The Fundamental Trick of a Writing Career

Underlying most of the decisions I make about my work is this: to what degree will I alter the work I feel called, even created, to do, in order to meet the requirements of the marketplace?

My standard for myself is that, in revising for the market, I figure out how to, at the same time, make the work better overall. I find a way to do what an editor wants (or that I'm guessing an editor wants) that better serves my own purposes as well. And what a wrestle with the work that can be!

On the other hand, if I'd gone farther in the direction of the market in my career so far, more people might well be reading my work. It's very hard to see the line between too much compromise and not enough. By the time we find out, it may be too late. The work is diluted and published, or the work is rejected.

I'm not one who is opposed to revising, to working with an editor. Not at all. I believe in selling, in publishing. Part of the job I feel I've somehow been assigned in life is getting the stories, not only written, but published. So the question rolls on, I've had to resolve it anew with every new project.

I never quit until the work both meets my standards and is published. But damn, it's right wearing sometimes.

At the same time, I'm grateful for my strong clear sense of mission. If I didn't have it, I expect I'd be wrestling with whether I was doing the right work.

"Take each day with no backward look."

That advice -- "Take each day with no backward look." -- just jumped out at me when I went to visit Scott Burkhead's site, Daily Spiritual Guide.

It's from Hazelden's Touchstone Meditation Series. What a VIVID and LIGHT-AS AIR life I'd live if I thoroughly managed to do that!

If one is prone to a bit of scrupulousity--did I say the wrong thing? Did I say the wrong thing that day 18 years ago?--this could be a LIFESAVER. With the aid of meditation, medication, and exercise, I'm about 98% better at that than I used to be.

Taking Charge of My Workday

I'm feeling unusually CLEAR-EYED today, because of an exercise in time-monitoring.

For the next couple of weeks at least, I'm tracking HOW I SPEND MY WORK TIME AS A WRITER and where I spend my money.

It's a trifle irritating to be watching myself so closely. One the other hand, the effort is giving me a POWER RUSH. I feel as if I'm in charge of what I'm doing.

Of course, being self-employed I should feel that way. But often instead, I feel that time has slipped by and I'm not quite sure where. Same with money.

Now I'm watching where they go, with special interest in time, whether any given moment is spent on art, administration, consulting, or promotion of my work.

It makes me feel uncommonly brave simply to be willing to do this. Because I suspect that some days I HIDE OUT by busying myself with administration--tearing the edges off sheets of stamps, etc.

I tried this monitoring once before, very briefly, and it made me much more effective and CONFIDENT. I'm curious to see what fuller information will do.

Visionaries Wanted

Here's a powerful resource for social entrepreneurs. That's you, if you're somebody with an idea or plan to CHANGE THE WORLD.

ECHOING GREEN offers big fellowships to help set world-changing ideas in motion.

I learned of the site through Naomi Wolf's Woodhull Institute newsletter, and found it an inspiring place even to visit.

Visit soon. The next deadline is the end of this month.

Floating Orbs, Synchronicity

I just bought a small piece of grown-up art. It's the one in the lower right hand corner with the red dot on it that means Sold. I was astonished when I saw these pieces because the image of floating orbs of light, central to all of these, is also central to the biography I'm working on, and the novel which will follow.

These prints were made by my friend and office partner Carrie Knowles. I watched her putting up this series for an open-to-the-public show on Sunday, November 19, 1-5 p.m.
A couple of years ago, sitting at lunch chatting with a reiki teacher, I saw a small ball of light rise from the top of her head, zigzag upward, and vanish a few inches from the ceiling. Nothing like that had ever happened to me. And at the same time it felt perfectly ordinary.

But this "ordinary" event was a big deal. (I think I've written about it before on this blog.) It became the seed for a novel I began.

Weeks into the novel, I felt seized by the need to find out more about a painter I'd heard of in my hometown in my youth.

I tend to FOLLOW THESE URGES WHEN THEY COME. So I did a bit of research.

I struck pay dirt on my second or third dig into archives. In an art library at UNC, I found a bit of her journal, in which she'd written a note that people sometimes see a light over her head.

That was my eureka moment. It was clear to me that I had to write both books, and the biography was what I wanted to do first.

When I saw these floating lights go up in the room next door, it was just as obvious that I needed one of them for my room, for a book cover, for a talisman. It felt like a good celebration of the ongoing projects, and of the good results from following mysterious urges.

If you're in Raleigh and loose on November 19, stop by and see this collection. My personal floating orb will be there, with its red dot, through the end of that afternoon.

Yes, You Can!

Around the corner from my office, a church sits up on wood blocks. A bold-thinking downtown developer, Greg Hatem, had it scooped up from its old site and moved to what was a parking lot.

A lot of people might think that a church building stays where it's planted for as long as it exists. And the same with parking lots.

This guy wasn't stopped by that kind of silly assumption. Now he's spiffing the place up to rent, and it's a lovely addition to my leafy old-fashioned neighborhood.

I so admire this move: TO SIMPLY DISCARD THE IDEA THAT SOMETHING CAN'T HAPPEN. The world gets much richer if we step right through the conventional wisdom. In fact, a lot of improbable and amazing things can happen with perseverance, imagination, and looking past the frozen ideas of what's possible.

In it most radical definition, a church embodies a sky's-the-limit view.

Quaker Wisdom from a Catalog

In one of the million catalogs that arrive at my house, often in duplicate, I found a nice bit of wisdom.

Signals sells "gifts that inform, enlighten, and entertain." Among these is a framed print with the Quaker saying:

LET YOUR LIFE SPEAK

The selling copy contains some possible interpretations: "Live authentically. Let others know what matters to you. Embody your truths and values. Follow your vocation." (boldfacing mine)

Nice work, copywriter. It's a rare thing when ad copy enlightens, or re-enlightens.

For many years of my freelance career, I wrote ads and catalogs and brochures, etc. in maybe half of my time. I still take on such jobs occasionally.

But I never have gotten such an inspirational message across. Not even in the sappy inch of copy I wrote for an ad in inflight magazines advertising a teddy bear to take home to the kids. Though writing it managed to bring tears to my eyes.

So now I ask myself: what does "Let Your Life Speak" mean for me today? (Long break for thought.) It means: step lightly, listen to small whispers of impulse and consider following.

What I hear first as I listen: my stomach gurgling. I'm going to run out and get some lunch.

Medical Test Reveals Current Mission in Life

This morning a doctor gave me an all-clear you-are-not-malignant diagnosis.

I didn't really think I would hear anything else. But last week's routine test didn't look right and had to be further investigated. Even though that's very common and usually isn't a problem, still...

The interim of five days allowed me to think things over.

If I had only a short time to live, what I'd say to God is: make it long enough for me to finish this biography of Elisabeth Chant. Because I think it's part of what I'm here for.

So now once again I have "all the time in the world." And it's very clear which item I ought to put at the top of my to-do list every day.

Even a hint of mortality can be very clarifying.

Resting the Brain

This week I had once-every-few-years crash into sleep. This happens when I pass a number of deadlines and I've been working too hard for too long. Then as soon as the last thing in the pile is done, leaving a couple of days with nothing do-- suddenly I'm too tired to remain sitting.

So I slept most of a day and a half. In the brief intervals of being awake I read O Magazine, which I always find encouraging at wobbly times.

Then I got up this morning and came to the office as usual, feeling almost normal, but a bit like I just got a cast taken off of my brain.

Used to be that this happened once a year. Now it's more like once every four or five years. Maybe I'm learning a bit more about balance.

But I'd been overworking since last December. And so...

I'm glad it doesn't happen while I'm still on deadline.

I think it gives my imagination a fresh start.

More on Glastonbury and the Isle of Avalon

More and more, I allow my book research to take me geographically, as well as imaginatively, where I'm yearning to go.

Here are a few more shots from last week's trip to Glastonbury in Somerset, England, in search of my biography subject's story.


The white pigeon (i.e, dove) that landed in the Abbey ruin near the alleged grave of King Arthur (one of my subject's obsessions) is an important mystery visitor in the story that is starting to unfold.

The white specks in the landscape photo below are a flock of doves. The picture is taken from the side of the strange steep hill called Glastonbury Tor, an ancient site for both Christian and Druid pilgrims. If anyone knows which species of white pigeon this is, I'd love to know.

A Writer's Photography

Used to be that I took pictures to illustrate travel stories. For many years, I published in travel sections of newspapers and magazines like Travel & Leisure, some women's magazines, Family Circle, etc. It was never my favorite part of the work. I didn't feel confident that I had what I needed in the can.
Now, working on research for my biography of painter Elisabeth Chant, I'm shooting for documentary purposes, and for descendants of hers who have been helping me track down her story. Plus, of course, these days I can look at the back of the camera and see how the photograph is going to look. I'm still no Brassai, but these will show a bit of where I'm seeking my subject.


The trip was to Somerset in the southwest of England, where Chant spent the first eight years of her life, in the shadow of such sites as Glastonbury and Cadbury Camp, an alleged site of Camelot. She came back to this area in her mid-thirties. Throughout her life, she was much affected -- in fact, formed -- by the history and myth and natural world that surrounded her here.



These are a few of the 298 images I collected. It seemed like a thousand at the time I was shooting. These show:
*The ruin of Glastonbury church. The original rough hut of a Christian church here is alleged to have been the first in Britain and possibly in Christendom, established shortly after the Crucifixion. The ruin in the photo is also held in legend to contain the graves of King Arthur and Guinevere, and has a marked site on the grass within.
*Glastonbury Tor, the steep and weirdly conical hill that is both a Christian and Celtic pilgrimage site. The open arch is the base of the tower at the top of the hill-- what's left of a more than 500 year-old church. Looking through it, as I stood at the top of the Tor was like looking out to sea. There's a semi-straight path up and down the Tor, as in the photo, and a path that winds slowly around the sides, forming a giant labyrinth.

Some have called this spot "the holiest earthe of England."

And then there's the 16th century Mermaid Inn where I stayed for my week of archival research and exploring. Miss Chant continues to lead me to some intriguing places.

Returned from Research Expedition

I got back to NC late last night from the rural southwest peninsula of England, the county of Somerset, where I was chasing the ghost of my biography subject, painter Elisabeth Chant.

I think I did get a glimpse of her.

Very good, and exhausting, trip. I added several pounds of photocopies to my files on Chant's early childhood in the town of Yeovil.

More later when I've unpacked and refocused my brain and eyes.

Research for a Biography

This weekend I head for southwest England to the county of Somerset to do more research on my biography subject, the painter Elisabeth Chant.

"Miss Chant" is how I always think of her; that's what she was always called in my hometown, where she spent the last 25 years of her life.

She was born in a crossroads English village called Holwell, outside the town of Yeovil. I'm spending next week there, looking for descendants and for every physical site and old record or newspaper clip that has to do with her family. I do know that the house her father was born in is still a residence. You can bet I'm going to be knocking on that door.

Though I started life as a newspaper reporter, I'm still fairly new to this kind of research. A few days ago it was terribly daunting. Now it's extremely exciting. I do find, though, that I'm pretty dependent on "the kindness of strangers."

Good-hearted and experienced archivists and genealogists are e-mailing me now with leads and bits of info. Everything that comes in is a fresh treaure.

And soon I will be on the ground in her old town. That's her in the picture, by the way. She died two years before I was born. I'm hoping her spirit is traveling with me on this venture.

Editing Marathon

Just now finished my part of a monster-huge project with a client. Her book is due today. We've passed 31 versions of the manuscript back and forth between us, marked up with red type comments in the last week and a half. We worked all through the weekend. Last night I shut down at a little after 2 a.m. She was on-line to me again at 6-something this morning.

And with all that, it turned out that my computer had suddenly decided not to send the two crucial files back to her on the night before Due Day.

As Harry Belafonte sings, "My Lord! What a Morning."

I got hold of Heidi, my tech advisor, on the phone. She talked me through solving the problem, while -- it sounded like-- she was cooking breakfast. Incredible relief!

Next up: to tend to a couple of other projects and get ready to go to the UK on Sunday to do research on my biography subject, who was born in a 15-house crossroads in the southwestern peninsula of England.

Hypnotic Cues for Creativity

I keep various toys and such around my office to help me ZONE OUT FOR WRITING. Some toys have a relaxing effect in themselves: like a slow-moving mobile, or one of those glass things that you turn over and watch bright-colored goop inside slowly run down to the bottom. It's THE LAVA LAMP PRINCIPLE: you stare and forget other stuff and slow down to the motion of the object. Relaxing.

Other things work to induce a relaxed and focused frame of mind (called TRANCE) not because they're innately hypnotic, but because I associate them with the way I felt the last time I messed with them, and I then start feeling that way again.

For example, a particular piece of music, or the smell of just-watered house plants, used again and again, becomes a cue to go into a particular frame of mind.

The blue image is something I put together just now while playing with some of my office objects. I like to look at it. It's a pale blue marble in a cobalt blue plastic box, shot close-up with flash and with the window light behind it.

I think it would make an interesting cover image for my most-recently completed project, my novel "COBALT BLUE." In the book, cobalt blue refers to the color, a tube of artist's oil paint, and to A MYSTICAL VISION.

If that picture doesn't put me quickly into a productive writing state, I don't know what would. BTW, the way I learned a lot of this stuff is from my psychologist-husband Bob Dick, who uses clinical hypnosis a lot in his practice.

An Adventurous Woman

Recently, and for the first time ever, I read two huge biographies of the same person, back-to-back.

And who was the fascinating subject? Not Benjamin Franklin or Clara Barton or any of those classic worthies.

Instead: Pamela Digby Churchill Hayward Harriman, who was in the league of Cheekiest Women of Our Time.

She married the son of Winston Churchill, and then producer Leland Hayward, and diplomat Averell Harriman, and in the interims was the mistress of some of the richest and most powerful men in Europe.

"Pamela had been in the headlines for some fifty years, nearly always in extreme terms: the dazzling saloniere, the 'international siren,' the homewrecker, the gold digger, the power broker. 'If I had ever gotten bothered about what people thought, I would never have gone anywhere,' she told a reporter for The Washington Post in 1983." From Reflected Glory by Sally Bedell Smith.

According to one of her biographies, the word was that when she needed surgery three different men paid the same tab.

Now, I don't admire that. However -- I do greatly admire that she appeared to live the way she wanted to live and didn't appear to be held back by propriety. She was a 70s girl in a 50s world, and that took a lot of cheek.

She also wound up accomplishing quite a lot, when she went political in her later years. She became a major fundraiser of the Democratic Party, was sometimes referred to as the "doyenne" and "First Lady" of the party. So The Life of the Party by Christopher Ogden has a double meaning. She was "life of the party" in two ways.

As a 70-something she made People magazine's 50 Most Beautiful People List. And she even died with flair: of a stroke in a swimming pool in Paris.

What Writing Type Are You?

What type of writer should you be? This little quiz is a hoot: as much fun as finding out your sleep number or your Myers-Briggs type. It's also flattering. And encouraging.

I took this test and learned I should be a screenwriter. What I write is novels and nonfiction books and articles, and virtually everything but poetry and the city directory. But I've never sold a screenplay (though I have sold screen rights.)

I wouldn't mind a bit getting a story into the theaters.

BTW, I first ran across this item on the site called Mom and Apple Pie: Serving Fresh Poetry. The link's to the left on my blogroll.

Wonder how Henry James would be profiled by this test! Or Don DeLillo.

Horseback Writers, Galloping Creativity

For writers in or near central North Carolina:

Writer and rider Billie Hinton, a wonderful regular commenter on this blog, will be hosting in October an all-day experience using horseback riding to jog loose the creative juices. It's called "CREATING FORWARD MOTION IN YOUR WRITING."

Billie will lead the workshop at her home. "Up to 4 participants will explore forward motion and movement with horses, planned writing breaks, lunch, and guided exercises in the midst of autumn color and hopefully, sunshine!" Email Billie at billie@billiehinton.com for details.

I highly recommend it. BTW, Billie is also a psychotherapist.

The Definition of Courage

Shirin Ebadi, a woman judge in Iran, was demoted to the position of court clerk after the Islamic revolution in that country in 1980. The very thought of such a thing happening makes me feel momentarily blind with fury. Ebadi fought back using her legal skills, and in 2003 received the Nobel Peace Prize.

Last week a reporter for my local Raleigh newspaper interviewed her and asked her this question: "Would you define courage?"

She answered: "Courage means persistence in your belief, that difficulty along the way does not cause you to deviate from your path. It means you will make your best effort for what you believe in."

Succinct. It applies just as well to the long stumbling process of writing.

Ebadi, who has been jailed and gets death threats, has had to put up with a lot worse, though, than uncertainty and rejection and revision. Sunday, two days after that interview was published, she refused a summons from Iran's Revolutionary Court. Her book is Iran Awakening.

Publishing Requirements, Art Trends: How to Hitch a Ride

A large part of success in getting published or in almost any activity is being able to BORROW ENERGY from the great forces. Even when making the most iconoclastic art, it helps to have an awareness of the tides and trends--for making the best choices of allies, venues, timing, and marketing strategies.

Friend, shaman, and author Kelley Harrell gave me this week the startling seasonal wreath you see here, in celebration of our heading toward the cold season. I love it--the drama of it, the mystery, and the gutsy lack of cuteness.

Among other things, this wreath reminds me that, though we're heading for cold, we're now in the harvest season: editors who were at the beach a lot in summer are back in their rolling desk chairs now. It's time to send out the new ideas, harvest results from earlier efforts, and begin a new cycle.

The dark image, with its mirror and cross and feathers and cobwebs, is also for me an image of the meditative moment: when action will come to a dead-halt, before setting forth again in a new revolution.

Until I placed this rather delicate structure where it is, I hadn't realized how my mantel has been working on a theme. At the other end, though I know you can't see clearly, are prints by my artist and office-partner buddy Carrie Knowles. The shorter one is a highly stylized rendering of a greenish-gold sun. The tall one is three pictures: each one of the same wave forming and growing taller. (She made that rising wave while living in Australia, only weeks before the tsunami hit Asia.)

All these images are reminders of the great universe beyond the day's activities. They also manage to remind me that even if my work is new and odd, I can still hitch a ride on the existing power and HELP MY CHANCES FOR SUCCESS BY:
*locating the most sympathetic markets for my style and purposes
*calling people when they're most likely to be in their offices
*finding out the schedule and deadlines for a target magazine's theme issues
*jumping on opportunities wherever they turn up
*not planting flowers in the shade, thinking they'd be so much more comfortable there (as a beginning-gardener friend of mine once did)
*figuring out when to try to ride a big wave and when to run for high ground

May we all have an especially rich harvest this year!