This summer, I’m going to teach an online course called “Thinking Small to Write Big.” I’ve never taught this course before; the idea emerged from my book Small: The Little We Need for Happiness as a way to incorporate all I’ve discovered about small into …
Many of the writers I work with believe that writing is–and must be–a linear process. When they first sit down to write, whether it’s a short story, a poem, an essay or a novel, they think they have to start at the very beginning–first words, …
After I received a contract for my book Small: The Little We Need for Happiness several months ago, I found myself at a loss for what I could now begin writing. I had spent so much of the previous few years writing and revising the essays, then submitting the manuscript to small presses, that its acceptance at Shanti Arts left a surprising vacuum in my life.
I’m taking up my blog again, hoping to make one posting a week from now–until eternity. I’m taking up my blog again, and at the same time, I’m enlarging it. I originally wrote about writing and writing practice, exploring for my readers how to work …
Choosing to Write Although I’ve been working with writers for many years, exploring with them and within myself, all the misconceptions and anxieties that keep us from writing, I still do not understand fully—as if we ever understand anything fully—why it is so easy for …
For Whom Are You Writing? Recently, several clients have talked about how lonely and isolated they feel when they are writing, how the solitude is difficult for them to tolerate. As I’ve reflected on the struggle of these writers, I realized that their difficulty is …
While sitting down is where writers begin their writing day, even before thinking about sitting down, writers should choose the best place to write. That takes precedence over everything else.