If you’re not disciplined enough, try this approach to writing and creating more easily.
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Creative Accountability Monday
Happy Monday, Creative Dynamos!
Let’s start the week off right, shall we? With a bit of support for our creative challenges, because we’re in this together!
Share in a comment below ONE thing you will do this week in your creative realm. Something that you need a nudge for. Something a bit daunting.
Whether you’re a photographer, painter, sculptor, writer…any kind of artist. I’ll help hold you accountable this week to doing something you really want to do.
For my part, I am committed to return to making regular videos. I want to do this, yet it keeps getting pushed to the back burner. I commit to making and posting a video by this Friday. There. I said it, publicly. GULP!
What one thing will you do? And when you do it, will you return here to add another comment and perhaps a link?
Monday Writing Accountability: What's on Your Writing Agenda This Week?
Monday! Fresh start to a new week. (Rubbing hands together in glee but also, well, it’s cold here in Colorado.)
Tell me, what will you write this week? Perhaps it’s a blog post or an essay. Or maybe that proposal or…the text for your new web site.
Choose the ONE thing that is a bit of a challenge for you. Yes, the thing you are avoiding. Tell us in a comment below what your writing focus for the week will be.
If you like weekly accountability but know that daily support is really what you need, keep reading. I’m offering insanely affordable daily support for writers in February.
[Read more…] about Monday Writing Accountability: What's on Your Writing Agenda This Week?
Writing accountability: What is your creative edge for 2015?
I’m sure you’ve got your word of the year. Goody. It’s nice to have a guiding principle.
Now, what are you going to make happen in 2015?
I’ve seen that we glean the most satisfaction and actualization when we specify a creative edge for the year. When we dedicate ourselves to a very specific phase of the creative process and dig down deep.
Look at the following four creative edges in the writing process below. If you were to focus on one, which would give you the most satisfaction this year? [Read more…] about Writing accountability: What is your creative edge for 2015?
Want to write a book? Answer these questions first
When someone discovers that I help people write books, she usually asks me how to get on track and stay focused until the book is finished.
Before I can respond, I have to ask them some questions. I never want to make assumptions about the author’s motivations.
If you’re considering writing a book, take some time to write your answers to my coaching inquiries. This will help clarify your motivation for any major project. Your answers will help you decide whether you should do it or shelve the idea.
- What’s important for you about finishing this book?
- Who is this book for, specifically?
- What impact do you want this book to have on your readers?
- What impact do you want for you and your work?
- What kind of help do you need now to get started and stay on track?
Self-publish or traditionally publish?
Based on your answers, you can look at the self-publishing possibility. This is a very personal decision and is largely based on whether you have a large enough platform to attract the interest of an agent and publisher. If the word ‘platform’ is not familiar to you, it’s likely self-publishing will be your route.
That’s a generalized statement. Each author has to choose her own path based on her answers to the questions I pose above. I love helping my clients sort out which direction is right for them.
What Helps You Make Your Creative Mark: Interview with Author Eric Maisel
An Interview with Eric Maisel
Eric Maisel is the author of Making Your Creative Mark and twenty other creativity titles including Mastering Creative Anxiety, Brainstorm, and Creativity for Life.
Eric coaches individuals and trains creativity coaches through workshops and keynotes nationally and internationally. Visit him online at http://www.ericmaisel.com.
I’d like to know more about what you call the “freedom key.” What sort of freedom are you talking about?
Many different sorts—let’s look at just one, the freedom not be perfect; or, to put it slightly differently, the freedom to make big mistakes and messes. Not so long ago I got an email from a painter in Rhode Island.
She wrote, “I’m a perfectionist and I want my artwork to be perfect. Sometimes this prevents me from getting started on a new project or from finishing the one I’m currently working on. I think to myself: If it’s not going to be the best, why bother to do it? How do I move past these feelings?”
One way to get out of this trap is to move from a purely intellectual understanding that messes are part of the creative process to a genuine visceral understanding of that truth. You need to feel that freedom in your body. As an intellectual matter, every artist knows that some percentage of her work will prove less than stellar, especially if she is taking risks with subject matter or technique.
But accepting that obvious truth on a feeling level eludes far too many creative and would-be creative people. They want to “perfect” things in their head before turning to the canvas or the computer screen and a result they stay in their head and never get started. You have to feel free to show up and make a big mess—only then will good things start happening!
Another key that interested me is what you call the “relationship key.” What sorts of relationships did you have in mind and what can an artist do to improve his relationship skills?
All sorts of relationships! And relationships in the arts are frequently very complicated. You may be very friendly with a fellow painter and also quite envious of her. You may actively dislike a gallery owner or a collector but decide that he is too valuable to cast aside, maybe because he is your only advocate or your only customer. You may respect your editor’s opinions but despise the rudeness with which she delivers them.
There may be no such thing as a genuinely straightforward relationship anywhere in life but relationships in the arts are that much more complicated and shadowy. The main improvement an artist can make is to actually think about the matter!
You can decide how you want to be in relationships but only if you actively decide. You get to decide if you want to be honest and straightforward even if others aren’t, if you want to be polite and diplomatic even if others aren’t, if you want to be quiet and calm even if others are stirring the pot and making dramas.
It may not prove easy to be the person you want to be at all times and in all situations, especially since the marketplace has a way of throwing us off our game, but you can nevertheless hold the intention to try your darnedest to be the “you” you would most like to be. This takes thought and preparation!
Thanks, Eric, for sharing gems from your book with us!
Join the Wild Money Revolution and Fall in Love with Money
What is it about a new enthusiasm that makes us want to run out and spend money?
With my new focus on art making, the possibilities to buy are endless. New books. The incredibly seductive lure of the art supply store. Surely I need to get a new journal every week, right?
Then there’s the learning curve. The more I practice, the more I see the need to improve. Surely I need to take a class or sign up for some expensive retreat like the month-long program in New York at the Visual School of the Arts.
I see this trend with myself and my clients: the creative impulse is immediately followed by the spending impulse. But I think this urge to open our wallets is not based on need, but on our own discomfort.
We’re uncomfortable that the true next step is to sit the hell down and do the work. Fumble through that shaggy first draft. Fill pages of crappy sketches of distorted faces. It’s so much more fun to go out and get a (cheap) thrill by buying something we’re convinced we need.
Years ago I got my financial act together. But recently, I’ve had to do a refresh on my spending, saving and buying patterns. I’ve had the good fortune to work one-one with Luna Jaffe, an amazing woman who’s both artist and financial planner.
She gets this creative urge. She doesn’t tamp down my enthusiasm for my art. Instead, she points me toward solid practices that help me feel good about creating and about my money relationship.
Luna’s book, Wild Money, offers deep insights into why we thoughtlessly spend. Luna’s book kindly guides us – in bright, beautiful color – to design a financial life that supports our wild creativity. This book is part of Luna’s mission to lead a money revolution based on love, creativity and mindfulness.
Be part of the revolution and get your hands on Wild Money so you can create and play with ease, knowing you’ve got your money thing handled.
Won’t it be fun to say, I love money and money loves me, and to believe it? Join the Wild Money revolution now and tell your friends, because being rich in all ways is better with friends.
How To Measure Your Writing Success
Did your writing measure up this year?
That feels a little harsh, doesn’t it? But I bet your inner critic is asking the same thing – poking you to see if you and your writing measured up this year.
How do you make an honest assessment of your progress that’s not fueled by the gremlin’s sharp stick poking you? If you’re like my clients, it’s easy to forget all the boons and progress you made.
Last week I wrote about how our superlatives are killing us. How they represent a standard – best, most, perfect – that we simply can’t achieve. We also can’t assess progress on those terms.
So how do we glean satisfaction from our efforts? This article will help you absorb all the nutrients from your efforts and your successes so you can build on them next year.
Pause and absorb the nutrients of your successes
These are the questions I ask myself and offer to my clients; I invite you to make the most of your writing year by answering them too. Make a pot of tea or pour a glass of wine and enjoy savoring your writing year. Look back at your mid-year check-in, and to use this metric to gauge your progress and process:
1. On a scale of one to ten, how satisfied are you with your efforts?
2. What could you have done (given all the circumstances of your life) to bring that satisfaction level up two notches?
3. On a scale of one to ten, how satisfied are you with the results of your efforts?
4. What acknowledgement can you give yourself for all you did and felt?
5. Check your numbers. List your numbers in the following categories that are meaningful to you:
- Number of publications
- Number of hours or writing sessions you logged
- Number of writing retreats you gave yourself
- Amount of money you earned from writing
- Number of books sold
- The amount of help you asked for and received
- Number and quality of comments on your blog
- Number and quality of reviews
The numbers are the external measurements, but they’re not the only way to assess your success. Go back to your satisfaction and really soak in all the effort you put into your writing. That is where you will be able to relish your good enough writing year – by measuring your efforts and not your results.
Sometimes answering these questions brings disappointment. For me, I never have as many comments or views as I want. But my expectations and disappointments don’t stop me. Don’t let yours put a lid on your writing, either. Use your dissatisfaction to fuel next year’s best writing efforts.
6. What didn’t happen that you wanted to happen?
7. What can you do differently next year?
8. How does this assessment help you set expectations that will help you feel successful?
9. Finally, what image can you post in your writing space that reminds you of your efforts in 2012? This photo of me proudly holding my book at Shakespeare and Company in Paris marks many hours of work come to fruition. The photo helps me savor all of it.
Be real, be kind to yourself
I’ve seen unrealistic expectations do more damage than good with my students and clients. Big dreams are great, I’m all for them, but expecting too much from ourselves can bring disappointment and discouragement. Examples include expecting ourselves to write every day no matter what. Thinking we can forge ahead no matter what the circumstances, season or level of our energy.
We’re human, and our energy ebbs and flows as much as our creative output does. Be kind to yourself as you assess your progress and reevaluate your process.
No one can tell you how to measure your success. I invite you to be clear about which metrics are important to you and why. Gleaning satisfaction from your writing this year can help point you toward what you need to enjoy even more success next year.
What helps you feel satisfied with your writing efforts?
Who to Trust When Writing Your Book?
You’re in a writing workshop and your recently-drafted chapter is up for review. Students offer their reactions. Let’s listen in:
“I love this. I love what you’ve done with your character.”
“I didn’t get it. Was she trying to pick that guy up or what?”
“This would make a great short story or a performance piece. It doesn’t have to be a just a chapter in a novel.”
Helpful?
Feedback is vital to the creative process. But inept critique from the wrong sources can squash your confidence or worse – dissuade you from continuing with your book.
Where do you go for constructive criticism? I’ve written elsewhere about how to design the feedback process so it’s useful to you.
Here I illustrate four groups you might consider asking for help writing your novel or non-fiction book.
Peers
These are your fellow writers, the people in your writing classes, or your writing buddies. Even if they’re not writing in the same genre, style or subject matter, these relationships can provide:
- a sounding board for your process
- a forum to share resources for developing your craft and publishing your work
- accountability partners to help you stay on track.
Most importantly, peer relationships help you feel ‘gotten’. Being understood is vital to writers and artists who are creating something from nothing.
My peer relationships helped me and made the writing journey much more pleasant. The friendships I developed at La Muse writing retreat in France and writing buddyships I had in Boulder with Suzanne, Ann and Dorothy were all invaluable to my book.
Mentors and teachers
Writing instructors, mentors or professional editors have most likely written a book themselves. They deeply understand the craft of writing. They will be able to assess your work as a whole and offer critical and constructive insights.
After an initial novel writing workshop in 1999, I relied on professional editors to guide my work. Hiring someone to critique my manuscript was for me like taking a master class in novel writing. I did this at least four times in twelve years.
Audience members
These are people who won’t necessarily offer a critical review of your work. Instead, they’ll respond as someone who would ultimately buy and read your book. This is the person you are writing for.
Once you’ve established your core message and content, it can be helpful to pass it by your ideal reader. Do at least two drafts before showing it to a person in your audience.
Former bookstore owner and avid reader Valarie read drafts of my novel. Her perspective helped me see holes in the narrative and how I could increase the dramatic tension.
Friends and family
Your people love you. But they may not ‘get’ your work. They have a specific perspective of you and perhaps a hidden or obvious agenda. They may not yet resonate with your AUTHORity.
Here’s some of the feedback I’ve gotten from my loved ones:
“Why not just let this go and start another project?”
“The first chapter is a real downer!”
“This was a real slog!”
These comments came from highly intelligent people who love me, believe in me and wish the best for me. They were not trying to hurt me.
But they had no clue about how to give constructive feedback.
The people who matter most to us have the biggest influence on our actions. While drafting your book, I advise not sharing it with friends or family.
So which is right for you?
When you’re just beginning to write a book, you will likely opt for writing classes that teach you how to write. Be sure to learn how to filter out useless or misguided criticism that classmates may offer and focus on the teacher’s input.
As you progress in your book and solidify your message and confidence, work with other professionals and your audience to ensure your book is hitting the mark you intend it to.
What’s been most useful in helping you claim your AUTHORity? Let us know in a comment below to share what’s helped you the most.
To get solid support and make real progress on your book – fiction or non-fiction – join me for the Claim Your AUTHORity retreat this July. I’ve helped hundreds of writers claim their AUTHORity, respecting them, their material and their unique process.
The early registration discount ends this Friday. We’ve got a limited number of spaces available for this profound workshop. Claim your spot with us at the Sylvia Beach hotel on the Oregon coast, and claim your AUTHORity.
Download a .PDF of this article here.
Target the Heart of Your Book to Write More Easily
This is part of the Claim Your Authority series.
You feel the urge to write a book. You’re haunted by an idea or a cluster of ideas, but have no clue how they will hang together in a meaningful way to form a book.
This is a common problem: most people are trying to write a book from a surface level. As a coach, I’m always helping my clients dig deeper to find the core of their impulses.
Connecting to the heart of your book provides a powerful anchor to make what you’re expressing in your book easier.
Here’s a simple but profound exercise to target the heart of your book so the ‘what’s it about’ question will no longer haunt you.
Values + themes + stories = the heart of your book
Okay, let’s look at a strategy to dig deeper to connect with the heart of your book. Remember the last CYA post where I asked you to identify a short list of your values? Get those out.
We’ll use a target to map stories, themes and values. At the core are your values. The next ring represents your themes. The outer and most visible ring stand for the stories you’re telling. Here’s an example of the model.
In my novel Chasing Sylvia Beach, here’s the top layer of story:
- My character, Lily Heller, is bored and aimless
- Lily wants to be a writer but doesn’t know how to get started
- She looks to the life of Sylvia Beach as a model for a life of meaning and influence
In the next layer we find the themes:
- Desire to live an interesting life
- Desire to express something creatively/be a writer
- The heroine’s journey – who am I and what am I doing here?
Finally, we see these values I hold:
- Adventure/stretching/travel/learning
- Creativity/expression
- Learning/growth/expansion
As you do this, you should experience some ‘aha’ moments, where you access the deeper levels of your work.
Once you are connected to the core of your book, it’s easier to make the time and space to write it.
Homework: Try this process to connect with the heart of your book. You can do this on a big piece of paper, dry erase board or use index cards…whatever method you like.
I suggest three different colored index cards, one color for themes, another for values and the third color for stories.
Play around with the cards, seeing how they connect to form the heart of your novel or non-fiction book.
Depending on how you think, you may start from the center (values) or the outer ring (stories). Let this exercise flow organically and don’t worry about figuring it out in a linear way. Take your time with this and let the process be yours.
Try any of these three approaches:
1. Start with your values and work your way to your themes, then the stories that represent the values that are deeply meaningful to you.
2. Identify the themes or topics that keep recurring in your writing and match them with values, then find stories that express those values.
3. Look at the stories you tell often. What themes are inherent in them, and what values are you expressing when you relate these stories?
If this seems confusing or daunting, leave a question below and I’ll help sort it out.
This is one of the juicy exercises we’ll do together in the Claim Your Authority retreat on July 10th – 12th, 2012, on the Oregon Coast. Together we’ll work through this to clarify the core of your book to make it easier to write. Reserve your spot before March 30th to get the early registration discount.
How does identifying your values help you write your book? What did you learn from doing this exercise? Let me know in a comment below.
Download a pdf of this article to make Claiming Your Authority easier.
What Happy Writers Do
When we’re satisfied with our writing – writing often, working on challenging pieces, having our work read – we’re happy.
I’m on a mission to help people who want to write feel good about their creative impulses.
I’ve made a video inspired by my own writing happiness. How do you celebrate and express your happy writing habit?
My online class, Make Writing a Happy Habit, starts Monday, March 19th. You may not be rolling around on a ball to express your happiness. Instead, you’ll feel your own irrepressible urge to express your happiness.
Come write with us.
Triumph over Editing Despair
On Christmas Eve, I was nestling into bed after a day of play and feasting. While shutting down my computer, I saw the email I’d been waiting weeks for.
My dear friend and editor David Hicks, true to his word, was delivering his comments on my novel before Christmas.
I eagerly opened the document. The copious line edits didn’t faze me – I welcome ways to make my prose sing. It was the comments that made this Christmas gift a combination of coal and gold.
In over 300 comments, David pointed out issues both nitty and gritty. Consistency issues, abandoned plot threads, and confusing red herrings were all highlighted.
I quickly shut the document down and ducked toward sleep. Yet the feeling of despair had rooted in, and I spent most of Christmas day in a state of numb weightiness.
Why is revision so difficult?
With every draft past say, draft twelve, I’ve asserted that this was the LAST ONE. With every draft, I was sure I had reached the limit of my persistence. With every draft, I’ve spent at least a year doing the work to make this book not only readable, but excellent.
With a June launch date and plans well under way to get this novel into the world, the last thing I wanted to face was another deep revision.
I spent the last week of 2011 getting my head around this. Trying to shed the weight of the impending work, I turned once again to my coaching skills.
Little problems and big decisions
The thought of hours of wading through David’s comments induced a strong desire to give up and flee. Bleak moments.
But I’ve been here before, and this time I noticed what was below the bleakness: irritation.
I was seeing every comment as a problem to fix. The more comments, the more problems. The more ways I had gotten it wrong and the more work I had to do.
This insight helped me deal with the work ahead. I don’t like problems. I don’t like when things break down or need tending to. Understanding this helped me get a grip.
But dispensing with the little problems, there were now the bigger issues of plot and character. Things I need to think about and change. Make decisions.
Voila two things that I don’t excel at – enjoying solving little problems and making decisions. I can do it, but I don’t like it.
It’s never been more clear to me that how we do something is as important as what we do. I couldn’t do this final revision with this weight on me.
What shifts perspective?
Two things work for me: both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. Deadlines and meaning help me triumph over editing despair.
Deadlines
The Amazon Breakthrough Novel Contest is here again. The deadline is January 23rd. When I read David’s comments, I suspected I wouldn’t be able to finish the book until the end of February.
An January deadline is just crazy enough to jump-start my challenge value. Can she do it? is the guiding impulse here. I’m driven to expedite this revision, not just with speed but with accuracy – to write well and strongly.
An archetype saves me
Several times during the last week of 2011 the Chariot tarot card appeared for me. The Chariot archetype represents success and forward movement. Cheers to that – the novel moving on and into the world, and me with it.
But further study showed me that the Chariot also points us to manage emotions, using the fiery forces within to move forward, not get overwhelmed and stuck.
I need both of those concepts for myself – control over the emotional maelstrom in writing and a sense of forward movement.
Using this image and energy, I am driving toward a January 23rd deadline. I work every day on the novel. I have accepted most of the line edits and am moving through the comments.
I feel a great sense of purpose and commitment, like I am riding that Chariot, and it’s taking me where I want to go. I relish this, because I earned it.
I am grateful to have found both a perspective and a process that will allow me to do this final, final, final revision.
I am more than halfway through draft 16. At this pace, I think I can make the January 23 deadline.
What about you?
What do you find most difficult about the revision process?
What perspective and process will you choose to keep going?
Take a second and tell us works for you to keep going in your creative projects.
Why I Help Writers
Pointing the way to the houseboat museum. Lifting someone’s luggage up the subway stairs with him. Taking a photo of a couple on a bridge. Sharing my map with a woman and her daughter.
I can’t not help. When I see someone in need, my first impulse is to help.
I was recently asked to write about why I do what I do. Why do I coach writers and artists? Why do I guide people to claim their own authority so they can write their stories?
Perhaps it hearkens back to my days of a different kind of service, when I waited tables and sold books at a corner bookshop. People came in and I was there to help. This urge to serve is embedded in my social code, and in my work ethic.
A positive perspective for writers
Years ago, as a young writer, I attended a reading at the Tattered Cover in Denver. I don’t recall the author, but I do remember his message: the writing life stinks, publishing sucks, and if you take him as a model, by the age of 50 you’ll be cranky and bitter, all your words washed away by the uncaring, cruel world.
On the bus home from that discouraging talk, something rose up in me. A determination. A resolve. A knowledge that the sour author was speaking a truth – his truth. And that while the writing life may be an uphill battle, it was one I couldn’t deny.
My clients and students are like me – hearing the call to write and despite all good advice to run far and fast from the writing impulse, they’re heeding it. Following in the footsteps of Julia Cameron, I believe that if you have the impulse to write, you must follow it.
A fool’s journey
To take up the pen and write is an act of foolish courage. It requires bravery, and a willingness to shut away all the negative voices that shout their bad advice (to paraphrase poet Mary Oliver).
I know how tender we are when we step forth and admit we want something. When clients and students ask for my help developing their writing life, I already believe they are heroes and am honored to help.
I help with them overcome the issues creative people face. I help boost their confidence. I help sharpen their focus. I help clear away the inner and outer underbrush that gets us tangled up when we try to create something.
All of this helping helps me, too. I feel connected to the rushing river of the creative process, in all its eddies and twists. I feel connected to others, to our deep humanity that so truly wants to generate good things. And I feel connected to my own impulse to write, the humility and grace that’s required to keep on writing.
Even when I’m in a foreign country, people constantly stop and ask me for directions. I think they sense I’m a helpful person. It makes my day to point the way for others. It’s my work, and I’m grateful to do it.
I teach, coach and write because I am here to help people express their unique selves and claim their creative authority. Here’s more about my work.
Why do you do what you do?
Buff Up Your Creativity: Ten Creative Capabilities Enhanced by Travel
I gave this article to my Curious Boulder participants to remind them that travel itself is a creativity workshop. Formerly published in 2009 here, I offer these perspectives to you again, so your summer travel may incite your creative juju.
Creativity is a combination of skills, qualities and perspectives that allows someone to bring ideas into form. Identifying and cultivating those capabilities allows you to be more effective in life and work.
It’sno surprise that the rigors of travel build our creative capacity. Both
endeavors push us to our physical, mental and sometimes emotional limits.
Travel and creativity aren’t for pansies.
After a year as a creative nomad in Europe, and from observing the changes I see in my Curious Excursions participants. I have charted ten ways that travel sparks our creativity. Check out the following ten creative capabilities to see how travel has contributed to yours.
[Read more…] about Buff Up Your Creativity: Ten Creative Capabilities Enhanced by Travel
Juju Infusion 6: An Extraordinary Yoga Feat
Episode Six of Juju Infusion – inspiration, fun, yoga and productivity hacks for creative kooks from coach Cynthia Morris.
Quick links for things mentioned in the show:
Cynthia Morris’s Secrets of Empowered Creativity – Free Course
Creative Fortunes
Muji
Manduka Yoga Mats
Andrew Locke – “Help My Business Sucks!”
Le Thé des Écrivains
Welcome to episode six of Juju Infusion. Thanks for all the comments and support you’ve shared with me. It makes it that much more fun.
Enjoy this wee pause to inject an infusion of Juju – good, zesty creative energy – into your day.
In this episode:
- A Creative Fortune for you
- Vital Yoga Challenge – and my extraordinary yoga feat!
- Q&A: How did you get started making videos, Cynthia?
- Journal Juju – Last week’s winner of the journal juju giveaway* was Jaime Lyerly. Who is it this week? Watch to find out!
Please share your thoughts and questions in a comment below. You may end up on the show!
*Winners of the journal juju giveaway must contact me with your address so I can mail your journal. Without that, I can’t send your journal!
To your juju infusion,
Cynthia
(There are no paid endorsements in this episode. Other than my own. Original Impulse Inc. pays me to do this silly show.)