Bloom Where You Land

This little rock garden plant emerged between the front steps of my office building and has been blooming cheerily for about a week. Everyone is careful to step over it.

This is a good demonstration of the crack/flaw in an object being part of its charm. Remember the story of the cracked pot and "do your thing" whether you're perfect or not.

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Do What You Love

Dropping by my local library a week ago, I looked around toward the desk to say "hi" to my favorite librarian. I didn't see her and figured it wasn't her Sunday to work.

A few more steps and I came upon a picture of her, surrounded by fresh camellias from someone's yard. Joyce. That's the only name I knew her by. She'd died two days earlier, suddenly of a stroke at the age of 58.

Since then I've learned that she -- Joyce Bingham -- was a lot of people's favorite librarian. Many people looked around to say hello when they came in the door. Now there are notes around her picture acknowledging that: "...I never even knew your name..."

The obit in the News & Observer said she had lived a "vagabond life" settling finally here in Apex, North Carolina. Her philosophy: "Do what you love, Love what you do! Bloom where you are planted!" She certainly bloomed at the Eva Perry library.

Notice of the memorial service requested: "To reflect Joyce's spreading of sunshine to all who knew her, the family requests no black attire."

Do what you love, Love what you do. And don't delay getting around to it.

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Gutsy Obama

However you feel about the healthcare reform bill passed this week(and I'm heartily in favor), it's surely clear that Obama is a president who has stuck his neck out. Who bet the farm. Who put his eggs in one basket. And any of the other cliches that stand for high-risk persistence over a long haul in the face of stubborn obstacles.

And he succeeded.

Obama was my candidate. And, though I don't agree with everything he has done (the war business), I'm immensely proud of him. Especially for the courageous and pragmatic way he has pursued this legislation.

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Plastic Highways

Just ran across this item about repairing roads with garbage in Saathee, which is a magazine for Indians living in the Carolinas.

It doesn't sound as if the idea is entirely worked out. However, this is the kind of thinking we all need to be doing: using one problem as the solution to another problem, thus solving both. That's bold.

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Attention: Raleigh Writers and Other Creative Types

One of the five offices in the charming 1910 Raleigh house where I work has been transformed. The room or half the room can be rented by the week or the month, by a writer or anyone else needing a place to work quietly within a small creative community. Above you see Desk One in the room now referred to as A Room of One's Own, with a nod toward Virginia Woolf. Below are Desk Two and the central conference area, all beautifully appointed and awaiting the grace of your presence.





Currently the downstairs of the house is occupied by owner Carrie Knowles, writer and visual artist and US director of the Cross Currents Chamber Music Arts Festival. She has an office, a studio, and, in the large foyer, a gallery. Then there's me, my office for writing, reading manuscripts, and meeting with writer clients.

Upstairs, Lisa Finaldi, national campaigns director for Greenpeace, has her headquarters. Greenpeace is the environmental outfit best known for defending whales against whaling ships on the high seas.

Right now, a memoirist and novelist is at work in A Room of One's Own, but space will be coming available again.

In addition to the inspiring and interesting company in this edge-of-downtown Raleigh building, there's a kitchen with a microwave and fridge, a small lovely garden and deck in the back, a big front porch, a bathroom with a clawfoot tub, a security system, and safe street parking.

You can rent a desk for $50 a week, and keep quiet so the renter of the other desk stays happy. Or you can rent the whole room for $100 a week and talk on your cell to your heart's content. Or you and a friend or colleague can share the office. Utilities are included in the price.

It's a good place to get a lot done: finish your novel, meet a tough deadline, get your dissertation wrapped up, start a consulting business.

Here are a few more visuals of life here. And if you're interested in more info or taking a look, contact Carrie Knowles at: cjknowles@earthlink.net.

The July crepe myrtles at the curb out front:

Carrie setting up a show in the gallery:


Our creed, posted in the foyer. And that's my office at the end of the hall:

Again, for more info, contact Carrie Knowles at: cjknowles@earthlink.net.

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Making Good on Old Promises

A couple of times, in answer to requests, I've promised pictures that I didn't immediately deliver.

I guess I should say I'm making semi-good on the promises, since I've come up with only picture in each category.

This first one is a piece of the road from where I live toward the first stretch of pavement. It's the downhill-and-around-a-pond route I said I didn't care to drive when the ruts had turned to ice: see, "The Driving Decision."


This second is from Rancho La Puerta spa in Tecate, Mexico, where I taught a writing class over Thanksgiving week (that's how long I've dragged in getting to this.) This is a walkway through the grape arbor toward one of the gyms. Rancho often shows that things don't have to look the way they usually do. The gym has stained glass doors and a fireplace with a piece of mosaic art inlaid in the stone wall above it. See: "Spa Teaching."




To me there's always something bold and adventurous about a path or a road.

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A Blogging Drought?

I seem to have fallen off quite a lot in my frequency of posting. Partly because I'm so busy. And also I haven't had sufficient impulse. It's easy to get out of the habit.

Not sure whether to let the rate sag until I feel like boldly opining more. Or to keep myself cranked up and pontificating daily as has so long been my custom.

I could flip a coin daily, and then whichever came up, I'd (characteristically) do the opposite.

Maybe, boldly, I won't ponder too hard about this. Over-pondering seems to be a favorite sport of the non-bold.

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A Short Week with a Long To-Do List

Almost finished cramming five days of work into four. Such are the perils of taking time off. Seems that I don't plan and schedule in a very self-protective way.

I've never thought of planning as a bold activity. Quite the reverse. But I'm starting to see that it could be. It would involve my taking a much more clear-eyed look at what I do and when and for how much. And how much time I spend taking a break and cruising Gawker.com and similar venues. Clear-eyed can lead to all kinds of worrisome questions.

(This is so short it could be a Facebook update. Apparently my style has been affected by the social media.)

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"You Rock"

Here's a most inspiring post from uber-blogger Seth Godin. It's similar to the change-by-making-a-series-of-tiny-changes approach of kaizen posted about here earlier.

Godin's idea is to be amazingly bold and excellent for a mere five minutes a day. To do that much can rock the world.

I agree with him on all except his last line. See what you think and let us know.

Note: I've been absent from posting for a couple of weeks. Now getting back in the saddle. I took a week of stay-cation: time off at home reading and puttering. Also took a wonderful drawing class. And of course I worked like a maniac in advance and immediately after in order to have time to do this. Thus the alarming absence of my posts... Thanks for noticing.


Note 2: I just noticed that I posted about kaizen this past January and three years ago and thought the concept was new to me both times. Well, I suppose that gives me double the pleasure of discovery.

Finally, welcome to Calin as a regular subscriber here.

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Public Speaking!

Y'all, I have always loved giving talks.

What I mean by a talk is standing up and telling 30 minutes of war stories, plus reading a few pages from one of my novels and then taking questions.

What's not to love about doing that?

This morning, however, I went to a session at a Duke alum seminar weekend ("Money, Sex, and Power") on giving more powerful presentations. I was one of the four who volunteered to give a talk and then get a critique in front of the sixty others in the group.

Oh, shit, I was terrible!

(I'm going to recover from this. I really, really am. I've just left that auditorium and come straight here to the library to blog about this experience.)

It was bold! I'll give myself that much credit. The three who went before me performed quite creditably.

The assignment was not to offer amiable personal anecdotes, but instead to make a three-minute presentation with a beginning, middle, and an end. I've done that only once since high school and I had a teleprompter then.

I won't bore you with details of how my effort this morning was a mess. Except to say that temperamentally, I'm a novelist. I communicate in units of 100,000 words, with lengthy flashbacks. Just believe me... (And it got worse as I realized how badly it was going. Perhaps from people's expressions of faint puzzlement and alarm.)

Now, here's the good news. I learned a lot. The teacher -- Joy Javits -- was terrific. She managed to say some nice things that I actually believed. I wound up feeling comfortable and redoing some parts in front of the group, using Joy's suggestions.

And I left with one tip that I know will stick with me: don't just skim my eyes across the whole audience, instead make lingering eye contact with one person after another.

Now, here's the clinker. I have a mid-day talk scheduled for Monday, at Edenton Street Methodist Church in Raleigh. My plan has been my usual rather informal chat. That's likely what I'll do, as usual. It goes over well. (In 39 years of giving little chats, it has gone over horribly only once --at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan--and semi-badly only twice, both in my hometown at UNCW where my father was a trustee. Thirty-nine years! Hear that, Joy? )

However, I may well pursue with Joy this business of learning to give a short pitch that's to the point. I need this skill so that I'll be prepared should I ever get an Oscar.

And now that I've told you all this, I feel much better. Really rather good, in fact. I couldn't immediately get my soothing and encouraging psychologist husband Bob on the phone to debrief, and turned next to you.

I'll let you know how the Monday talk goes.

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Hacked! And Inspired!

Someone sent 2,096 of my friends and colleagues an email Friday trying to sell electronics devices. If the message made it past your spam filter, sorry for the intrusion.

I discovered this state of affairs tonight--didn't pay much attention to my email over the weekend.

But I stayed unusually cool...all on account of an inspiring manuscript I'm reading. A young writer to whom I provided only the slightest bit of help sent me her completed novel asking if I'd consider writing a blurb for her brand-new agent to send out with the manuscript.

First, it was exciting to see what she'd done. Then I spent most of the day reading it: and the book so inspired me. The story, a whimsical delightful romantic fable, put me in the mood to relish the minor difficulties of life as part of the big game.

I'm not always inclined to take that attitude. The last time I played a driveway game of pickup basketball, some decades ago, I got irritated because people kept waving their hands in my face.

Today's delightful reading reminded me that the waving hands and other obstructions are part of what makes the game.

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Pulitzer for The National Enquirer?

The long-scorned tabloid, The National Enquirer, is reportedly in the running for a Pulitzer prize. The Pulitzer folks have allowed them into the race, submitting the stories that broke the John Edwards story. (This news was broken by the Huffington Post and then reported in The New York Times, and of course The Enquirer.)

The Enquirer deserves to win, and not just because it's thrilling to see an underdog rise to fame. They did an extraordinary job of reporting and I'm glad to see prejudices and outdated images of the publication give way to recognizing this excellent newspaper work.

Bold updated admission of my own: I have a glance at the Enquirer website most every day I'm at a computer.

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"Presto Book-O"

Steve Almond, the guy who wrote Candyfreak (and how could a true candy freak be anything but virtuous and wholesome?), has an interesting piece on The Rumpus about self-publishing a book of one-page pieces that he couldn't rouse a lot of industry interest in.

What he's doing is mainly selling it through his readings,making it a rare and thus-to-be-cherished item.

It's not my ambition to proceed this way, and it's not his only outlet. He has a book coming out through Random House. Nonetheless, I like his innovation and his cheeky style and wish him well with This Won't Take But a Minute, Honey.

Thanks to Mary Moore for the heads-up on this. I welcome stories of inspiring boldness, in small matters and large -- please let me know when you have one to pass on.

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Il Fuoco Nelle Vene

Flipping through an old Allure magazine a few nights ago (I'm into Old Allure), I came across a breakout quote that seized my attention: "...il fuoco nelle vene....) which means "fire in the veins" and refers to living with passion.

The story was about the style of Italian women, at least some of the more flamboyant ones. The writer adopted that style and found it liberating and pretty thrilling to be mistaken as Italian.

I found interesting the responses of a few other online personalities to this quote:

It's Q's World says the phrase is "... an Italian expression for women carrying on in an over the top way (more referring to a Gaudy look, obvious makeup, extra jewelry buxom big hair , and I truly I do feel I'm living like that, well that and my Tits Out, big Heels, lots of gloss and eyebrows and legs out approach to life, with Fire in the Veins, is what the Italos call it, I need more eyeliner in my life to finish pulling the look But I'm almost there!"

Fuck Yeah, Tattoos!: shows the phrase wrapping in elegant cursive around a bare midriff.

Actor-singer Demi Lovato on CelebrityTweet: "So, blood is fire pulsing through our veins.. We're either writers or fools behind the reigns..."

Erin Ashley has posted a painting of hers on the theme: "The Italians have a name for their rapturous approach to life: Fuoco nelle vene."

One blogger admired the philosophy and its "rupturous approach to life."

I have a more subdued approach myself, not so rupturous as some of these. Even so, the fire-in-the-veins image and the very sound of the Italian phrase feels pleasingly intoxicating.

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A Daring Writer Reads in Raleigh

At the admirable Quail Ridge Books at 7:30 tomorrow (Thursday) night, Joe Ashby Porter will read from his new book of short stories, All Aboard.

A Shakespeare scholar and teacher of creative writing at Duke University, Porter has earned many awards for his work, including an Academy Award from the Academy of Arts and Literature, with the commendation: "No writer of his gifted generation has shown greater daring or has earned higher praise."

And from the Quail Ridge description of All Aboard: "Porter ventures into new, sometimes unprecedented territory, from the luxe restraint of 'Merrymount,' through the stops-out eroticism of 'Pending,' to the distilled heebie-jeebies of 'Dream On.' Here, reading, travel, and sexual orientation (and disorientation) loom larger than before in Porter, and the dialogue gives new play for what Harry Mathews has called Porter's 'golden ear.'"

Do come if you're in the neighborhood.

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A Magic Cottage in a Coastal Village

My inventive and creative brother Franc Payne has taken a little old house on Core Sound, behind the North Carolina Outer Banks, and turned it into a magic cottage with big screened porches. He did it himself on weekends over a couple of years.


















It's delightful (I painted a couple of doors myself) and situated in the town of Atlantic, which is a village a lot like Ocracoke was many years ago.

Should you be in the market for a magic cottage in a coastal village, this one's for sale at $189,000. Contact: Franc.Payne@ForTheBestRate.com





Even the facilities are charmant.

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Behind the Refrigerator

An event high on my scale of domestic boldness: this afternoon Husband Bob and I moved our fridge and cleaned the coils in the back in the hopes that this will take care of a popsicle crisis.

I am devoted to consuming coconut popsicles (up to three a day) of the Whole Foods house brand called 365. Lately these personally important items have been getting melty in our freezer.

Before tackling the fridge coils, I tried a different experiment. Two weeks ago, when there was snow here, I buried a popsicle in snow. My fallacious logic was that the snow was frozen and would therefore refreeze the popsicle into a solid item.

Not so. What I dug up was a sack of unappetizing milky liquid.

So I did some Internet research and learned that the problem might be dusty coils. For a person who doesn't dust things that are in easy reach, this is large.

Also, we live in a semi-old log house with two mastiffs. The layers of dust on the floor behind the fridge had to be scraped loose with a sharp object.

I'm eager to see if this cleaning thing works. Will report. If it does, it could encourage further domestic boldness.

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The Bad News, The Good News

A radically mixed day: two pieces of bad news and one piece of good news. All coming from different directions and none of them my story to tell. The bad news is about friends' very difficult situations.

So I have today the challenge of holding hot and cold in my hand at the same time. Dealing with each requires different strategies.

In practice, this adds up to flicking back and forth, back and forth, in my attention.

It also adds up to: very preoccupied. Tried to drive to the Post Office and passed it twice before I remembered to turn in. Keep staring at my laptop and waiting for it to do things I haven't told it to do.

I have to say that sadness is getting a whole lot more time. That and a feel of dislocation: shiftings just beneath the earth's crust.

I guess my plan is to keep on with the back-and-forth -- let it have its way -- and drive carefully.

--and then, of course, I googled and found an idea worth considering. I didn't agree with everything in this health blog post, but I did like the idea of focusing on feelings of love for all concerned.



If you like this post, please bookmark it on del.icio.us, share it on StumbleUpon, vote for it on Digg. Thanks so much.

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Wisdom from Mystic Pizza

As I've often mentioned here, I have a K&W cafeteria lunch once a month with half a dozen people with metaphysical interests: Mystic Pizza.

Today was the day and here's the report from the lunchtime mystics (three of whom are pictured below.)
*Instead of flight or fight in a moment of confrontation, try gently shifting your weight from side to side. One could consider this dodging. But in fact it's just giving yourself a bit of room and activity other than darting away or getting in someone's face.
*Things work out better if you let people do you favors and you pick up some of their slack. (Some of the assembled have a hard time with this in practice.)
*Tiny little barely-conscious thoughts can cause our intended actions to get hung up. Invite the thoughts to show themselves.
*Stay fluid.

Sounds more like a self-improvement, how-to-live group, I know. But the discussions included much about the mysteries of energy.

Mystics here with me at this shot at the K&W. Thomas Griggs, a leadership consultant, and Rolfer Marsha Presnell-Jennette. Photo by author, shaman, and computer person, Kelley Harrell.

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All Us Chickens

Just came from the final celebration of my 61st Jubilee. It was the winter-quarter birthday brunch of six buddies who have been celebrating our aging since most of us were in our twenties.

One gift I received was particularly bold and imaginative: fresh eggs from Stephanie's chickens. She keeps them in her mid-town backyard, as pets. I like that.

After all, where is it written that we should be limited to cats and dogs and ferrets and iguanas as animal companions?

She did have to re-home a rooster after it took to waking central Raleigh far too early. But otherwise, she's found them very good company, clucking and burbling and strutting around.

I learned this morning a few things about chicken care: mainly that it's important this time of year to make sure that they're combs don't get cold; they're prone to frostbite.

I'm tempted to knit a few hen hats for the next round of birthdays. But that might be sliding past bold to eccentric. Can't have that.

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The Fine Example of Lord Keillor of Wobegon

Last night Husband Bob and I went to see a live TV showing of Prairie Home Companion at a local movie theatre: a perfect celebration of Bob's 68th birthday yesterday.

It was sublimely good and completely heart-warming: a winning combo that Garrison Keillor produces weekly without fail.

Here's why I mention him again on a blog broadly devoted to boldness and marching to your own drummer, artistic and otherwise. GK has made an immense success and ongoing contribution based on an idea that at first probably didn't sound like a sure-fire national hit. Think about it: a two hour radio show about an imaginary Minnesota town, two cowboys, a lovelorn private eye, ketchup, duct tape, and hopeful gospel music. A show based on one sorta odd guy being relentlessly himself. I'd hate to have to pitch it in a meeting.

And I'm continuously inspired as well as delighted by both the show and the example.

Encore performance of the HDTV showing: Feb. 9 at a theatre reasonably near you.

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Dabbling in Retail

Recently I decided to sell some clothes on consignment. In the past I've taken my physically or emotionally outgrown items to the Goodwill. This new possibility felt to me a small enticing adventure. I grew up in the midst of the clothing business. My parents owned stores in Wilmington, NC. And I feel I know a tiny bit about merchandising.

Well, dammit. Neither consignment store I tried wanted a single piece. One place said that my items were "too matoo-ah." The girl there pointed out that their target audience is high school girls. It is true that I'm 61, but my husband thinks I dress like a high school girl.

So I went to a consignment store for classic clothes, thinking surely they'd like my tastefully mature collection. There, I was given no reason for the total rejection, and didn't ask for one. Apparently I'm neither a high school girl nor a classic.

Next stop is either the back door loading dock of the Goodwill-- or Sotheby's. I'll show 'em.

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The Driving Decision

Still snowy here in the unaccustomed South, and we each have to make the decision about when it's safe to drive. It varies, of course, with the vehicle and the address.

To get from my house to a paved and cleared road, requires covering the long downhill curving driveway with woods on either side, followed by a hard right onto a second dirt road. Should one slide straight across this fork while trying to turn, one enters the woods airborne and enjoys a three to four foot drop when a tree finally intervenes.

The second dirt road leads across a curving dam with a pond on one side and drop-with-creek-and-woods-at-the-bottom on the other.

Next is the winding uphill for another half mile, followed by a turn onto a paved-but-not-scraped lane, and then a three mile paved-but-not-scraped country highway.

I've never gotten around to getting a four-wheel drive -- it freezes here so rarely -- so it's just me and the dainty floral Carmella Camry making this trip. I take a fairly conservative approach. Not what anyone would call bold.

As usual, I consider this minor matter a metaphor for larger decisions. At what point, does cabin fever trump risk? When do the risks outweigh the gains? Well, it's almost never clear. So we just decide and act and, ideally, don't look back.

It's the hidden boldness of daily life, these little decisions.

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My Snow Experiment

We have the rare pleasure here of snow these last few days. It was two and a half days before I could get from our house on a hilly dirt road through woods to the main road. So I've had a cosy few days, with a little cross-country skiing, up until the bindings broke on one of my 20 year old skis.

Seeking other ways to play in the snow, I hit upon my experiment. I decided to do the garden fertilizing I'd neglected to do in October, figuring that the slow melt of the snow would remove any need to water.

This isn't the right time of year, and some of this fertilizer is the weekly type, some the acid type, and some is the kind that burns if it isn't watered enough.

We'll see how it goes in the spring, if I remember what I put where. This is what I mean when I say in my website bio that I'm a slapdash gardener. Given my approach, I think it's bold of me to keep at it at all.

But I've always felt that anything worth doing was worth doing badly. Otherwise, how would we ever get started at anything new?

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The Kaizen Way

This afternoon I heard for the first time about how a Japanese business management technique can be usefully adapted to making positive changes in one's life.

Like lightning, I rushed to Google this new word: kaizen.

The basic idea, as explained in One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way by Robert Maurer, is to make improvements in such tiny increments that resistance doesn't bother to kick in.

I love this idea. It could explain the ancient puzzle described by Paul in Romans 7:19 "the good I would do, I do not." I've never understood why it was often difficult and sometimes apparently impossible for me to do the "good I would do."

If I make too large a resolution, fight or flight kicks in and wins. Nothing changes.

Here's the story of a man who tried this approach and found it gradually and easily quite successful: How to Overcome Hesitation, Fear, and Laziness to Achieve Your Goals.

I have had an idea that the minimal approach works with writing: I'm ever suggesting to clients and workshop participants that they make a commitment of, say, 5 minutes a day. Nobody fights writing for 5 minutes, and once you've begun you tend to keep going on a lot of days. And even doing things 5 minutes at a time, they eventually get done.

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Before There Was AVATAR

If you're needing an inspiring role model, read the Wired Magazine career history of Avatar director James Cameron. What a combo of persistence, courage, and inventiveness! But to make that feel real and encouraging, I always need to know the details.

Thirty-three years ago, he was a young truck driver who went to see Star Wars and came out angry that he hadn't made the movie. So he raised $20,000 from some dentists to make a sci-fi short, that then led him to the next step...and some of the steps from there to Terminator to Titanic to Avatar have not been so easy.

I'm impressed that he didn't let his imagination shut down when immense amounts of money were riding on a project and things weren't going well. That's some grace under pressure.

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Self-Defeating Thoughts 4

Okay, it's Monday at the office, time: 7:36 p.m. I haven't had a self-defeating thought all day. Not one.

Maybe it's not just work that keeps them at bay. Maybe it's concentration, a strong focus.

But I can't be this focused all the time. Obviously I need a leisure time strategy as well. Will ponder this. Am open to ideas that might be of use to me and other readers.

I do know that substituting a positive thought works some of the time. Maybe that practice could take hold and start to happen automatically.

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How to Save the World

Turning through an old issue of Metropolis magazine -- "Architecture*Culture*Design-- last night, I came across an interview with a wise furniture designer, Bertjan Pot. He said this:

"I think the best thing you can give to the world is the thing you do best. And if that is making pretty tables, then let it be pretty tables."


And welcome to new regular here, Ketchup.

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Self Defeating Thoughts 3

It's the first weekend since I've been writing down self-defeating thoughts--as a way to get rid of them. This process of "therapeutic homework" continues to be an education.

Obviously, I don't have a big enough sample to claim I've discovered a pattern. But I do notice that I've written down many more of them today Saturday --and it's only 4 o'clock--than in several weekdays combined. What's different: I'm not at work today. I'm guessing that without the tight focus of work my mind can stir up more trouble. (And I just recently ran across the term "leisure illness," referring to getting headaches, colds, etc., on taking time off.)

What also interests me is the fact that I'm having a good day. If I weren't keeping tabs, I'd barely have registered most of the bits of self-sabotage. But I suspect that they have a cumulative effect anyway.

Another finding that surprises me: these thoughts are very diverse. Ranging from telling myself that I won't get a grant I've applied for, to remembering saying the wrong thing to someone about 15 years ago, to grandiose expectations of myself and what I should be doing. Also, a couple of times I've imagined someone doing something to make me mad, and then had an imaginary argument about it, the entire scenario a fabrication. I have to ask myself why I would take the trouble to manufacture that last one.

Just had another S.D. Thought--"What am I doing blogging about my mental health when I should be helping Haitians?"

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Self-Defeating Thoughts 2

Yesterday I mentioned that I had begun writing down my self-defeating thoughts and finding that the process of watching for them seemed to make them occur a great deal less-- in fact, hardly at all.

Important addendum: this morning I worked steadily through my forty-some e-mails with no procrastinating at all about the more complicated ones. This is seriously unusual. I think there's a connection.

My psychologist husband suggested to me a while back that I write down my obsessive thoughts. My reaction: omigod, I'd be doing nothing but writing repeating thoughts. I didn't even try it. Clearly, I should have.

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Self-Defeating Thoughts

Tuesday morning my shrink suggested I write down any self-defeating thoughts I have in the course of the day. I can't honestly say that I've had any since then. That's three days without. I'm impressed. Who knew a cure could be so easy? Try it. And, if you will, share how it works for you.

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Rethinking the Concept of "Being Chicken"

Consider the lovely South African guinea hen. Here's a bird that's actually used as a "watchdog" on farms.

Not that she's fierce. Instead she has a lot to say. She's so attentive and ready to give voice that she can alert a farmer to any little disruption in the night. And warn off an intruder.

Why does this come to mind? My office partner and pal Carrie Knowles made this watercolor monoprint a few months ago while working at The Artists' Press in Mpumalanga, South Africa. (She was in the country advising on strategies for supporting local artists and developing the economic impact of the arts.)

This print is one piece in a show Carrie has just hung at Raleigh restaurant Zely & Ritz. You're invited to the opening on Saturday January 30, from 4 to 6, should you happen to be in this part of the US at that time. Or for more info on Carrie's work, guinea hens or otherwise, she welcomes your questions at cjknowles@earthlink.net.

I intend to remember this bird, even after the print has moved on. If I ever have the self-defeating thought that I'm too chicken to do what I want, I'm going to remind myself that some chickens rule and they don't have to become bears or lions to do it. Don't let anybody tell you otherwise.

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Meditation in Motion

At Saturday's workshop, we spent a little time on the use of simple physical jobs as a form of meditation to improve our writing. As in: do a little writing, do a little laundry or sweeping or sorting, then write some more. Once we've cranked up the writing, then the rumination continues, in a more relaxed and less conscious and more wide-reaching way, while we're doing the housekeeping task.

To demonstrate, I brought along several pounds of bright plastic beads of dozens of different colors and shapes. I ladled out a couple of good handfuls to each participant and asked them to sort for a while and then go back to their writing. It's amazing how a "mindless" meditative interlude stirs the imagination and problem-solving abilities of someone who has already fed in the basic facts.

I used to do a fair amount of advertising copywriting. For a while, I felt that I was so-so just-adequate at it. Then I started meditating, and I got to be pretty good.

What I'd do is read the material on the product or service, then meditate for half an hour with a mental focus that didn't allow me to cogitate on the ad job. Often a headline or two for an ad would pop into my head just as I ended my meditation. And even if it didn't, I came back to the work more relaxed.

One of the writers at the workshop said that she keeps a huge jigsaw puzzle going in the room where she works. Now and then she'll loosen up her mind again with a puzzle break, which I think is a wonderful and pleasant strategy.



In other news, here's a good quote, passed on from Mamie of Can I Do It?:

Most obstacles melt away when we make up our minds to walk boldly through them.
- Orison Swett Marden


And welcome to Alexandre Ferrari.

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A Writing Schedule

Oh, shucks. I thought I was about to shut down and go home for the day and then I realized: not yet.

Saturday at the workshop I taught, I asked participants to devise and make a commitment to a realistic "sustainable" schedule for doing their own writing.

At the same time, I silently made a new commitment to my own. I vowed I would do some work on my own writing (in addition to critiquing manuscripts, meeting with writer-clients) on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. At least.

Here it is Monday, at 6:31 and I haven't yet done it.

So...reckon I'll get to it now.

Care to make such a commitment yourself? Or report on how yours is working out?

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A Morning with the Ganges

It's Saturday morning and I'm in the midst of leading a workshop called Get Your Ganges On. We're now spending about 15 minutes writing, so this space is where I've turned. The point of the class is to help people draw on their most powerful inner resources in doing their work.

I'm finding it exciting. As always, the teacher has to relearn. And this is a very interesting group. I've heard a couple of new ideas, new work strategies, I want to take home with me.

The exercise we're now doing (or the others are, anyway) is about how each one views their invisible partner in writing, whether it's called God or the unconscious or Higher Power or something else.

I believe in God and what I see is a river: thus the Ganges in the title. This class is sponsored by the Resource Center for Women and Ministry in the South. And there's a fire in the fireplace behind me. I'm going to be interested in what the other folks here have to say.

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Getting Focused

I keep ducking out of the task before me today to cruise celebrity gossip web sites. Partly because I've worked too much lately and partly because of the disaster in Haiti.

Here's the Haiti connection: when something huge is going on, it feels wrong not to be somehow involved in the moment. It reminds me of the feeling I had once in the early 70s when I was working as a reporter for the local afternoon paper, The Raleigh Times. Some big local story broke; I have a vague memory of a hijacking attempt at the airport. I was working on another story and wasn't shifted to the big news of the day. In the newsroom I was surrounded by people madly working at deadline on this one overwhelming event. It made what I was doing feel trivial, or disrespectful, or just beside the point.

Curiously the opposite was true during the 9/11 morning. I was creating a set of book club questions about themes in my novel Sister India. I learned that one tower had gone down. Then I went back to work. Somehow the impulse to find a TV to watch felt like prurient interest. (It somehow didn't occur to me that another building might fall. I foolishly optimistically assumed it was over.)

In any case, the fact that my novel was about Hindu-Muslim clashes in an Indian holy city made what I was doing feel intensely relevant.

I have no such feeling about my schedule for today and any connection with the collapsed city of Port-au-Prince. And I'm distracted.

The bold thing -- the right thing -- is to send money, say a prayer, and go back to doing the stuff that is mine to do. Certainly my dawdling at Page Six Celebrity Gossip isn't going to help anything.

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Help Haiti

Prayers for Haiti and... here's a good annotated Guide to Haiti Relief Funds


Welcome to doni_ione, carmen_tourney2, ktr2, and jsuddath.

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Bold Image

On weekday mornings, I pass this building, Unity Church of the Triangle, on the way to my office at the edge of downtown Raleigh, NC.

Every time I see it, I'm affected: by the sharp edges of the white against the sky. It seems to make the sky bluer (and I didn't fool with the color on this photo at all.) I think of it as emboldening, and am happy that it greets me on my route.

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Bold in the Face of Gossip?

A very juicy account of our most recent presidential campaign is released today: Game Change by New York magazine writer John Heilemann and Mark Halperin of Time magazine.

I've only read an excerpt and I won't burden you here with the scorching details, but the intimate material about one failed candidate's family life was pretty stunning.

I started to think about how I'd deal with such a public onslaught. I can well imagine I'd find it devastating. A lot would depend of course on whether what's said is true. But it could be pretty rough either way.

I wondered how people go on, what the principles are for self-management and care in such a situation. I found a bit of good advice on: "How Do You Deal with Gossip that Damages Your Reputation?"


"How do you deal with the gossip? That's simple - you don't. Not at least, as far as defending yourself, against those who are gossiping.

Hold your head high. Live by example and allow the gossip that tarnished your reputation, die a natural death. You don't have to defend yourself or your tattered reputation. Just let it be. Those that know you, won't believe the gossip. Those that do, have issues bigger than yours.

Gossipers can be insidious people and they can become a victim of other gossipers themselves. Gossipers feed on gossip. Today you are the talk of the town - next week it will be somebody else's turn."

I'm quite the gossiper myself these days (whereas as a teenager I was quite high-minded). I don't like the idea of the gossiped-about individuals suffering. But I do love to read scurrilous bits of news.

I thought about this matter back during the Watergate days: how would those implicated face the rest of their lives? Well, they turned out to be amazingly resilient. Getting religion seemed to help a lot. And writing memoirs. And in the case of Bill Clinton, going on heading the ship of state.

If you have other good strategies, I'd be interested in knowing. My next novel--which will someday emerge--is a trifle shocking.

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Wading Through Mud Today

I've noticed that there's a rhythm to my productivity and my get-up-and-go. Mud-wading periods are followed by flying-faster-than-light periods when most things are easy. The mud periods inevitably feel to me like a failure of nerve: as if timidity were slowing me down. This may not be true at all; it may be just a cycle, like waking and sleeping.

Today I was having my monthly cafeteria lunch with four mystic-philosophers I know (the group I refer to as Mystic Pizza). One of these wise individuals said that her theme for the year was Confronting the Resistance.

The idea of The Resistance comes from the excellentWar of Art book/CDs by Steven Pressfield. The Resistance is the great invisible force that can get between any of us and the good that we intend to do.

My friend's resolve/theme isn't to beat the Resistance every time. Instead it's to recognize when she's justifying not doing the right thing and instead make a conscious decision about which way to go.

For example, she finds herself saying: I'll go to the Y and work out after I finish this Sudoku. But she knows that what she needs is exercise and not more mental games. Her resolve is to simply acknowledge that exercise is the right decision and decide yes or no. I'll do the right thing and get moving. Or, I'm going to sit here and do this puzzle because I want to.

Her idea is to acknowledge when she's using gradual procrastinating rationalizations and instead admit that she's making a choice, on the probably correct theory that this awareness will lead to making good decisions more often.

I think she's on to a good plan. Maybe I should decide to wade through mud for the rest of the afternoon--doing easy things slowly. It would at least be better than brow-beating myself. (If I had a resolution for this New Year, it would be no berating myself.)

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Losing Mum and Pup: A Brave Book

In the last 24 hours, I've read Christopher Buckley's memoir, Losing Mum and Pup, about the deaths of his parents William and Pat Buckley.

William F. Buckley Jr., as you know doubt know, was the conservative who used big words on Firing Line and wrote several dozen books and created National Review. I long admired his intelligence and style and wit and devotion to his faith, though I disagreed with him politically almost entirely. I've tended to refer to any thoughtful conservative as Buckleyesque.

Son Christopher, himself the author of 14 books, is a writer I'd seen interviewed by Jon Stewart and knew as the author of Thank You for Smoking (saw the movie) but had never read until now. I'm soon to read the rest of him.

His memoir about the loss of his parents--his mother Pat Buckley as interesting a character as his famous father--is as loving as a story can be, though it has been criticized for how much it reveals. It is also as funny a book as I've ever read. It feels tremendously honest.

This is not a full-blown review; I'm not going back through the book finding examples to quote to prove my points. I simply want to congratulate Christopher Buckley on his courage and balance, and to say to anyone who may have so far missed the book: Read It. I'll think of him whenever, in my work, I fear I'm losing my nerve.

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Eating Dessert Instead

"Eat Dessert First" is a classic bit of tongue-in-cheek advice. I've arrived at a guilt-free variation on this for special days: skipping boring proteins, etc., and going straight for a dessert that I've long eyed.

Last night (to review: it was my 61st b'day) for dinner, I ate Oh, My God, Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie at Daniels Restaurant in Apex, NC, where I live. I've eaten there a number of times--but after a platter of pasta, peanut butter pie seems drastically unwise.

I can now happily report: this particular delectable is an excellent celebration. And I'm thrilled with my new manner of celebrating. (26th anniversary in December was Chocolate Chip Cookie Molten Cake at Chili's)



Welcome to: You Like and Qalinx.

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