Imagine

 

 

Imagine we are sitting in front of a fireplace. I pour the coffee, would you rather have tea, or a mulled wine, that is warm too? The fire is quietly burning, snapping occasionally, I guess those logs had a bit of water in them.

We settle down with our drinks, prop our feet up, and I explain that I have aired complaints on my blog for the last couple of years; now it's your turn.

So, tell me, is anything bothering you?

I used to have a close friend who would visit for a few days, and we would sit up at night talking. First, we had to get all the frustrations, irritations, and junk, out of our heads, and then about 3 in the morning we would get down to serious, insightful conversation.

It was like a writer's morning pages—write the junk out so the good stuff can come in

Steven Pressfield advises artists to "Sweep your floor, so the Muse doesn't soil her gown on the way in."

But here we are, you and me. 

If you don't want to tell me what's bothering you, that's okay. Write it down; I won't peek. Get personal, not just about world conditions.

(Ah, I have to tell you, a Robin just perched on a limb outside my window, and it's November 24, 2025. I thought winter was coming, and that robins are spring birds. He sat a minute, looked at me, and then flew on. Good luck on your journey, sweet bird.)

Having an interruption like that rather knocks those bothersome thoughts out of one's head, doesn't it? 

It did mine.

Lately, I've been reading and writing about "Get Happy." And I know the idea of "Let's just get happy" irks some people. I have a friend who says she is happy all the time, and she gets flak for it.

But I am investigating the possibility of "Let's Get Happy Now" using Joseph McClendon III's definition of happiness.:

"Happiness is a mental and emotional state of being where your internal focus is optimistic, and the body produces positive energy."

Now that's something I can get behind. It doesn't say, "Just decide to be happy."

It doesn't minimize hard times.

It doesn't say that we will live in eternal joy.

It doesn't say that being grateful will bring about happiness, although being thankful for the good in your life is a splendid idea. 

It doesn't say that your emotions of sadness, depression, grief, or anger ought not to be expressed; it says that "your internal focus is optimistic, and the body produces positive energy."

"Happiness," some say, "comes and goes." It's fun to be happy. But we aren't "ha ha" happy all the time. We laugh at a joke and it fills the happy coffer for a minute. We see a beautiful sunset, an ocean, a beach, or an exquisite alpine forest, and we are in awe. That's fun. We giggle with our children when we see them running in joyful enthusiasm. We love being in love—talk about endorphins. There are many avenues to happiness. But we don't live on the mountain top all the time; that might wear out our synapses, too. However, the idea of living in an optimistic, positive state sounds good to me.

I think when people say, "I just want to be happy," it means more like McClendon has described—being optimistic and allowing our body to produce positive energy.

Those individuals who have lived to be 100 or older, especially those who live in the "blue zones" of the world, probably have experienced sadness, grief, disappointment, anger, and resentment, but that is not where they live.

Generally, those centurions have a full life: they eat well, have social contact, a spiritual bent, and, as they mostly live in a village, they walk a lot.

Most of us don't live in villages anymore; we live in cities or on the farm or in residential areas where often neighbors never speak to each other. However, we can make an effort to create a healthier lifestyle. Joseph McClendon III, a neuropsychologist, says that when people come into his office and he asks them what they want, they usually have a grocery list of things they do not want. When he presses them by asking what they want, they go blank.

Here is an exercise McClendon suggests: Write down your most magnificent day as you see it in your mind's eye.

Or in our case, sitting here in front of the fireplace, we could share how we see our Magnificent Day with each other.

I would love to hear your take on this.

This has been a lovely visit, more on happiness later.

Thank you for joining me.

                        

P.S. I wrote this post for the newsletter I am trying to get going, but decided to also post it here so you will see what I am up to.

josnewsletter.com

A Gift

 "You don't start out writing good stuff. You start out writing crap and thinking it's good stuff, and then gradually, you get better at it. That's why I say one of the most valuable traits is persistence.”

 — Octavia E. Butler

 

Isn't it odd that we are told that we have a gift to give, and I have said it and believed it? And with that, we think that perhaps some creative endeavor will be our pathway to success and livelihood. And so we begin, we work at it, and sometimes we get better. Sometimes we make a sale or get hired. Often, we fail. 

 

In come the thoughts: I'll never make it. I'm not good enough. It's too late for me. I've worked for 30 years and have nothing to show for it except a pile of crumpled pages and dashed hopes.

 

All those nitty, annoying and ridiculous thoughts we tell ourselves. 

 

Maybe the test isn't how many times we fall. It's how many times we get up. Cliche'? Yes, I know, but pertinent.

 

I use writing as a beginning point in my discussions of creativity because that's my venue. However, if I were a painter, I would probably start at that. Writing, however, is something everyone can do. It doesn't have to be creative writing or poetry, or you don't have to be a blogger or a novelist to write. Journaling is a way to take another look at an event, sad, happy, whatever. Happy event? Relish it. Sad Event? Lay it to rest. 

 

"Morning pages" (Julia Cameron's term) can clear the debris that is standing in your way of a fruitful, pleasant day. It is writing out those nitty, whining thoughts that like to circle your brain. It is putting a period at the end of a sentence.

 

You can gripe all you want on the page—remember it's for your eyes only. Just get it out. You will put a smile on the muse's face. 

 

"And what, you ask, does writing teach us? First and foremost, it reminds us that we are alive and that it is a gift and a privilege, not a right."

 — Ray Bradbury

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mindset Shift

 

Dear writer,

 

I'm leaning on you today.

 

Readers, you're welcome too.  

 

Everybody writes, like everybody walks (you know there are some exceptions). You love it or hate it. You rush to write or avoid it as though you are about to sit next to that person at the dinner table who will tell you her life story—the bad parts—then tell you again. 

 

I've been reading a lot this past week. Steven King says, "If you don't have time to read, you don't have time to write." So it's a balancing act. Should I be reading or writing?

 

Right now, I'm enjoying reading more than writing. The authors are better. I feel inept. I have a book in mind, but I fear the process. I know the time involved. I know how hard it is to get a publisher. I know how few will read it. 

 

I'm turning to you guys asking, "Do you ever feel this way?"

 

For years I wrote for fun. I wrote because it was my self-expression. I wrote for nothing in return. I figured I was honing my craft.

 

I believed it was a creative outlet and that everyone ought to have one.

 

I believed that morning pages were a way to pour out the crap (that nobody would see) and allow the good to come out. I thought that if more people wrote their "Morning pages," putting a period at the end of their whine, uh I mean sentence, it would quiet the mind and let the good stuff through.

 

I believed writing was a therapeutic endeavor.

 

I loved it.

 

What happened?

 

I was expecting to receive some reward, I wanted my writing to pay. Instead, I'm feeling the pressure.

 

This morning I was reminded once again of Anne Lamott's writing advice, "Write Shitty First Drafts."

 

"Everybody has them."

 

Well, that takes the pressure off.

 

Hemingway said, "Write drunk. Edit sober." You don't have to get drunk; you get the idea. Write with abandon, then pull in the reins, and clean it up. 

 

I began this blog yesterday. Today, I followed Steven Pressfield's advice. He referred to the Lady of Fashion, Coco Chanel's advice on fashion. "On your way out the door," she said, "look in the mirror. Then take one thing off."

 

Steven Pressfield says Chanel's advice applies to writers. Pressfield, once a screenwriter, said his mentor's advice was to take 10% out of his script, then take 10 off that.

 

Soon I'll be down to zero.

 

However, I'm going for that shitty first draft and a piece of writing advice that arrived in my mailbox this morning: "Save editing for the end."

 

 

"Writing and editing are two separate processes,” wrote Shawn & R.J. from Book Marketing Tools, "so guard them fiercely! When you start editing during your writing process, everything grinds to a halt. Stay mindful, keep the processes separate, and you'll see your mindset shift."

 

Carry on, dear one,

 

Jo

 

Over a decade ago in the foothills of the Himalayas, before much about mindset unfolded, Brad Stulberg asked a Nepali Sherpa named Indra about the prayer flags that were all over. “It’s simple,” he told me. “When you are feeling a strong emotion, you plant a flag. Since the beginning of time, my culture believes the wind will spread that energy and the universe will receive it.”

 

Drink water--see https://www.wishonwhitehorses.com 

 

And visit Jo's Store,  https://jos-storebooksandcoffee.com 

 

 

 

 

 

Write The Music You Need to Hear

 

“Write the music your inside you needs your outside you to hear.”

--Eric Whitacre

I figure most of you are here because you are either a writer (Isn’t everybody?) or want to be one.

 

The plethora of bloggers online tells me that people want to write and want to be heard (Read). Yeah, me, included. 

 

We want our lives to mean something, and we want to contribute something.

 

Although sometimes we need to write because we need to hear what we have to say. (Perhaps that ought to be private.)

 

I don’t know if you’ve heard me speak of Morning Pages (Julia Cameron’s term). In her book, The Artist’s Way, Cameron describes morning pages as that writing we do before doing the real work. It is clearing away the static so we can hear the music.

 

You know, sometimes you write something, and in reading it, later on, you wonder who wrote it. Sometimes you’re proud of it, sometimes you embarrass yourself.

 

Shit happens.

 

I’ve heard that there are only three rules for writing.

 

Unfortunately, nobody knows what they are.

 

So, there you have it, folks. Make your own rules. Write your little hearts out. It will make you a better writer and a better person. 

 

Readers do expect something, though, and they have a right to find it. People are attuned to a story, with a beginning, a middle, and an end. Follow the Hero’s Journey, and it will stand you in good stead. I think the concept of the hero’s journey began long ago when a storyteller stood at the campfire with the people eager for entertainment. The hunter who brought home the bacon would get attention, but the one who embellished the story got more. The one who died on the hunt was popular, too, for he met a consequence that didn’t bring home the bacon. The trouble was, someone else had to tell the story for him. That’s where you need a great obituary writer. Gosh, when I think about it, most obituaries I’ve heard were boring. Now, that doesn’t do the person justice. They’ve had a life. They loved, wept, had children, hardships, victories. (Born somewhere, educated somewhere, married, survived by.) I’m feeling sad for them.

 

People want to hear how the hero/heroine got kicked out of Paradise and had to find herself in the world. He/she had to endure hardships, and the stakes were high, the consequences extreme. He/she would, hopefully, come home victorious and bring honor to the tribe.

 

This morning, I searched the internet for an eye doctor, and I noticed that I was drawn to the ones that wrote a bit about themselves. I guess I ought to write something about myself on my blogs. I always figured reading whatever I wrote would tell my reader about me. Still, truthfully, I didn’t know how to sell myself without sounding like a moron.

Avocados

  I tasted my first avocado after I was grown, married, and had graduated from college.

When I encountered a sugar-cube sized piece of avocado in a salad, I thought I have bitten into a raw fish. But when I discovered guacamole, the avocado world opened its doors and played celestial music. 

 Now we wrap raw fish and avocado in a pillow of rice, tie it up with seaweed and call it a delicacy.

 See how times change. 

 When I began reading Natalie Goldberg's book Writing Down the Bones (My new one, the 30th year edition), she told about tasting her first avocado in the 1960s. With that, she gave us permission to write about such things. 

To become a writer, you write. You put pen to page and begin and keep on keeping on. 

If writing about avocados will do it for you, write about avocados.

When William Cowper (1700) was stuck with nothing to write, Lady Austin told him he had no subject and suggested he write about his sofa. His sofa poem turned into an epic poem, including all manner of furniture.  As it turned out, Cowper changed the direction of poetry by writing about everyday life.

I was drawn to Cowper when I read this: "To find the medium asks some share of wit, and therefore 'tis a mark fools never hit."

 I figured that man had a handle on life (1731 –1800). I found that he was the most popular poet of his day and a forerunner of Romantic poetry. He was also a hymnist, "God works in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform." How many times have you heard that? Cowper translated the Iliad and the Odyssey from Greek into English blank verse.

See what neat things you learn when writing with a little curiosity.

When Cowper was six-years-old, his mother died giving birth to his brother. This grieved little Cowper bitterly. To add insult to injury, his father sent him to boarding school, where he was bullied. He and his brother, who he was close to, were the only two of nine children that survived infancy. Cowper fell in love with his cousin, but because of their close genetic ties, his uncle forbids the marriage.

Cowper fell into depression and madness for a time and was tenderly cared for by a lady friend to whom he became engaged but never married.  He recovered his sanity only to have another bout, later on, believing that God wanted him to sacrifice himself.

Well crap. Old religion doing a number on a person again.  He doubted God but wrote hymns. Pool fellow. I heard he never entered a church again, but what if he had learned that God doesn't have an ego problem? Why would a supreme being care if you believed in him or not? Would a loving God demand sacrifice? Nada.

If Cowper knew this, would it have made a difference in his mental health? What if our purpose is to live in joy? I guess that was a concept unheard of in those times. And living by other's rules can screw up many an innocent soul.

Cowper's life was the sort they tell writers to write of, "Throw rocks at your hero," they say.

But make the ending satisfying.

And whether you agree or not, a happy ending is more satisfying than a sad or ambiguous one. 

Ar-TISTS sometimes take pleasure in sad endings, but often that doesn't work. Sad endings rarely become blockbusters. (The English Patient might be an exception.)

 Would we have remembered Luke Skywalker if we found he had failed Jeti training and didn't destroy the Death Star?

Words of the wise say that the beginning of your book will cause people to read it. The ending will win you fans.

 You can write for fun or self-examination. You can journal, write morning pages, or go wild and make up stories.

And why more readers read non-fiction than fiction is beyond me, for much can be learned from fiction. A skilled writer can weave self-improvement into the story, so it is almost impossible to know you are getting it.

Here I am praising fiction but writing non-fiction. There is room for both. Besides, we are into How-tos, wanting answers, and looking for data, so it is logical that non-fiction would gain the highest readership.

Natalie Goldberg was one of the first writing instructors to tell her students that writing is a therapeutic endeavor. 

When we moved from Temecula, California to Eugene, Oregon—or rather back to Oregon, my husband packed up the Prius with his shop equipment and moved to Oregon to begin a new job.

That left the packing and shipping for my daughter and me to complete. I chose U-Haul Pods. We thought six pods would do it. However, at the last minute, as the sweet girl fork-lift driver was loading pods onto a mammoth truck, the scale on the fork-lift told her some Pods were over-weight. We found that paper-filled boxes were heavier in one Pod than another that contained an airplane engine. Yep, we were shipping an airplane engine that was so heavy daughter threatened to roll it down the hill instead of packing it into a Pod. However, the two of us hefted and rolled it onto the bottom shelf of a rolling cart and pushed the cart into a container.

Bottom line: as we were scrambling to pull out boxes, one removed box contained my favorite books on writing. We had determined that rather than order another Pod, we would donate more to Good Will or Salvation Army.

My books on writing kept getting shuffled aside. We had already loaded the pickup truck bed to the brim and tarped it. The U-Haul trailer we were pulling behind it was full.  (Remember our faithful Pickup truck that went to Hawaii and back? It had carried those 19 loads of household belongings from the Mattson sea-going container to the house, then back again.) that truck was moving us again. I looked into the pickup’s cab—no room.

We were carrying the driver, me, a passenger, my daughter, and Peaches, our little poodle, would be on the bench seat between us. Daughter's three-year-old son, my grandson, would be in the backseat alongside a 150-pound Newfoundland dog. Oh, yes, and we had two cats and no room for a box of books.

No room for cat carriers either. Nina and I put harnesses on the cats, so we could clip them inside when we wanted to leave the truck for whatever reason. So, I dropped them into the truck to sift into whatever spaces they could find.

And we took off.

My books were left for a scheduled Good Will pick up at the house, where they would go to another writer—who is probably rich and famous by now.

[From Chapter 4 for Grab a Pen and Kick-Ass by jewell d with permission from the author.]

Available on Amazon.com for $1.99.

https://www.amazon.com/Grab-Pen-Kick-Ass-jewell-d-ebook/dp/B08V4ZNL2X/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Grab+a+Pen+and+Kick-Ass&qid=1612048475&s=digital-text&sr=1-1

Thanks for giving it a look-see. 

Joyce, aka jewell d

Boy, Do I Have an Answer for You. Your First 15 Minutes Are Not Wasted

A comment from a fellow blog reader/writer: 

“I was interested in how you center yourself and clear your head prior to writing. I have had trouble clearing my mind in getting my ideas out. I truly do enjoy writing but it seems like the first 10 to 15 minutes are wasted just trying to figure out how to begin. Any suggestions or hints?”

 

Okay, here goes. This is one of my favorite writing techniques. For those who have heard me speak of it, sorry to repeat myself, for those who haven’t, come, get on board.

This technique was coined by Julia Cameron in her book, The Artist Way. It is writing your “Morning Pages.”

 

Writing Morning Pages is a mind dump.

 

Morning Pages are an exercise is to write out what’s on your mind, that junk that likes to cycle and recycle.

 

Morning Pages are those first pages writers used to crumple up and vigorously heave into the wastepaper basket. Now, with the keyboard, we are missing that satisfying crumbling and throwing, and I suppose ripping the paper out of the typewriter has a satisfying ring to it. Using the keyboard is the same sort of writing though, without the throwing or ripping. 

Writing your thoughts instead of allowing them to circle allows you to put a period at the end of a sentence. Our fingers get tired of writing the same old thing over and over. That’s punishment, like sending a kid to the blackboard to write out the error of their ways. 

 

So, write for those 15 minutes, all the junk you don’t want anyone to see. Keep them or delete them.

 

You’ll find that after writing those few minutes, that you have exhausted your mind’s ramble, and something of importance begins to worm its way in.

 

I look at those pages as a sort of meditation/cleansing. And it tells your muse you mean business.

 

After I heard that the simple act of writing longhand (cursive) brings forth creativity, I now think we ought to write our morning pages longhand, Probably compose that way as well. But, we probably won’t. It’s easier to type, as I am now doing.

 

Apparently, there is a mind/brain connection with the act of writing with a pencil or pen. The movement of the arm connects the brain somehow, it is a feedback system.

 

I believe so strongly in Morning Pages, that I think non-writers ought to use them.

I’m thinking specifically of those individuals who will tell a story, then retell it, then tell it again. 

 

They have a mind loop.

 

I know they have a need to tell particular stories, for they have some latent emotional impact, often trauma. It’s a sort of Post Traumatic Syndrome. One psychologist commented, “Tell your stories as often as you want, but I think 10 times is enough.”

Put a period at the end of the sentence. 

 

Stop.