writing life – Page 2

“That’s Delicious”, and Other Advice From My Grandmother

February 7, 2019 By Catherine McKenzie 16 Comments

My Grandmother, Dorothy, turned 103 last week. No, that’s not a typo. She was born in 1916 in Lethbridge, Alberta. She grew up in a middle-class family with one brother. She graduated high school and worked at Sears. My grandfather asked her to a dance when she was sixteen and he was fourteen (cheeky bugger!) and she said yes. They married after seven years of dating on November 11, 1940. He died four years ago, at the age of 97, in the year when they would have celebrated their 75^th wedding anniversary. They were together for more than 80 years. Everyone, including my doctor, told me that she would likely be dead in six months, their lives so intertwined that she literally could not go on with out him. And yet… here she still is.

I often get asked what the secret to her success is. My cheeky answer? Cocktails. But there’s some truth to that. I went to see her in October. It might be morbid, but at that age, it feels like every visit that I have with her will be the last. She keeps mostly to her bed, sleeping a lot, but when she’s awake, she enjoys watching the golf on TV (or any sports really) and she is always awake for her 4 PM cocktail. We chatted for a bit and she asked me about my life. She talked about how lucky she was to be able to be in her own house (with help) and to have people come visit her. Right on schedule at 4, her helper brought her her rum and ginger ale (it used to be coke, not sure how the change happened). She lifted her glass, took a sip, and said “That’s delicious!”

And there it was folks, the epiphany. The secret to how she’s lived this long, the reason she’s outlasted my grandfather etc: she is still able to find joy in simple things, including a drink she’s had every day for most of her adult life.

Imagine if we all approached life this way? [Read more…]

The Ordinary World: How Much and How Ordinary?

February 6, 2019 By Donald Maass 46 Comments

Even if you are not familiar with The Hero’s Journey, there’s a good chance you know that its first step is establishing the Ordinary World. That, commonly understood, is a baseline view of a protagonist’s life and location.

Establishing the Ordinary World is like playing the first chord in a musical composition: It’s the safe and satisfying sound to which we will long to return during the many variations to come. Until we know a protagonist’s “normal” we won’t know what order needs to be restored. We’ll lack the heart and home anchors that make a protagonist both relatable and motivated. We won’t meet the people who need to be protected and saved. A protagonist without an Ordinary World will be a hero without a cause, and so we need to spend some time there.

That, anyway, is the common idea; however, that idea is limited if not wrong. In too many manuscripts it leads to early pages laden with the domestic clatter of the daily routine. Characters do what they’d do on any ordinary day followed shortly, or so the theory goes, by an interruption that brings the first hint of trouble.

Even stories that begin with trouble—a dead body, say, or a special -ops mission—can retreat quickly to a “normal” atmosphere and tempo, as when a detective in Chapter Two goes home for a shower, or the team returns to base to debrief. Getting to know protagonists is important, obviously, but pouring cereal or joshing around do not automatically produce tension. In my experience, they almost never produce tension at all.

My colleague and friend Chris Vogler in The Writer’s Journey, his distillation and interpretation of mythologist Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces for writers, elaborates on the utility and purpose of the Ordinary World. Chris explains that the purpose of the Ordinary World is multi-fold. It can create a metaphor for the story world and its problems. It can set a story’s context, which is to say the framework for coming conflict. The Ordinary World can feel tame compared to the Special World later on, but the seemingly tranquil base can nevertheless contain the seeds of trouble. The hero’s problems do not begin elsewhere; they are already present at home. Pretty obvious when you think about it.

The Ordinary World phase of a novel can also foreshadow the Special World and raise the story’s dramatic questions. Heroes makes entrances, certainly, yet they can also sweep in along with them all of their baggage and hang-ups. We want to like heroes, unquestionably, but there is also no reason that heroes’ lacks, flaws, needs, wants, wounds, burdens or yearnings need to wait. The story’s stakes and theme are likewise in the air already. How could they not be? Stakes are always present and any issue worth writing about is already with us now.

Thus, the seemingly placid surface of the Ordinary World is deceptive. The Ordinary World is anything but settled and safe. Dangerous currents exist in the water close to shore. Any life that appears serene is actually loaded with suppressed conflict. A routine that feels comfortable and easy is in reality a situation in which a protagonist’s weakness is only temporarily tolerated. Heroes are not yet heroic at home, and if we look closely that is immediately obvious. Heroes have growing to do. They need to be tested. All of that is made plain in the Ordinary World.

Look at in that way, the Ordinary World doesn’t seem so ordinary, does it? Let’s take a look at some Ordinary Worlds already on the shelves.

S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders (1967) opens with Ponyboy telling us about his world; in particular, the distinction between his social class and another: [Read more…]

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A Writer’s Manifesto

February 4, 2019 By Julie Duffy 22 Comments

We’re happy to announce that longtime friend of the WU community, Julie Duffy, will join WU as a regular contributor! Julie hosts the StoryADay May and StoryADay September short story writing challenges on her website, StoryADay.org.

Learn more about Julie on her website, and by following her on Facebook and Twitter.

A Writer’s Manifesto

Imagine sitting down at your desk to write on a day when you’re just not feeling it.

You know you have to write this scene, or reach a certain word count, and it just feels like a grind. You light a candle, or sharpen your pencils, and begin to type, hoping to find that ‘flow’ eventually by dint of sheer will.

Now imagine sitting down at that same desk with those same goals.

You pick up a single sheet of paper and read it. Suddenly, you remember your purpose as a writer: why you wanted to do this, what you hope to achieve. You see the touchstones that shape and define your voice. You have a vision of your current project as one drop in the river that is your writing life, all of which is changing the world in a particular way. You remember what, at your best, you wanted that change to look like.

A little tingle of excitement begins to build. And you begin to type.

What was on that piece of paper?! And how can you get one?

Read on!

MANIFESTO OR GOALS?

A few months ago, I realized my writing journey had become like a clifftop walk where I was only looking at my own two feet and completely missing the amazing view all around me.

I lifted my head up and decided it was time to look beyond the next goal, the next deadline, and create a manifesto for my whole writing life.

That manifesto has helped motivate, target, and unify all my writing efforts, from the articles I pitch to the individual scenes I write. I helps me get excited about where I’m going, but also about where I am.

I’d like to help you create your manifesto, too.

WHAT IS A WRITER’S MANIFESTO?

A writer’s manifesto is a highly personal document that,

Is about your identity as a writer.
Gives you a unified sense of what you want to achieve in all your writing.
Transcends genres and projects.
Is more motivating than individual goals.

Here’s mine:

In my work and my life I will be

OPENHEARTED

OPTIMISTIC

Always looking for the HUMOR, even when it is dark.

SKEPTICAL, but not cynical.

FORGIVING of my work’s flaws.

PROLIFIC and POSITIVE and always producing the next thing.

Committed to the CRAFT (read lots, analyze and share, put into practice)

Committed to the COMMUNITY (past, present and future. Part of a lineage.)

UPLIFTING (this doesn’t mean Pollyanna-is. Remember my mentors.)

A BELIEVER that ART MATTERS.

I create worlds I want to live in, and inspire others to do the same (not just on the page).

Dated & Signed

Some of that won’t mean much to you, because it is so personal to me. In fact, it may make you cringe. Yours will likely look much different, and it should.

But looking that list, I remember the process of selecting each of those values and statements, and it takes me back to a moment when I was my best self. That’s what you should be aiming for, too.

HOW MY MANIFESTO HELPED ME WRITE A SINGLE SCENE

I had goals for my recent novel: I was to write a particular scene by the end of the week.

Only I couldn’t make myself do it.

My scene dealt with important issues and the mood of the piece kept skewing somber. I was depressing myself (and, I assume, my reader) and I kept stalling.

When I pulled out my manifesto the first three qualities were: ‘open-hearted’, ‘optimistic’, and ‘always looking for the humor’. My manifesto reminded me that, for me, art is a way to create the kind of world I want to live in. And that world is not somber.

No wonder I was stalling when I was trying to write a ‘serious’ scene. That realization gave me permission to write the scene in a much lighter way, which broke my block entirely.

For you, remembering your manifesto might give you permission to go deep, to make readers cry, or to scare the pants off them.

Or it might remind you that you have no patience for wasted time, so why are you trudging though this scene, trying to describe everything from the lighting to the drapes, instead of getting your character to the fight scene?

Likewise, when I pitch articles to magazines and blogs, or brainstorm podcast topics, my manifesto helps narrow down the topic areas and the tone each piece will take. It helps me focus on the work I love.

HOW TO CREATE YOUR MANIFESTO [Read more…]

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Vanquish Emotional Overwhelm to Increase Productivity

January 28, 2019 By Kim Bullock 36 Comments

Flickr Creative Commons: in lovely memory

My older daughter is six months shy of being a legal adult. The approach of this milestone has been fraught with anxiety, so I anticipated a rough night before she embarked on a new semester at the local community college. She’s taking an extra class this time. She has a part-time job. She worries about keeping up with it all. What I did not expect was for her to lament that she saw nothing to look forward to in the years to come. Community college will only lead to a regular college, which she is lukewarm about attending. College will only lead to a job she hates.

“What’s the point in any of it?” she asked. “Every adult I know is miserable.”

The weight of her negativity made remaining in her presence physically uncomfortable for this empath, but I couldn’t allow that comment to slide unchallenged. True, her father comes home shell-shocked from work most nights, but he isn’t all adults.

When I balked that I’m not miserable, she bestowed that special expression teenagers reserve for parental observations that conflict with their worldview. “Well, you’re not happy.”

I hadn’t given much thought to the idea of happiness lately, having spent the last four years as an involuntary sponge, absorbing the stress of one family member after another. I’d wring myself out only to fall into another puddle. I self-medicated with almost daily mocha lattes I no longer tasted, let alone savored. On particularly stressful days, I’d add a muffin, too.

I now own fat clothes.

She was right. I wasn’t happy, but what she had not lived long enough to understand is that happiness isn’t something that simply happens. It must be chosen. Every day we get to choose.

She had thrown down a challenge to prove her wrong, to show her another way. This was a wake-up call.

I’m convinced that much of what we call “writer’s block” is a consequence of emotional overwhelm. We are wired to put ourselves into the shoes of others, to share and, let’s be honest, sometimes to exploit their struggles by weaving them into a story. Easy prey to the perils of empathy, we become ensnared in that cycle of absorb/wring out/absorb and forget to allow ourselves to dry off in the sun. We forget to take care of ourselves. We forget to do the things that help us recharge, to pursue joy. Under these circumstances, when we have nothing left to give, is it any wonder our work can suffer, or even stall? [Read more…]

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Mathematical Equations of Perfection in Nature

January 12, 2019 By Kathryn Magendie 8 Comments

Photo Credit: Pictoscribe – Fibonacci Math

Nobody’s perfect, I thought by myself to myself, as I walked my mountain cove one spring morning.

I am measuring me against me. The time of writing consistently and arrogantly and prolifically against the me now who watches her bank account as if it may disappear while sleeping—and it often does, what with auto-pay ripping out its due. There should never be a time in an author’s life when what you loved so fervently and beautifully is placed away on a shelf while Real Life Stuff, like work to pay bills, takes priority. But any sentence that begins with “there should never be a time …” is often an idealistic wishful thought.

There is not a perfection of time, or place, or words, or language, or books, or people.

What’s all this stuff around me? Growth and abundance where just a month before was brown and sticks and sepia tones. Huh.

I inhaled clean mountain air. Alongside the road I walked that morning many wildflowers and wild plants, some unique and rare and beautiful, grow in a seemingly random way. Is it random, though, after all? A daisy caught my eye, then another and another. My eye focused, refocused, honed in. There. The inside of the daisy. That circle. How can it look so perfect yet so random and imperfect?

I asked my dog, who often indulges me. Lil Bear has listened to me spout off about characters and places and things without boredom. Because, my friends, there is really nothing more boring than to hear a writer talk about his or her book. I refuse to do that to anyone, except my dog, or inside my own crowded head. If someone asks, “What is your book about?” I know they really do not want to know more than a sentence or two, perhaps three if I say it really energetically—and if they want more, they’ll ask for more, and really, how often does that happen? haha! So, I asked Bear, “Is there a perfect, absolutely perfect, circle of yellow inside that flower? A perfect so perfect it can be measured mathematically? There is an equation for it. I think I read that somewhere. Or saw it on Nova. Yeah. And it’s called the Fibonacci Sequence or something like that. And it’s all over nature, and art, and music, since time began even, since the big bang, since . . . .”

My dog yawned. Well, there goes my “he’s never bored” statement shot all’a to hell.

I am not a mathematician, and indeed, mathematics puzzles me, frustrates me—always logical, always right, always perfect? I am such a Right-Brainer, if we will speak in stereotypes and clichés, and we do! we will! I imagine the right hemisphere of my brain is swollen and pulsing, the synapses firing off chaotically, but with their own kind of weird organization caused by complete disorganization’s attempts to make sense of it all; however, I imagine my left hemisphere as a bit flat and aloof, sitting stoic at a desk while reading important stuff that it won’t share with the right brain (because the right brain can’t, or won’t, listen).

If I could merge my left and right sides better, as many may be able to do, I could write books with intricate fantastical plots! I could perhaps make the gorgeous black hole in my brain open up the darkness and provide in more detailed logic what hides there. Alas. Dang.

I wonder, if a mathematician were to measure the golden inside of the daisy (and I am certain this has been done, of course!), would it be an absolute circle every single time for every single daisy? The eye finds an imperfectly perfect circle. I need to know, for the eye gauge is not enough, since the brain will imply and waver and be indecisive and wander and wonder and is awfully awesomely fickle at times. Is the soft sun inside of the daisy chaotic and wild or controlled and perfect, or something in between? Who will measure for me and then let me know?

I just have a need to know if there is some order to the daisy that I never noticed before. You see? No? Yes? Are you yawning? I bet you are. Dang. [Read more…]