Magic of Awe Inspires Creativity
- At February 20, 2023
- By Write in Community
- In Blog
8
“My mother loved butterflies. After her celebration of life, a Monarch was fluttering around the exit door. She followed me to my car. Later, I wrote a poem about my mother migrating south with Monarchs. Glorious” – Becky Breed
If someone asks “What makes a good life?” Would 
you say friends and family you can count on? A spiritual connection? Personal resources that make you happy? Dacher Keltner, author of “The Thrilling New Science of Awe,” replied, “Find awe.” In his many years of research, he found that an awe-inspired life gives us meaning, and helps uncover something larger than ourselves–intense joy and a sense of mystery that transcend common life. For artists and writers, there’s more. The magic of awe inspires creativity, creating a sense of wonder and deep curiosity–profound satisfaction and meaning.
Writing From the White-Hot Center
- At January 30, 2023
- By Write in Community
- In Blog
- 8
Writing From the White-Hot Center
This last year I discovered a new writer that I love, the novelist, Lily King. In an essay in the back of one her novels, she tells about doing a reading at an Ivy League college in which, during the Q and A afterwards, she was asked “what factors determine your authorial distance from the narrator?” She responded that “I don’t think when I write. I am like a blind worm on the ground.” I love that! “A blind worm on the ground.”
She goes on to relate how she loves English literature classes and has been an English teacher herself. How she’s discussed and taken great interest in English-teachery things such as themes and yes, authorial distance. But that when she writes, she doesn’t use her “English teacher brain.” Not in the first draft of writing, “What you need,” she writes, “all you need, is your creative, sensual, wide-open brain.”
Read More»Gifts of Creativity: More Good Follows
- At December 19, 2022
- By Write in Community
- In Blog
- 4
“The spirit of an artist’s gifts can wake your own.” – Lewis Hyde
Give Freely
“Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you,” remarks Annie Dillard in her book “Give It All, Give It Now.” She shares her view about the writing and creative life by describing the grand generosity and great courage giving asks of us: to give, to share, to offer what we can to the world. Dillard said when gifts of creativity are offered, “…something more will arise for later, something better.”…and more good follows.
Creating what rings true requires us to pay enormous attention to the world. For many, it is our love and destiny to create–our romance with possibility and the unwritten promise to imagine more. Barb, an artist, saw beauty in her garden and captured it in dazzling watercolor. She painted me a set of beautiful notecards of pink petunias with bright lime green stems. Afterwards, a friend was experiencing a loss and I sent her a flowered notecard with a few lines of poetry. Giving changes us.
Want the world better
Sharing our creativity shows we care about the world and want it better. When Anne Frank picked up her pen to write, although just a little girl, she was possessed of great insight and courage. She had the power to enter the minds and hearts of others bringing about deeper understanding, wider love. It’s true, an act of creation can have a rippling effect. Consider son-in-law Chris who created a magnificent red and white mosaic birdhouse featuring Charlie Parker, a brilliant black saxophonist whose life was cut short. His gift to the world brought new significance to the musician and by donating his creation raised money supporting a burned mountain top in Colorado.
More Good Follows
Ask yourself, the next time you sit down to create, what do you find yourself being pulled toward? Perhaps you want to write poetry about unrequited love, the search for inner peace or the struggle to find meaning and purpose in your existence. Photograph the beauty and finality in nature–or paint an unforgettable purple sunrise. Whatever your gifts are, cultivate imaginative compassion and notice how more good follows. You can begin today. As Anne Franke reminds, “How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” Your life and others will be richer for it. – Becky
Writing/Creativity Exercise:
- Re-read the glorified words of Francis of Assisi, “For it is in the giving that we receive.” To begin, reflect on the many ways you can offer gifts of creativity to others. Recognize and celebrate your talents.
- Now select the ways you want to share and light up someone’s life. Your time, talent and creativity can make a difference. Consider:
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- Interviewing an older relative or neighbor and writing one of his stories.
- Painting a small canvas of a colleague’s dog or the big fish she caught.
- Photographing a beautiful sunset and giving to someone you love.
- Listening and encouraging a friend who is struggling.
- Other ways to give: offering your talent of organization, playing the piano or singing to a shut in, baking and decorating someone’s favorite holiday cookies. The opportunities to give are endless.
For more inspiration, check out our website www.thewritingandcreativelife.com.
Or follow this link to purchase our latest book, The Fire Inside.
Postscript;
“May you be surrounded by friends and family, and if this is not your lot, may the blessings find you in your solitude.” – Leonard Cohen
During this special season, sharing our love and friendship might be the best gifts.
Here’s to the good that you find and the great that awaits.
Warmest Wishes,
Becky
Writing Brings Me Close to the Bone
- At October 17, 2022
- By Write in Community
- In Blog
- 12
Artist shed. Photograph by Chris Carithers
“This is what separates artists from ordinary people: the belief, deep in our hearts, that if we build our castles well enough, somehow the ocean won’t wash them away.” – Anne Lamott
How do I build my castle so part of my story doesn’t go out with the tide? Writing. Writing brings me close to the bone.
Read More»Goodreads Giveaway for The Fire Inside
- At September 19, 2022
- By Write in Community
- In Events
- 1
Are you feeling the need for a little inspiration? THE FIRE INSIDE: A COMPANION FOR THE CREATIVE LIFE by Lucy Adkins and Becky Breed may be just what you’re looking for. And right now, it is being featured on a Goodreads Giveaway.
Enter on Goodreads for your chance to win a free copy!
What Are You Remembering?
- At August 22, 2022
- By Write in Community
- In Blog
- 6
On my stove the kettle whistles and suddenly I see my grandmother’s face in her tiny kitchen. A small, veined hand grasps the hot handle of an old teakettle. Grandmother is making cinnamon tea. She looks out the small window. Above the horizon, a blue mist, small and noisy songbirds. Her face turns to me.
Do dreams flow from memories or do memories become dreams? What are you remembering?
Certain images keep floating in my head and sometimes surprise me when I least suspect. Perhaps only a scrap or fragment of a long held dream resonates, but its incompleteness stirs a longing. I follow it. Maybe the inspiration is an aroma—Old Spice, a horse barn—or the prettyprettypretty sounds of a happy cardinal. Today the inspiration is a treasured photo–a black and white of Grandmother in her kitchen. Then, the whole story comes into focus.
Every year after I could walk, I spent two to three weeks in the summers on my grandparents’ farm. A two-bedroom bungalow with a screened in sagging porch was their humble home. Two big fir trees stood as towering sentries in the front yard. All manner of wildlife homesteaded there—red squirrels, one lonely hoot owl, starlings, goldfinches, and grackles. On clear days, I would climb to the top of the tree and scout the horizon. Once, I saw a red-tailed hawk looking for mice in the cornfield—and getting one—before flapping away to the woods.
Memory carries a strong emotional kick like walking past a playground and suddenly you’re mad again chasing Greg, the fourth grade bully, all over the school yard. These experiences are part of who we are, still inhabiting us sometimes like a summer cold that won’t go away. Experiences that are inside us beg to be freed. Remembering them can be a triumph or a challenge. What are you remembering?
Few rules existed at my grandparents’ house. Until sixth grade, Grandma let me run around without a shirt as long as Grandpa and Uncle Jim were in the field. Divine pleasures. I could eat as many Washington cherries as I wanted from the two trees in the back orchard. My fingers stained bright red. The hay loft was my secret place and it was there I became a little headstrong. No one climbed the ladder to the loft without my permission. Of course not many people asked, but I was always ready waiting for a special knock or the magic word for them to enter.
What are you remembering?
Writing/Creative Exercise:
- Write or create about a treasured object. Take a walk through your house or, perhaps, in your yard. Reflect on two or three objects that you love. For each, consider the history, who gave it to you, what it means to you. Consider its shape, color or place where it belongs. Then, select one that is the most evocative and express your creativity through painting, photography or whatever stirs you.
- Read Photo Album by Meenakski Iyer https://hellopoetry.com/poem/1187839/photo-album/Everyone has certain images that keep floating in their heads. How do we prime these and let them reveal themselves? Begin by scanning through an old photo album of people in your lives. What did they mean to you, to another? What were some of the special stories about them? What do you remember? Select two or three that resonates with you. Choose one. Consider using this line as a starter sentence: It was a day I’ll never forget or She/he had a face of _______. If you’d rather, choose a line that works for you. Then write, repeating the line several times throughout your poem or prose.
For more inspiration, check out our website www.thewritingandcreativelife.com.Or follow this link to purchase our latest book, The Fire Inside.
Want to Consider Collaboration?
- At July 25, 2022
- By Write in Community
- In Blog
- 4
Ever think about collaborating with another writer or artist on a creative project? Wonder how it works? Bryan Collins, host of the “Become a Writer Today” Podcast recently interviewed Becky and me about our collaboration on our two books, Writing in Community and The Fire Inside. We had an intriguing conversation which provided an opportunity for us to think more about collaboration, how it worked successfully for us, and how a collaborative partner can help you to accomplish more–and better!
You may want to know:
How does the collaborative process work?
What are the advantages?
How do you find a collaborative partner?
You can listen to the interview (or view the transcript of it) here.
For more inspiration, check out our website www.thewritingandcreativelife.com.
Or follow this link to purchase our latest book, The Fire Inside.
Father on Father’s Day: Caretaker of the Earth
- At June 13, 2022
- By Write in Community
- In Blog
- 10
We come and go, but the land is always here, and the people who love it and understand it are the people who own it – for a little while.—Willa Cather
Father’s role was caretaker of the earth.
Although my father was a private person, his beliefs were evident in his role as caretaker of the earth—as if it were holy; and the many ways he applied the wisdom of nature to his life. He didn’t just think about how he valued the planet, he lived out that basic precept in his activities of each day. Coming from the old school of farming, he knew that all things mattered, that the world consisted of intricate, interwoven elements and he was a caretaker of that design.
Read More»Mother on Mother’s Day
- At April 18, 2022
- By Write in Community
- In Blog
- 14
Mother on Mother’s Day. How can I possibly write about her? Create something with meaning? Hold her in my heart? Mother-daughter relationships are dynamic, created and recreated over time like an artful layered painting. Our canvas, my mother’s and mine, was brushed with light and shade. Yet, I found there was richness in both.
What Do You Know: This is what I know.
I was aligned in the same orbit with her. We were intertwined with an energy force that allowed me to develop independence and Mother to see with new perspective—giving each the power and space to grow and transform. My relationship like most mother-daughter bonds was complex and layered, creased with the places and depths of our living, and filled with fragile things and other things that mattered. There was synchronicity and love between us.
Read More»The Writing Life: Keeping the Faith
- At March 28, 2022
- By Write in Community
- In Blog
- 6
Are you a writer? A visual artist or musician? As my writing partner, Becky Breed, and I write in The Fire Inside, we are all creative, an inner fire aflame in us, urging us on. But it is not always easy—sticking to our writing or our art–we need to keep the faith.
I believe that the longer we live the creative life, creating poems or paintings, making music, loving our work, sometimes struggling in our work, the more we realize that our art is a calling, our birthright to create. And we are in it for the long haul.
We may come to the realization gradually, or it may be that after two or three years of writing, it suddenly dawns on us that this obsession of ours is not going away. This is not the fad of the moment we pick up for a while, and then drop as interest wanes. It’s more like embarking on a marriage, building a relationship that will last a lifetime.
There will be hard times: days when it’s difficult to get to your easel, when the words for your poem won’t come, or if they do, limp onto the page and fall flat. Nothing worthwhile comes easy, the old saying goes, and that is certainly true of our passions, our art. Still, it is our passion, our deep love, and we want to keep at it, knowing that our lives would not be as rich or as full without it. So you find a way to keep the faith, to keep on going. How do we do that? Here are some tips:
Keeping the Faith
- Look for the joy in the “every-day” of work. Relish those moments when the words flow from the tips of your fingers, when the brushstrokes come free and fluid.
- Read books like Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way and Natalie Goldberg’s Writing Down the Bones. These and other writers provide gentle encouragement and help keep you going.
- Set goals for yourself—such as writing a certain number of pages per month, or sending out a certain number of submissions—and ask a friend to hold you accountable.
- Celebrate your accomplishments—even the small ones. When you find the right color for your painting, the right word for your poem. Give yourself a pat on the back when you send out a story to a potential publisher.
- Develop a work schedule and stick to it as much as you can. Include in your schedule some down time, time to go “off-line” and free your mind.
- Don’t beat yourself up when you stray from your writing schedule or fall short of your goals. Give yourself a break. Be kind. Then get back on track.
- Become a part of your local artist community. A good writing group or artists’ group can provide a lifetime of support and encouragement, and is probably the very best thing you can do to nurture and sustain your creative life.
Elbert Hubbard said that “Art is not a thing, it is a way.” It is not the finished painting that matters, the completed novel (though these accomplishments are wonderful!) It is the everyday of work—the violinist practicing, the writer writing, the many happinesses found in doing what we love. This is why we wrote The Fire Inside—the joy in creating. We hope you pick up a copy and explore its pages. We hope you get in touch with your inner fire—and keep it blazing.
For more ideas to help you along the creative path, see our book, The Fire Inside. We think you’ll be inspired!
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