Our bodies create stories. Give yourself a minute to take that in. While we are unconscious, we weave narratives. One-third of our lives are spent sleeping. On average, we can dream anywhere from one to two hours every night. Moreover, we can have four to seven dreams in one night. Five minutes after the end of the dream, half the content is forgotten. After ten minutes, 90% is lost. How can we get to know ourselves in a new way by investigating our dreams? I've been keeping track of my dreams since I was a teenager, and even before then I had dreams that were recurring as a child. As … [Read more...]
Writing With Triggers and Trauma
(Re) Considering Trauma In my new day job, I work tangentially with people in drug and alcohol recovery. I say “tangentially” because I do marketing and am not a therapist, but being around it starts to seep in. Most of us have either had some sort of trauma or have known someone close to us who has an addiction problem. One thing about trauma is that once you start to see it or recognize it in other people you begin to see it in yourself. Looking through the lens of trauma puts your own in focus. Most people have trauma – it is very hard to get through your life without an accident, … [Read more...]
Orienteering Your Life With Personal Maps
The lyrics from the song Once in a Lifetime from the Talking Heads plays in my head sometimes: And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack/ And you may find yourself in another part of the world/ And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile/ And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife/ And you may ask yourself, "Well... how did I get here?" There have been quite a few periods of drastic change in my life. You look up, the dust has settled, and you wonder, where does this leave me? Where do I go now? What are my new, and bigger dreams? … [Read more...]
Inspiring Writing Prompts for Self-Care
“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” ― Audre Lorde Writing is a way for me to hit the "refresh" button. To wring myself out when I feel like a crumpled rag or just get my feelings out in one long diatribe (that no one will ever need to see). I have definitely been through difficult times when I began to wonder if anything made me feel calm and at ease. Whether it was local trouble - seeing the homeless line the freeway underpasses here in Los Angeles and the pain of knowing how unkind society can be. Violence on the news … [Read more...]
Our Ten Most Popular Writing Prompts
Sometimes you just need to be able to choose the writing prompt you are in the mood for or see what calls out to you. Remember to turn off your ringer, put on some headphones, and maybe meditate for a few minutes to find your focus. Rewrites are for later. Keep your fingers moving and remember that your best friend is the word "AND" because it begs you to keep going. 10 Most Popular Memoir Class Writing Prompts Writing a Letter to Your Teenage Self Contemplating Your Unique Life Gifts Writing Your Recipe For Resistance Metamorphosis: A Writing Prompt Your Life is a Writing … [Read more...]
Writing Advice to My Fifteen-Year-Old Self
New Writing Prompt: How to write a letter to your teenage self! Try starting out with second-person to make it intimate (I recorded a video here on YouTube about the second person if you need a refresher). A good jumping off place is "You think that..." or "When you try...." Really imagine yourself - get out a photograph. One of those hideous school photos or a yearbook. Doesn't it look like a different world? What would your teenage self be the most shocked by? Is it something personal that has happened to you? Have you overcome something you never thought you would be capable of? Can you … [Read more...]
Writing Prompt: What are Your Life Gifts?
There are certain things that are woven into the fabric of your life that become part of who you are, but because they seem so inevitable it is hard to think of them as a gift. One of my friends experienced a rift in her life - when she was a child her mother decided to leave her husband in the US - and she took her daughter and resettled in Portugal. Leaving San Diego, California behind as an 8 year old, and starting her life again in Lisbon with her mother was a strange process. Not knowing the language or customs, not having any friends or people to go to for comfort radically changed … [Read more...]
Writing Prompt: Writing Your Recipe for Resistance
Sometimes it feels like the world is bent on telling you who you "must" be. As a prompt, write your own recipe for resistance. What do you suggest for shaking it up? Today is a day to look for cracks to move through. Change form. Pick a new exit. Try a new greeting, and a new way of saying goodbye. If it feels like a yes, say yes. If it feels like a no, then no way. Stop coming up with a reason. Today you don't have to explain yourself. Move towards people who you can sit in silence with. Share things you have made with people, but don't ask for feedback. Feel free to change your mind, … [Read more...]
Maintaining Your Practice: Your Life is a Writing Prompt
The last few months have been difficult for me as I try to help my family through a devastating illness. I have been in three different hospitals in two states and it reminds me of another sage whose life was cut short, John Lennon. Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans. So how do you maintain a writing practice during chaos, illness, overwork, stress and change? One way is to treat your life as a writing prompt. At the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota I took copious notes. Between appointments with my family I wrote down exchanges between couples sitting … [Read more...]
Spark & Flow FREE Creativity eBook Download!
Let's start with the good news: you don't need to find creativity, it is already inside of you! The Spark & Flow eBook was created to give you ideas about how to access, play with, experiment on, and move with your already existing creativity. Our brains are dialectical storytelling machines. If I give you two images, your brain will immediately compare, contrast, and begin to tell a story about the two scenes. We cannot NOT tell stories. Our very consciousness is a long repeated internal story about who we are, where we came from, and what we want. A recent article in the Los Angeles … [Read more...]