I've Been Thinking About...A New Series

Introducing a new, occasional, maybe even random, series

True confession, this is not rain in Portland, as you might have guessed, but rain in Montone, Italy, where when they say rain is in the forecast they mean RAIN.

Hello from Portland, where it has just started raining after a long stretch of glorious sunny days. (Although I’ve only been home two weeks, so I’m not sure what the weather was like in September.) It’s warm enough to have the windows open, so I can hear the rhythm of the rain as it ebbs and flows. I love that. It makes me feel safe and cozy. And the older I get, the more I realize how much I appreciate cozy. A warm, dry, home, people I love about, the glow of my dragonfly lamp as I write at my desk. The funny thing is, I love travel adventure, too. But quite possibly I love travel because I have a home I love to return to.

Welcome to a new occasional series. Or maybe I should say a random series because that’s more how my mind works. I like to think it will be weekly, mid-week-ish, but I know better than to promise that because of the nature of what I have planned (and my own fickle brain which likes to rebel against itself).

Anyway, the idea for the series is this. Often, as I go about my business, working with writers and writing myself, I have thoughts about aspects of writing. These thoughts might be something along the lines of:

—For the love of God, please learn how to use the past perfect

—Surprise that accomplished writers still don’t know how to properly notate dialogue

—A new way (to me) to journal

—Surprise that lots of writers have not heard of The Artist’s Way. (Would anybody be interested in a 12-week Artist’s Way class held here on my Substack as part of your paid subscription? I’m thinking about this for January. Let me know.)

—Why morning pages really are the most useful tool for creatives.

—And who knows what else. I make notes as I go along. As I said, it’s meant to be things that occur to me in the day-to-day moments of my writing and teaching life.

Some of these topics deserve long posts but many of them are just shorties. And some of them may turn out to be collections of things on my mind pertaining to writing and creativity, like this particular post I am writing now.

The main thing for this week is about fear

This is not at all the thing I was planning to write about here. But, staying true to the spirit of this new series, it is something I stumbled upon that I think is worth sharing. A quick hit.

colbertlateshow

A post shared by @colbertlateshow

In this clip, Kathy Bates shares a quote from Dune (the book, written by Frank Herbert, to give credit where credit is due) that inspires her to overcome fear every day. And one lovely commenter transcribed it. Here you go:

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

Remember that this week when your brain tells you to mop the kitchen floor instead of writing. Or when your inner critic yelps at you that everything you’ve just put on the page is a piece of crap. And then keep writing.

Two more things:

—I need a name for this series. The title “I’ve been thinking about….” (and then whatever I’ve been thinking about would come after the ellipses) is my working title because that’s what this series is about, topics in writing and creativity that I’ve been thinking about. But, is that an engaging title that is going to cause you to rush to open the post? I think not. Suggestions welcome.

—If you have burning writing questions, throw them at me and I’ll do my best to answer. After I think about them, of course. Haha. You can leave a comment or reply to this email.

Photo by Chris Montgomery on Unsplash, Not one of my zooms. But I do have a mug that looks very similar to the one in the photo.

Okay, one more thing: Zoom Writing

I have come to realize that it is time to tell you all about these sessions that I host again because it’s been awhile. Twice a week, a group of writers come together to write. We meet on Mondays and Thursdays from 3 to 5 PM Pacific time (but there are regular attendees from every time zone in the country). We log on, chat, then turn off our cameras and microphones and go to the page. At 4 (top of the hour) we reconvene to check in, then go write, and repeat at the end of the last hour. A lovely, friendly, community has formed and we all get a lot of writing done. Some guidelines:

—It is not a workshop, or meant to be a generative couple of hours. The time is meant for you to work on your own WIP or whatever project you would like. I don’t give out prompts or writing exercises. We do often talk about writing in our top-of-the-hour chats and if you have questions or concerns you are welcome to bring them up. But the main point is to write.

—There’s no charge for this.

—You can attend whenever you want, as much or as little as you want. You can come late and leave early. The only rules are to be kind and polite to the other writers and, well, write.

—I’m pretty sure there was something else I was going to tell you but now I’ve forgotten. If you have any questions, reply to this email.

—If you want to join us, it’s as simple as replying to this email. I send out an email reminder with the link every Monday and Thursday morning and I’ll get you signed up on that. (The group has become cohesive enough that they continue to meet even when I am off teaching workshops overseas.)

I’d be delighted if you joined us!

That’s it for now. See you on Sunday for another edition of my weekly Love Letter. Oh, wait, one more thing, if you enjoy getting my Substack posts, please hit the like button and/or leave a comment. This helps my post become visible to more readers. Thanks!

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Other places to connect with me:

Buy my books

Instagram

My website (badly in need of an upgrade)

Our workshop website

My original blog (now for archive purposes only, no longer updated)

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Ways I can help you:

Book coaching

Manuscript evaluation

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