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love, loss & longing transcending writing

First Anniversary of ‘Transcending’

May 3, 2011

Does a blog have a birthday or an anniversary? Following the communicatrix and others, I’ll go with anniversary. In this case, it’s the first anniversary of ‘Transcending’, a significant milestone. So what did I start out to do on May 2 last year? After much research, reading and thinking, I decided that ‘Transcending’ was my theme. And it still is. Sometimes I wonder, for sure, and I still need to do more work to build this theme and this platform; but I know that transcending is it, that it is relevant to so many people and that I need to keep mining it, milking it and keep that vein of possible riches flowing.

It’s been a huge battle at times. I’ve managed nearly a post a week on average and given the demands of my day job, seven weeks’ overseas travel, my daughter’s final year of school, a couple of operations and other dramas, that’s not so bad. I could do better, but it’s an achievement, all taken into account. The main thing is that I kept at it: writing, researching, tuning in and reading to others, synthesising and reflecting.

And as the communicatrix says so eloquently in her sixth anniversary post, it’s really all about writing:

What I’m trying to say, albeit rather clumsily, is that a lot of the time, the reason to write is just that—to write. You can write to promote yourself or write to make money or even write to find yourself but ultimately, you write to write. To be able to keep on writing. To be able to keep on getting better at writing. To be able, god willing, to write long enough that you write well enough to actually say something that will live on after you are no longer there to write.

But even if you don’t, even nobody reads your writing while you are alive and all your writing dies with you, if you are a writer (and maybe even if you are not), you are the better for having written.

Now, write.

That’s an important motivator for me: writing itself, the value of it, the process and the product. It’s what my working life has also been about.  I’ve been happy with what I’ve written here and how I’ve found a voice here over the past year. It’s a voice that can do much more and stretch itself out a little now. I do know that the feeling of having written here, once I get through the resistance and work it through, is like birds soaring in the clearest of skies. One of my earliest posts, ‘The value of howling into the wind‘ captures this in a way I am proud of and still has the  most hits of all my posts so clearly strikes a chord.

It is also the second anniversary of my father’s death today. His death and my brother’s tragic death in November 2007 are key motivators for this theme: one transcended in many ways in a sometimes difficult life and the other, also an incredible achiever, did not make it through one night. It is for these reasons, and the grief that goes with them, that transcending has become a theme in my life.

It’s why I write about transcending and resilience: working through, rising above, moving beyond, climbing across whatever is difficult or challenging. It’s not so I can look down on anyone else or feel superior in any way; that connotation sometimes worries me. It’s so that I, and you through reading and engaging, can work through, create, connect, be productive, strategise and achieve success in whatever is important: writing, grief, work, blogging, creativity, family contexts, planning and progress. Cut through and move on to the next challenge with the support of all those bloggers and other writers and creatives out there who are similarly focused on their life’s work and next project.

So what did I say I was going to do here 12 months ago? Here’s my first post:

‘Transcending’ is an exploration of the ways that we rise, overcome, climb across and pass beyond.

It celebrates the extraordinary power of the ordinary self in creativity, writing, in love, in the workplace and in our family contexts, such as our family history and what it means. It is about  resilience, grief, love, loss, longing and the resonating shapes and forms we make to deal with this and move on and through. It’s about constructive approaches at work – strategies that cut through, synthesise and provide solutions. And it’s about images, structures, texts and ways of thinking that makes this possible.

This theme resonates and connects for me in all spheres of life and I hope connects and resonates with you also.

Join me in this journey as it unfolds. Some of the areas I hope to explore are:

  • writing as a way of transcending and moving through
  • my own creative journey as a writer
  • poetry and the shapes and structures we find to manage our emotions
  • music and images as vehicles for experiencing and managing feelings
  • family history and its stories of how we connect and experience life
  • constructive leadership behaviours and strategies
  • reading and reflections on transcending
  • connections with other writers and thinkers on this theme in all its guises

Reflecting back, it’s still spot on and it’s what I have focussed on. I can do more to hone my platform and that’s a challenge I welcome. I’ve revamped my page recently and it’s whiter and brighter: a new theme, Linen, to usher in a new year. Like my theme, there’s more to learn with the technology but I’ve also loved that learning over the year: learning wordpress, flickr, managing RSS readers, linking, taking photos and everything else that goes with a blog.

It’s been a wonderful journey this past year and I thank all those who have been here with me and visited. I also thank my inspirational guides and leaders in this online space, my seven stars that continue to be guides and fellow travellers in so many ways. I look forward to the next year with a sense of brightness and light. I hope you will join me here also in the shedding of that light.

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creativity poetry writing

Gems #14 Writing Poetry

March 26, 2011

 Some gems on writing poetry whether you are just getting started or an old hand needing inspiration and direction…

Writing the Life Poetic: An invitation to read and write poetry – Sage Cohen

Poetry is often seen as a rarefied art on the fringes of life; even when you are a poet yourself, you can feel like this. Sage Cohen’s Writing the Life Poetic takes poetry from any pedestal it might have ended up on, and brings it firmly back into the central context of your life. The book is beautifully written and gorgeous to hold, with quirky graphics through-out. It feels like you are being taken by the hand and gently led back to the heart of poetry and its rightful place for you. As Sage points out in the introduction:

Poetry gives us an opportunity to experience our lives twice. First, as it happens, in real time. And second, in heart time. The poem gives us a kind of cosmic canvas to savour a moment, make sense of it, put a little frame around it, and digest our experience more completely.

Especially for people who love poetry and might have lost it somewhere along the way, Writing the Life Poetic helps you discover or rediscover the power of poetry, its place in everyday life and how to engage practically with this creative space. The book is full of advice such as starting where you are, showing versus telling, working with the senses, using imagery, reading poetry, understanding how stanzas work, revision, writing rituals, creating a system for poetry practice and so much more. Each chapter is short and focused with  exercises to practically apply the skills and concepts discussed.  It’s like a sensitive guidebook to take you through a deep engagement with poetry from wherever you are starting or recommencing your journey.

Writing Personal Poetry: Creating poems from your life experiences – Sheila Bender

I found this brilliant book in my local library and then had to have it so I could read it more fully and over time. The introduction ‘Poetry is always a good idea’ had me saying, ‘Yes, yes!’ as I read through. Sheila quotes poet Louise Gluck saying that:

writing a poem begins with a haunting, as if the finished poem already exists somewhere. In this way…the poem is like a lighthouse, “except that, as one swims toward it, it backs away.”

Coming from a similar space as Sage Cohen, Sheila Bender situates poetry in the context of daily life, commenting that poets also ‘cook, clean and take out the garbage..’ and then identifies how finding that writing about the ‘lighthouse-that-already-is’ can be part of this daily life.

Sheila’s focus is personal poetry, why we write it, how to empower yourself to write, acknowledging your poetic intelligence, getting the confidence to start, the value of reading poetry, tools for writing poetry and the poet’s stance. There are some excellent poems in progress included in this book from Sheila’s students’ work. They show how a poem progresses from an idea to a draft to a revision to a fully realised piece of work. I loved these students’ poems and what they showed about the progress and realisation of their art. There is much to be learnt from this book: especially heart for the journey and specific processes and techniques for writing personal poetry.

Creating Poetry – John Drury

Creating Poetry  is a little more technical in approach and this a useful complement to the above two books. It’s an accessible introduction to poetic terms like metaphor, assonance, simile, alliteration, rhyme and enjambement. These terms are explained with clear examples. The book also provides an excellent summary of poetic forms and rhyming patterns: ghazal, haiku, pantoum, sestina, villanelle and sonnet, for example, again clearly set out and explained.

The book takes you through the stages of preparation, language, the senses, shaping, patterns and traditions, voice, sources of inspiration and the revising and finishing processes. Full of practical exercises that help you engage as you read, the book is an accessible reference for the more technical side of writing poetry.

All three of these books have a central place on my poetry writing bookshelf and are heavily underlined. They are guidebooks I visit regularly to help me orient my poetic journey, to keep me moving positively ahead and to ensure I have courage and skills for the writing process.

What are your recommended guidebooks for writing poetry?

Image by alexschwab  from flickr and used under a Creative Commons license with thanks: One poem of thousands located on the longest poetry wall in the world in Changde, Hunan Province, China.

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blogging creativity planning & productivity writing

The Productive Writer: Review

March 13, 2011

Two of my favourite topics are ‘Writing’ and ‘Productivity’ and the planning linked to bringing successful outcomes about. So Sage Cohen’s latest book, ‘The Productive Writer’ is perfectly attuned to my interests and priorities and I’m sure relevant to other writers interested in making the most of their time and creative efforts.

It’s eminently practical and full of tips for anyone interested in being more organised and able to produce outcomes, especially words framed in a meaningful way to make an impact. It’s relevant to all kinds of writing: poetry, fiction, business writing, non-fiction, blogs and freelance approaches. Ultimately it’s about the place of that writing in the context of your life and how to make all this work.

Sage’s key platform is that productivity is a ‘lifestyle choice’ as she outlines in the introduction:

Productivity, then, is your own, personal GPS as you navigate the endless windernesses of your mind, craft, or subject matter and bring the best of what you have to offer to the page – and the world. Productivity is a means of witnessing and steering yourself toward your greatest good and training yourself to weed out the interference along the way.

‘The Productive Writer’ then navigates its own GPS through these wide waters to cut a swathe of practical advice to assist writers to be as productive as they can in every facet of their work. The weave of the book traverses critical themes you can hang onto as signposts for your own journey. These include:

  • building a case for your future as a writer
  • studying your heroes and how they work
  • establishing a platform or organising principle for your work
  • thinking productively & capturing ideas
  • goal-setting and organisational tips
  • managing time and procrastination tendencies
  • revising tips
  • publishing and promoting
  • sustaining relationships around your work
  • celebrating your success

I especially loved Chapter 12, ‘Writing in the Margins of a Full-time Life’ that reminded me that I am not the only one working full-time and trying to write; that it’s not just about balancing work and writing – it’s about balancing life and writing; and the value of my day job to my writing life and the need to remember to acknowledge the skills I learn there. As Sage comments in the context of her own diverse mix of writing commitments:

Each skill I acquire in service to someone else’s goals becomes a part of my own toolbox.’ (p115)

Sage, as her name suggests, is a very wise writer. This book, linked in with her new platform ‘The Path of Possibility’, brings writing and productivity together in a way that amplifies both and clearly sets them in the context of a broader creative life. Like Sage’s previous book, the wonderful ‘Writing the Life Poetic’, ‘The Productive Writer’ has the effect of taking you by the hand and encouraging you, gently and practically, every step of the way from vision to fruition. Committing to writing is not an easy task and we all need all the support and advice we can get to overcome resistance, barriers and excuses. Sage’s book demonstrates that:

…when we see that there are endless ways to establish and sustain a productive writing life – at any age, in any work-family circumstance – we may have an easier time trusting that we will find our own way forward.’

As you can see from the recent gaps here, for a number of reasons, I am having my own struggles with balancing writing in my life. Thankfully, in the meantime, I have also been reading ‘The Productive Writer’. Whilst struggling with the immediate application at present, the ideas contained there will become a critical part of reorienting my own GPS in moving forward to achieve my writing goals.

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creativity planning & productivity writing

Gems #13 Time to write

January 30, 2011

I’m working on my annual review at present, reviewing 2010 and setting priorities for 2011. A consistent theme for me is about finding time to write. I work full-time in a very busy leadership role in the vocational education sector. I am passionate about my work and making a difference. At the same time, I am committed to creativity, writing and my personal goals. Making the time and space to write is a constant challenge.

Here are some gems I’ve come across recently, and in the past, about making time to write and basically getting on with it.

Anne Lamott’s article, Time Lost and Found, hit me pretty hard mainly because it rang so true. It’s about priorities in life, what matters and how we fritter away time and miss the important things. Her main message is that you need to make time for writing and other priorities and that this time can be found by having a good look at how you live. Twitter and other social media, television, cleaning, work and the gym are mentioned as areas where we might be losing time that we could allocate to our creative priorities such as writing. Anne says, in essence, that we do have this precious time and we can find it, though it might take some work to recover:

I’ve heard it said that every day you need half an hour of quiet time for yourself, or your Self, unless you’re incredibly busy and stressed, in which case you need an hour. I promise you, it is there. Fight tooth and nail to find time, to make it. It is our true wealth, this moment, this hour, this day.

An excellent article in last weekend’s Sydney Morning Herald Spectrum (January 22-23) by Australian author and teacher, Sue Woolfe, encourages us just to get on with it. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find the article online anywhere to link to but I can share the main points. Entitled,  ‘Don’t think about it – just keep scribbling’, Sue says that the way you need to work to write a novel is:

…to find a way of thinking that is mocked in our culture but that is all in the day’s work for artists, composers and writers.

This is a way based on discipline: reading fiction for an hour a day; writing for at least an hour a day; not rereading, editing or formulating and not sticking to a subject, character or plot when first writing. The whole focus is the discipline of writing and then later imposing other aspects such as narrative technique, plot structure and editing. In summary:

The whole endeavour is to lose self-consciousness.

However, it starts with those two fundamental ingredients: read fiction for an hour a day and write for at least an hour a day. Linking back to Anne Lamott’s article, the trick is to find this time by managing your priorities.

Some of my favourite practical articles on making time to write are by Australian blogger and author, Joanna Penn. Joanna lives and breathes this way of working and writing to come up with real outcomes such as completing her first novel, Pentecost and receiving a strong following and awards for her highly successful blog, The Creative Penn.

Joanna’s two posts: ‘On efficiency or how to get everything done as a multi-tasking writer,’ and ‘What will you give up to write your book?’ are perfect reads on the issue of writing and time and are grounded in practicality. Joanna’s tips include getting rid of the TV, sleeping less, maximising travel time, being organised and investing in education. Setting clear goals and priorities and ‘loving the process’ are also right up there as key motivators. 

As in Anne Lamott’s article, the emphasis is on the value of the outcomes spent on writing and other creative activities vs spending too much watching TV and engaging in an uncontrolled way with social media such as twitter. And as in Sue Woolfe’s article, the discipline to carry it all through is critical.

Now it’s back to my annual review with these valuable thoughts in mind. How are you making time to write this year?

Image, Time disappears by jtravism  from flickr and used under a Creative Commons license with thanks

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creativity planning & productivity writing

Planning for the Future Starts with Celebrating the Past

January 16, 2011

A guest post from author Sage Cohen

  A note from Terri:

I am thrilled to have Sage Cohen, pictured left, writing here for my first guest post. Sage’s background and the details of her latest work, including her new book, ‘The Productive Writer‘ are below.  I am indebted to Sage and her work as a gifted writer and teacher who has enriched my writing life.

In this post, Sage encourages us to review our broader writing successes in 2010 in preparation for a productive 2011! 

  

Happy New Year, writers! I believe that there is no better launching pad into the great, blank page of 2011 than a thorough inventory of all that went right in 2010. With this in mind, I’m going to ask a series of questions to guide you in recounting your many successes this past year! I encourage you to take your time and be as thorough as you can in listing every single thing you appreciate about yourself and what you’ve accomplished in each dimension of your writing life–even if the best you can do is admire that you stopped burning your rejection letters. Deal?

  • What was most fun, exhilarating or rewarding in your writing life this year?
  • What obstacles did you face and overcome?
  • What relationships did you build, repair or retire, and how has this contributed to your writing life?
  • What did you let go of (habits, relationships, attitudes, clutter) that was no longer serving you?
  • What did you read that taught you something about your craft, your platform or how to take your writing and publishing forward?
  • What did you earn or what opportunity did you land that felt prosperous?
  • How has your confidence and/or craft improved?
  • What have you learned about social media that is serving your writing life?
  • What strategies worked best for being effective with your time?
  • How did you nurture and sustain your well being–in mind, body, spirit?
  • Who has praised your writing or teaching or facilitating? What did they say and how did it give you a new sense of appreciation for yourself and your work?
  • What did you learn about your writing rhythms: time of day to write, managing procrastination, how and when to revise, making use of slim margins of time, etc.?
  • Who did you help, and who helped you?
  • What did you learn about yourself from rejection, and how has it helped your writing, your confidence or your submissions approach develop?
  • What did you do that terrified you–but you did it any way? And how did that benefit your life and your writing?
  • How were you patient?
  • When and how were you successful at juggling the competing demands of family, writing, work, and everything else in your full life?
  • Who did you forgive? Who forgave you?

Because it’s so easy to keep our minds trained to the loop of an unsolvable problem or two, you may be surprised at how many triumphs are revealed as you answer these questions. Every risk you took, skill you fortified and skin you shed in the service of your writing life is a foothold in the future you are aspiring to create. Nice work!

 About Sage Cohen

Sage Cohen is the author of The Productive Writer (just released from Writer’s Digest Books);Writing the Life Poetic and the poetry collection Like the Heart, the World. She blogs about all that is possible in the writing life at pathofpossibility.com, where you can: Download a FREE “Productivity Power Tools” workbook companion to The Productive Writer. Get the FREE, 10-week email series, “10 Ways to Boost Writing Productivity” when you sign up to receive email updates. Sign up for the FREE, Writing the Life Poetic e-zine. Plus, check out the events page for the latest free teleclasses, scholarships and more.

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blogging creativity planning & productivity

Looking back, moving forward

January 13, 2011

A new year is traditionally a time for resolutions; however, there seems to be a renewed focus on the more concrete work of reviewing the past year and celebrating milestones and special moments as a prelude to future planning.

I am especially enjoying this review process in the blogs I read: the people’s journeys I follow there; their aims and strivings; the progress and success they celebrate in various ways and the collective cheering on in progress to their goals I can take part in. This looking back, checking progress, highlighting achievements and tracking the journey is a critical part of moving forward and I am inspired and informed by the journeys of others.

The review can take the form of the writing of a blog as a way of accountability, checking in with readers on the set metrics of progress; for others, it is sheer celebration; for others, it’s a ‘warts and all’ reflection on what happened in 2010 and also what created interest in readers. For most, it’s a combination of all these.

I’m loving reading some of my favourite bloggers’ reflections on their work and achievements in 2010 and directions for 2011. Here are some of my favourite recent reviews:

Joanna Penn’s Review of the Creative Penn Goals for 2010 celebrates the accountability of blogging and how it motivates. Joanna set some incredibly high goals for 2010 and has achieved much. Read about her wonderful achievements including completing her novel and being way up on the lists of bloggers in the writing field.

For sheer celebratory energy, you can’t beat the white hot retrospective by Danielle La Porte. I am big believer in celebrating achievements as a solid and strengthening base for moving forward and this post just shows you why it’s so powerful. I especially loved the manifesto of encouragement – one of my favourite posts of 2010. As Danielle says:

With 900+ tweets, 3800 Facebook shares and 2,600+ StumbleUpons, the manifesto of encouragement took on a life of its own.

It truly was a magical piece of inspired thought and writing that engendered so much depth of heartfelt words in others. I look forward to the sequel and something I can hold in my hand!

Colleen Wainwright, aka The Communicatrix, reflects on the 100 things I learned in 2010 and what’s more has been doing this same process since 2004. Clever, funny, insightful as always, and like Colleen’s weekly round-ups, a rich read – especially for a fellow Virgo. I am thankful for the many valued reflections and resources that come through Colleen’s annual reviews such as how much growth can come from the darkest times.

I’ve only recently started reading Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist blog though clearly many other people are ahead of me here. It’s honest, on the edge and often controversial, it seems, as reflected in the number of comments and the level of engagement of her readers. In her recent, Most popular posts of 2010, Penelope provides a summary of the posts that generated the most comments. It’s another great way of reflecting on progress and a clever way to review.

Shanna Germain, whom I love reading for her incredible commitment to writing and publication and her documentation of the journey, has written a fantastic 2010 Writing Stats post demonstrating her passion and productivity in writing in 2010 and setting the metrics for writing goals for 2011. Chris Guillebeau emphasises the importance of metrics in personal planning and this is a great example of how to measure progress and success: number of submissions, rejections, words written, progress to goal. It’s super impressive in both process and achievements.

My seven stars  still mostly light the way for me as I blog forward but I’m loving finding new voices to read to inform my own path. And yes, I know, I need to work on my own review and goals. It’s coming in its own good time and I look forward to it.

In the meantime, reading and reflecting on the reviews of others is very inspiring in informing my own moving forward.

Who’s lighting your path for 2011?

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