanted to do.

Five hours later, much restored, I found that I had a draft of a little essay about the day I met Benazir Bhutto in a drugstore in a Raleigh shopping center. Working on that story, I had no sense that time had passed. I was feeling like my regular self again.

A person can't write ALL the time, though. I'd like to think it was possible to pause.

I once knew a very successful writer who didn't pause. Just before she finished one book, she started the next, then finished the first one, then went back to the second. That way she always had a story in progress, a cat purring in her lap.

I don't think that's entirely healthy. But I understand the impulse. And she did get a lot done.






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More Ways to Fight Depression

This is a compilation of additional ideas people have contributed for pulling up out of a sudden bad case of the blues. THANK YOU so much for sending them.

I found the one about singing an improvised opera version of my problems to be a real howl. Irresistibly funny and mood-improving.

This is Part II of the list. And I welcome more ideas. I'll happily post a Part III. Note: exercise is the one most often mentioned.

*Spend some time with a dog, cat, or horse. Or taking care of an animal. Mucking out stalls gets excellent reviews.
*Ask someone who sincerely admires you to say nice things to you.
*Mentally plan a trip.
*Take a trip.
*Stand in the sun for ten minutes.
*Do some tai chi.
*Make small decisions, in order to give yourself a renewed sense of control. (I like that a lot.)
*Have some favorite comfort/perk-up books, (David Sedaris?), or cheering music (Lightnin' Hopkins?) ever ready for these occasions.
*Sit outside. Or walk.
*Wallow in misery for a preset limited time.
*Drink two big glasses of water.
*List ten things you're happy about or that you love.
*Do a Mona Lisa smile, which will kick off some happy chemicals, whether you mean the smile or not. Even holding a pencil in your mouth, crossways, can do that, just by pushing back the lips into a smile-like position.
*Lower your expectations.

I'm feeling much better. I hope things are good with you.






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Writing Withdrawal

More on the subject of fast slides into depression. Mine, reported below yesterday, came on Night 5 of a much-needed vacation. It's better today and, full disclosure: probably the main reason is an adjustment in the medication I take for my touch of obsessive-compulsive disorder, no doubt mixed with some tendency to the blues.

With that said, other things are also helping. And other causes besides my chemistry are at fault. 1.Doing without the outlet of writing and producing (other than these daily posts) is also much to blame. As is 2.some business tension. 3.The freeing up of time by not working creates a space for all kinds of things to arise and unfold.

I've pulled together A LIST OF TACTICS for dealing with these times that right many of us go through. These come from my experience and observation, the helpful replies yesterday from Billie and Debra, my doctor, my psychologist-husband, and my reading. ("All the king's horses and all the king's men.")

The List:

*Read Dr. Seuss's My Many-Colored Days
*Do some small helpful thing for someone. See The Healing Power of Doing Good.
*Go to a movie.
*Vent to a friend.
*Hang out with a friend.
*Avoid delicate transactions.
*Exercise.
*Eat chocolate (unless this will lead to a binge and feeling worse.)
*Sit it out.
*Consider the possibility that useful creative stuff is stirring; jot down any little epiphanies...or big ones.
*Remind yourself that the mood will pass.
*Do a relaxation exercise.
*Cut yourself some slack.
*Ask someone to do some small immediate favor for you.
*Do some reckless art...without regard to result.
*Cry.
*Spread mulch.
*Make love.
*Don't chop wood or vegetables.
*Make something (a cake mix? string Christmas tree beads?) This one comes from Julia Cameron of The Artist's Way)
*Organize one drawer of stuff.
*Read an utterly absorbing novel.
*Clean one dirty object.
*Do some never-see-the-light writing or drawing.
*Avoid alcohol and any personal-danger behaviors.
*Delay decisions, if possible.
*Call your doc.
*Take a nap.

WHAT I DID, in addition to more meds, is:
*complain to friends, including my husband and my doctor,
*go to see George Clooney in Michael Clayton
*get deeply involved in someone else's novel (Michael Ondaatje's)
*write blog posts
*jot down my little epiphanies, including this charming bit of distorted thinking:
when I feel bad, I'm a shameful failure, because if I'd played my cards right in life I'd have no reason to feel bad.

Probably it's good I uncovered that little doozie. Since it doesn't quite hold up in light of consciousness. That discovery alone may have been worth the trip. In any event, Humpty Dumpty is, for the moment, pretty much together again.

I welcome any other ideas you could add to the LIFT-DEPRESSION TACTICS lIST. Thanks.





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Bad Mood

What constitutes boldly living one's best life on a day when one is in a very, very bad mood?

I would love to hear what your strategy is for such times.

I am indeed in a bad mood. And since I'm on a stay-home-and-read vacation, I have lots of should-be-attractive possibilities open to me and no work to either burden or distract me.

What's clear to me is that I should avoid any negotiations or conflicts while I'm feeling this way. Not schedule any conversations that require tact and a good view of human nature.

Exercise would probably help. (Skipping?) Don't know that I'm willing to force myself to do it.

Writing this helps. But writing is my work; and so this is again just falling back on my old stand-by.

I could sit it out. See what bubbles up in my mind.

Well, I'm open to suggestions that could benefit all of us.




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Skipping

Remember skipping? Not as in cutting classes or turning past the boring parts of some books. I mean the thing you probably used to do on sidewalks.

I haven't done it in some time and haven't missed it at all.

Turning through a Positive Thinking magazine from the summer, I came across a profile of a woman, Kim Corbin, who started skipping one night with friends and decided then and there to start a national skipping movement. "'As adults, we're conditioned to conform and worry about what other people will think....When you skip, you get in touch with the side of yourself that doesn't care about all that."

Twelve years later she still skips daily, and as Head Skipper organizes several large skipping events a year.













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Decompression Update

On the 5th day of my suddenly declared reading vacation, things are going well. You might think: of course they are!

But that's not to be taken for granted. I'm probably rather hooked on work. So this sudden cold turkey--being away from it for 13 days--is for me what a silent meditation retreat or a fast might be for someone else. All kinds of things can come up.

So far they're mostly good. The reading experience is excellent. I stayed up until 3 last night finishing Marisha Pessl's novel, Special Topics in Calamity Physics. I'd have stayed up until light if necessary. Wow, what suspense! It got more intense all the way.

And then I've also felt a touch of guilt or two...at the very idea of such leisure. I'm getting over that. This morning I declared self-flagellation to be a sin, and one to be avoided at all costs. Framing it that way may well take care of the matter.

Next novel in my pile is Ondaatje's Anil's Ghost. Will report.






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The Sartorialist

If you have any interest in clothes and personal appearance as a form of self-expression, do go to The Sartorialist and check out the imaginative outfits on design-conscious people from Manhattan to Kowloon. It's a nice break from the verbal arts--and a 5 minute rejuicer of the imagination.

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Asking

A friend of mine with a demanding and highly creative job was just assigned by his boss to increase his output by an additional half.


But a fifty percent increase in salary was not part of the deal.


So this highly creative staffer asked for an extra week of vacation a year. The word's out on whether he'll get that.


It sure wouldn't happen if the guy hadn't asked.


This is a reminder, too, that even if an art buyer doesn't have a lot of money, there are lots of valuable and appropriate ways to get paid.



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Fear of Success

A writer friend once told me about a "fear of success" dream she'd had: of finding herself perched on a tall free-standing column, with a space no wider than a medium tree stump to stand on, and nothing to hold on to.

As I think back on it, I'm not sure that wasn't my dream. It's so vivid to me. If it wasn't mine, then I do know I reported one much like it in that same conversation.

I haven't had such a dream in a very long time. But almost all of us do wrestle with some sense of the discomfort of feeling exposed.

Here's an image to counter that fear: this serene and well-balanced heron, photographed by Mark LeGwin at Atlantic, NC. The bird is perfectly comfortable and at home on top of the column--and probably has the genial company of other birds on other pilings nearby. If that heron can do it, so can we.

My Current Test of Courage

I'm out of the office until Nov. 20. (But I will keep blogging.)

Being self-employed, I've always had a hard time taking time away. Just last week, I took a day and a half off, but then it occured to me that I'd taken 2.5 days of vacation since last Christmas. And that's just enough to feel the fatigue.

I've been working for this company of mine for 35 years. Probably if some wiser boss were in charge, I'd have weeks and weeks of vacation each year. Not just hours and hours.

In my work with other writers, I regularly talk about the importance of time away from work. And then ignore my own advice.

So here I go: away from my desk, with no speaking engagement or assignment. It's surprisingly scary. I'll steady myself by keeping on with the daily blogging.

A Home-Made Cruise Ship

Two fine bits of inspiration arrived in my e-mail yesterday: a home-made cruise ship and Goethe's timeless encouragement to "...Begin."

My brother Harry, a devoted boater, sent me the link to the amazing ship and its creator, Francois Zanella, a Frenchman whose day job was as a mineworker.

The subject line of the email was "along comes a hero." This man's devotion to his work of art is indeed heroic: he spent 25,000 hours on this project. This amounts to 8.6 years of 40 hour workweeks with no vacations or holidays. You don't have to build boats to appreciate this kind of dedication.

Please go to see this gorgeous piece of work. It can put a still-unrevised manuscript into perspective.

You'll note that the artist is portrayed in his captain's hat. My hat's off to this captain.


And from Mamie Potter, who shot the close-up a few posts ago of the red shoes, comes this quote from Goethe:

"Whatever you would do, or dream of doing, begin it! Boldness has power, genius, and magic in it. Begin it now."

Begin...and remember that Captain Zanella is now sailing around the world on his ship.

The Fishbowl of Creativity

A study at Brandeis led by Whitney Ruscio observed 150 students working on art projects and concluded:

creative success typically comes from real interest, curiousity, and pleasure in the activity.

Working simply to complete an assignment more often results in quantity over quality.

Negative self-doubting thoughts inhibit the process.

Some useful predictors of a good outcome include attention to some aspects of the project, such as planning; the sense of playfulness in the artist's approach; moments of excited surprise; and changes in direction of thinking.

These findings are summarized in a review at www.creativeintensive.org.

The conclusions are certainly a strong argument--if one were actually needed--to stick with the sometimes weird projects that draw our passion, even if others try to discourage us.

Ask For What You Want

The results cited here teach a useful lesson for life in the writing business and other art commerce, and for men as well as women.

"According to one university study, male assertiveness may be the real reason why men are paid higher salaries. That same study shows that when women are assertive, especially when negotiating starting salaries, her wages earned fall more in line with her male counterparts – definitely a positive characteristic. Linda Babcock, economics professor and former acting dean at Carnegie Mellon University's H. John Heinz III School of Public Policy and Management, found that of the nearly 900 CMU master’s degree graduates they surveyed, the average salary difference between males and females was about $4,000. Of those questioned, 57 percent of the men had negotiated for a higher starting salary when interviewing for their first job, compared to only 7 percent of the women. When the women negotiated for higher pay, ironically their average salaries came to about $4,000 a year more then their initial offer."

The article quoted is at emeraldcoast.com from Fort Walton Beach, Florida. See Babcock and Sara Laschever's Women Don't Ask for more encouragement and info. The same day I saw this piece online I raced to my nearest independent bookstore and bought a copy of this book. I'm halfway through it. It's terrifically useful and eye-opening. (And I'd thought my eyes were already open.) More on this to come.

Artist Types

A paper on measuring creativity by researchers at Arizona State cites Understanding Those Who Create by Jane Piirto in describing different personality traits predominating in different kinds of art. I'd never before seen a distinction made by field.

"Artists tend to be more impulsive and spontaneous than other creative people; writers tend to be more nonconforming than other types; architects tend to be less flexible than others; musicians are more introverted than others; and inventors and creative engineers tend to be more well adjusted on the whole than other types."

Agree? Disagree? Resist the whole notion of predominant types? What do you think?

Kelley's Trash Angels

Kelley Harrell is the source of the stories I've linked to recently on encounters in other realms. Here's a bit of her wisdom on better dealing with our interior realms. (Perhaps this might help me with the reflexive feistiness I was afflicted with in the Kneejerk Argument thread.)

"I've recently had the opportunity to make the acquaintance of Trash Angels. I'm not sure what else to call them exactly, but they are indeed angelic beings who are adept at taking out our trash. One of the more amazing kernels of truth available to us now is that we don't have to do everything by ourselves, even the grunt work of releasing outdated patterns, thoughts, beliefs, relationships. I've found of late that there are beings who are just waiting for the opportunity to do work in this realm, and they can only do it by invitation. So the next time you feel a self-limiting pattern in your life, give the Trash Angels permission to take it, telling them that it's no longer functional, and take it they will. If you feel the pattern creeping into your consciousness again, no bother. Give them permission to take that bit, as well! We do so often forget the support the Universe provides us, but memorable as working with Trash Angels is, the profound shifts they bring are lasting."

Isn't that a lovely strategy for getting clear? For more, visit Kelley's newsletter regularly.

Kneejerk Argument

The opposite of being awake and present in my life is falling back into the same old arguments.

I just took part in a minor verbal skirmish in my writing group. My friend Christina, the other actively religious person in the group, and I got into a polite but insistent conversation about how much of the belief of the Gnostics was based on doctrine and how much on the experience of the believer.

Now, that's likely to be a large yawn for most readers.

Not for Christina and me. We marshalled our facts and a hefty dictionary, and neither of us budged in our position.

It ended fine, with both of us where we began. We moved on to tea at the neighborhood Whole Foods, and to subjects of more general interest.

But now I'm annoyed with myself for heating up the burners under that subject once again.

I do know what it's about: I have a still-belligerent preference for personal experience over received wisdom. Which is to say that I fall into the category of "cain't tell that girl nuthin'." Or want to, anyway.

Apparently I'd also like to believe that others in history have felt the same way.

I'm fine with that. What bugs me is the feeling I got during the conversation that I was starting to behave in a preset manner, that I'd yielded in-the-moment responsiveness to a pointless old routine.

I find it damned hard to stop that reflexive feistiness once it starts, and it's such a waste of steam.

The Invisible Door

Here's a Halloween question that emerged in a previous thread:

How does one "keep the door open" to the psychic or supernatural events? Or keep it shut?

And a similar one:

How does a writer keep the door open to material from the unconscious? And the furthest reaches of the imagination?

I'd love to hear any thoughts you have, any practices that help you.

Fantastical Worlds

I just received a gallery show email announcement from my office partner Carrie Knowles about the show that is going up in the rooms around me. I have the pleasure of sharing space with an artist/writer/gallerist, and I found this description of the art show inspiring in itself. Of course, you're also invited to come should you be in the Raleigh area.

"Coming the First Friday of November
At The Free Range Studio and Gallery
Australian Artist: Diana Maloney

Fantastical Journeys


Come take a journey through the slightly ironic dream life of Diana Maloney who creates an alternative universe through her paintings, drawings, and etchings where naked mariachi bands serenade you, faeries confound you with their presence and their magic, and the role of women in society gets a fresh take.


Diana is a dynamic emerging artistic presence in Australia and her work has begun to garner a great deal of attention as it challenges our senses and explores her own sense of confinement and freedom in the world.


Her work focuses on surreal dreamlike imagery laced with wit and whimsy that shifts between worlds of the real and the unreal. Her subject matter draws on an imperfect, out-of-proportion, half-remembered playground of her childhood. She uses the female form to express symbolic, literal, allegorical and spiritual associations.


As she says of her work: “I create a fantastic and ambiguous world in my work with reference to the role of women in society.”


From her miniature paintings to her large-scale works on paper and canvas, Diana is an important new feminine voice in art.


Opening reception on November 2, 2007 from 6pm-10pm. Fantastical Journeys will be at the Free Range Studio through the end of December.The Free Range Studio and Gallery is at 410 Morson Street in downtown Raleigh. Morson is a one block street between Bloodworth and East and runs parallel to New Bern and Hargett.The Free Range Studio and Gallery is open on First Fridays and by appointment: 821-3478."

Courage in Shadowy Places

In honor of the Halloween season, here's the second spooky story from shaman and author Kelley Harrell about one of her psychic experiences.


Whether you're a believer or not, I think you'll agree that what she did in this moment required enormous courage.


(I'll be at the beach Monday and therefore silent on the blog front. Back on Tuesday.)

Festival of Thinkers

My elder stepson Chuck has just arrived in Abu Dhabi to teach English. This is a place I've known little about--and my research has unveiled for me a dazzling city. The investment in some startling architecture is the strongest first impression. After that, I came to a second surprise. Last week, Abu Dhabi hosted a Festival of Thinkers.

I'd never heard of such a thing--and I really like the idea. Those in attendance included at least one Nobel laureate, a well-known Indian artist who is now in his nineties, the first woman from east or central Africa to receive a doctorate, and an American magazine editorial director sometimes known as "the queen of the tabloids.

I don't know what global problems were solved during the few days of the event, but I'll bet some new ideas hatched and some minds were expanded.

In addition to the homesite, there's a visually stunning photo-report on Abu Dhabi and its thinking festival on New York Social Diary.

The Charisma Tape

Last night in my mailbox was the tape from somewhere in the UK by the Confidence Club on "Physical Presence."

This is the one I reported ordering to help me develop some Bill Clinton-level charisma. So of course I broke into it first thing.

It's a hypnotic induction, therefore I listened in headphones, lying on the floor with my eyes covered. Total attention, insofar as I can manage that.

The assignment is to listen two or three times a week for a month. Here's my response on my initial run: First, it's an excellent relaxation induction. I zoned out pretty quickly. Became altogether still.

After the tone-setting came the material to establish what I think of as a powerful calm. The image that I remember--and I know there's some material I don't recall--was of a majestic tree on a hill that has seen a lot of human problems come and go. The listener practices being the tree, deeply rooted and weathering everything. Good image, I think.

Also--just now when I went to the website to get the link, it reminded me of a piece that had drifted from my consciousness: the part about posture and bearing. I don't remember exactly what was said, but that can be a good sign.

My take at this point: this has a lot of potential. Maybe to help me stop fiddling with this and that while I talk.

I'm going to be interested in what my husband Bob thinks of it. He's a clinical psychologist and last night was busy prepping for a seminar he's giving today on, as it happens, self-hypnosis.

Primitive Fears and Courage

The Halloween time of year brings is a reminder of our old fears of the dark and the unknown and eerie and otherworldly.

In honor of the season this year, my friend Kelley Harrell at Soulintent Arts, is telling of some of her own experiences of the supra-normal.

I find Story One thrilling.

A Boldness Totem

In response to my earlier post about my new archetypal red shoes, writer Mamie Potter sent this photo she took of a pair worn by a guest at her daughter's art show.

The same glorious shoes (almost.)

Red shoes happen to be a hot style item at the moment, but I have a feeling they're going to be a spicy part of my life for a long time after the fashion is over.

Does anyone else have a Boldness Totem?

I had one in the first grade: a starched cotton dress, blue as the Caribbean with white smocking that my grandmother added. It was my lucky dress. I don't think I've had such an item of lucky clothing since. But I do now.

California Fire

Folks, the news of the California fires is very bad. Debra Whaley who often comments on this site lives in one of the fire areas. I haven't heard whether she has had to be evacuated. Please do say a prayer for all the people there.