Low in Writing Inspiration? Hit a Meeting (or a Horse Movie)

Photo by Lucie Hošová on Unsplash

I was a horse nut as a child.

No doubt about it. I ate, slept and dreamt horses. I remember a junior school teacher asking me once if I might consider broadening my topics to complete a book report, story or project on anything other than the horse. I thought he was crazy. At the time, I took his comment as a personal slight, but looking back, he was probably just bored.

Do you remember those Participation videos; the ones with Hal Johnson and Joanne Macleod, sweating it up in their tights, encouraging us couch potato television viewers to get up and get going? As a little girl, my dream, my goal for participation, was to be able to catch my own pony and saddle it up all by myself and the day I achieved this feat brought me immense pride. Read more

The Mindful Writer & WWIV

Ever tried to herd cats? That question usually produces wry smiles and laughter.  It’s tough when you discover a group you cherish is less like-minded than you believed. 

And so it is with writers. We are all groping blindly for the path that will lead us where we want to go. Sometimes the path is 100% clear but more often, it’s just plain murky. Each time this happens in my world I reach for one of the myriad of writing books that I own. This time it was “The Mindful Writer– Noble Truths of the Writing Life” by Dinty W. Moore (2012). I reviewed his restatement of the 4 noble truths of Buddhism as they apply to the writing life and rapidly concluded that this was exactly what I needed to get back on my path. Read more

REBOOT

Sometimes crap just happens.
Three weeks ago, I was happily enjoying my time in the Laurentians with people I had not been physically near to in two years. It was a beautiful day, I was striding along, possibly humming a happy tune to myself – until suddenly I wasn’t. Faster than it takes for you to read this, I flew off a ledge I hadn’t known was there, landed hard, and just like that, broke a bone in the middle of my foot. A spiral fracture. The first day of vacation! Read more

Not Lucky

Do you remember the scene in Harry Potter when he won the tiny bottle of Felix Felicis or “liquid luck”? The magical potion guaranteed that the person would be successful at whatever they attempted for a short period of time. When Harry used the potion, it steered him to be in the right place at the right time and helped him say the right thing. Ironically, it didn’t allow him to have something “magical” happened for him—he just knew the right path to be on but he still had to walk along it. Don’t you wish you could have that precious jar of liquid luck to use?

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On The Rocks

The little boat
This is my little boat …

Have you ever been on the rocks? It’s a nautical term. Specifically it originated as a sailing term. It means that you can’t maneuver in any direction other than into peril. Specifically, the wind is such and the gear is such that you are heading for a reef or rocky shore and you do not have the time, skill, manpower and wind to save you from an assured wreck.

I’ve been there. Well, I mean, I’ve been in a situation where nothing I could do Read more

Letting Go

 

“The most exquisite paradox: as soon as you give it all up, you can have it all. As long as you want power, you can’t have it. The minute you don’t want power, you’ll have more than you ever dreamed possible.” ~Ram Dass


As writers, sometimes we want so badly to be published, that we will do just about anything to make that success happen. What ultimately happens is that we get stuck on a gerbil that’s spinning so fast, we can’t get off.

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Accountability Partners: Are They Beneficial?

Accountability Partners: Colleen Winter & Lori Twining

I have a simple goal: I want a writing career.

Unfortunately, it is not as simple as quitting my day job and writing the damn novel. Other things factor into a writing career, besides having money to pay the bills. In 2021, as a writer, it is essential to have a social media presence, network with others, be searchable on Google, be knowledgeable and experienced with the craft of writing, have an agent, have a publisher, and the list goes on and on. It is endless.

Is a writing career something I can do alone?

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Long Distance Writing

Long Distance Writing

A recent visit with a forever friend has resulted in a new collaboration; we are going to start writing together this fall. That is, come up with story ideas, contribute to writing and editing and hold each other accountable.

We had not seen each other for more than ten years, keeping in touch only sporadically through email and Christmas cards during that time. She returned to our hometown this summer to sell her family’s home so we got to hang out before her return to British Columbia.

It is one of those friendships where no matter the time lapsed between visits, we pick up where we left off; an example of the old adage, ‘Make new friends but keep the old. The new are sliver, the old are gold”. Sharing mistakes, adventures and naivete as teens and twenty-somethings provides lasting bonds.  

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