I wonder if it’s “the” writing life or “a” writing life?  I suppose it’s “my” writing life I’m about to describe as while all writers write, each of us approaches our practice differently.

Annie Dillard called her book The Writing Life and I rather like that title so used it for this blog. There are obvious similarities among writers’ lives: we all write whether for publication or to record and explore life’s journey. Sometimes we don’t write but it’s writing that sustains us, nourishes us, keeps us connected to all that was, that is and that will be.

When writers say they’re writing, they could be creating new work or attending to the myriad of other aspects of their writing life. I like to call my “to do” list:

Passions + Possibilities.

Ideas

There are always ideas and one of those good ideas is to capture them in a notebook that can include questions and thoughts about future possibilities. Sometimes those ideas don’t take too long to become reality. I once created a small collage with a door and thought of a title for a poetry workshop: “Poetry as a Doorway In . . . and a Welcome Home.” Not too long after, I began offering writing circles at Bethlehem Centre in Nanaimo with that title and am now leading a Writing Life women’s writing circle with the same theme. The mandala shown at the left is titled “Come to Centre” and is by Sarah Clark. It’s the symbol I use for the “Poetry as a Doorway In” writing circles.

The “ideas” notebook could be a place to keep lists so they’re all in one place. I have a list for blog ideas, book review ideas, and ideas for future writing circles.  And I still get ideas for a novel I wrote a long time ago called “Ordinary Life” as well as ideas and quotes for a personal essay I’m working on.

Already in the World

Writers are not necessarily good promoters of their own work but it must be done to let others know the work exists. Once the book is available, it needs to be nurtured along it’s path in the world otherwise know as publicity and marketing.

The image to the left is from the cover of Writing to Map Your Spiritual Journey, a writing resource I have available through the International Association for Journal Writing (IAJW). While it’s noted on my website and visitors to the IAJW site will see it, I do like to let people know, which I can, that it’s available. So I’ll provide a link right here, right now!

While Writing to Map Your Spiritual Journey is available digitally, I would also like to have print versions done. That will involve having some typos corrected and having the graphic designer, Mark Hand, get it ready for the printer.

Writing Home: A Whole Life Practice is already in the world as it’s a book that is part of a mentoring program I offer. I’m out of books though so need to do a second printing and I’d like to make it available for anyone i.e. without the need to be part of the mentoring program. That involves some tending to corrections as well which can be done with Sarah Clark who is my own in-house designer!

Proposals

When a project or poem is done, it’s time to send it out into the world. That seems a better plan to me than filing it away. There are other ways to share of course such as in a letter to a friend or in a circle of friends.

I have a collection of poems that I call “Modern Words for Beauty.” Many of them were started while on retreat with other poets so were shared in their earlier versions. I’ve been looking for a publisher for this second volume of my poetry. One of the “rejection” emails I received said said that writers must persist and indeed we must.

Praise
Every
Realization
Surely and
Instinctively: a
Soulful
Testament

I’m working on some personal essays and sending them out one-by-one to contests with literary journals. I like contests as there is a reasonable timeframe for hearing back.  One of my essays began with an idea proposed to the co-editor at Freefall Magazine. I worked with Crystal MacKenzie over many months and my essay, “Frogs Fell from the Sky: Fiction in Poetry” appeared in the spring issue of Freefall. You can also read it online here.

One Main Project

Creativity coach Eric Maisel who is one of my fellow journal council members with the IAJW, says writers and artists ought to have one main project. That does make sense to me. While I work on individual essays that could become a collection and the other things noted above, my main project is “Inside the Treasure House: Ceremonies + Practices for Your Writing life.”

A Table of Contents is serving as my outline as I write about my writing life with passion and possibility.  Writing is my anchor so sticking to it during the pandemic year was grounding and sustaining.

Journaling

Whether I’m working on any of the above aspects of my writing life, journaling is at the foundation of all of it. It’s what I do first thing in the morning when I write down my dreams and ponder the day ahead.  I begin with greeting my guides including the trees right outside my window and the mountain known as the Grandmother of All Surrounding Mountains to the Snuneymuxw people.

I often take a flower essence (which I offer in the writing circles as well). Right now, I’m taking a combination essence called “Following Desire” from Raven Essences. It’s made up of several flowers and other combinations including Gloxinia, Mock Orange, Cuban Hibiscus, Portia Tree, Castor Bean, Columbine and Sedum.

I usually pick a card or perhaps three from “On a Positive Note”, mandala meditation cards by Sarah Clark. I read a poem or some prose from an inspiring book. Lately I’ve been reading The Art of Aliveness: A Creative Return to What Matters Most by Flora Bowley (Hierophant, 2021).  I appreciate Flora’s question: “In times of transition, circle back to this potent question: Would I rather be comfortable and stagnant or uncomfortable and alive?”

Journaling is what we do in the Writing Life women’s writing circle and much of it becomes part of longer pieces or poems that can be worked on and shared again. The same happens when journaling on my own. I take my writing from the writing table in my bedroom across the hall to my office where I have my computer and all sorts of books to which to refer in a beautiful space.

Aides to the Writing Life/A Basket of Tools

All of these things, noted above, are aides to my writing life as well as a creative and supportive partner, a beautiful home in which to live and create, a regular income in the form of an Old Age Pension, and writing friends. Besides weekly writing circles, I like getting together with other women writers to chat. Literary events have been a great way to connect to other writers and I look forward to in-person events soon. (I am thankful for Zoom for the times when we couldn’t meet in person and as an added bonus, seeing people who live far away.) As I’ve been going to poetry retreats for a long time, I am part of a community of writers that will begin to meet again in person, possibly in the Fall.

This is another bonus to sending things out and having them published as books or in anthologies and literary journals. You get to share your work with other writers and readers and celebrate the written word together.

Flora Bowley writes about “Your Basket of Tools” in her book noted above: The Art of Aliveness. She says that her basket of tools “took many years of dedicated work and curiosity to acquire, and I’m so grateful I have them when I need them. At the same time, I’m careful to keep the basket behind me when I’m painting.” She doesn’t want to give the tools priority over her blank canvas. She wants to keep “the channel open between me and the uncertain unfolding of my current creation.”

“The blank canvas is where life unfolds,” Flora says. Her wisdom very much applies to writing. (She writes books too!) She finds “the most life-giving practice is to find a balance between our well-intentioned routines and the space we need to keep free for improvisation, surprise and change. We keep our basket of lived experience behind us, while keeping the path of possibility open before us.” I could also say: The blank page is where life unfolds.