I received a forwarded email today, Friday the 13th, from a friend. The opening words were, “If you don’t share this with at least 2 friends, you’ll have a year of bad luck.” I didn’t even bother to read it. Whatever it had to say, I wasn’t interested. As far as I’m concerned, a threat…Continue Reading “A word to the superstitious: Ignore emails that threaten bad luck”
The end of one year and the beginning of another signifies leaving behind the old to embark on a journey into the unknown. For some, shedding what we know and identify with is a daunting, if not downright scary proposition. Many of my fellow baby boomers frequently send me nostalgic emails that are a medley…Continue Reading “Cherish the old while embracing the new”
When I was 15 years old, an outspoken young friend of mine said to me, “Not everyone is going to like you. no matter how nice you are.” I was shocked. How could it be that no matter how hard I tried and no matter what I did to achieve what I thought was perfection,…Continue Reading “Be real, not perfect”
My niece witnessed an older woman in the supermarket checkout line deliberately turning a magazine to hide the cover photo of President-elect Obama. The woman who flipped the magazine around said nothing to explain her strange behavior. Was it a silent protest against a Democrat winning the election? An African-American? I found this story very…Continue Reading “How hate manifests when we’re afraid”
After writing for 28 days, at least 3 hours every day, I am wrung out, but thrilled to have created a novel out of thin air. As I think back over the story I see how each of the plot lines and characters contain elements of myself. All of the issues I’ve tackled are fragments…Continue Reading “Pushing words up the anthill”
Around 15 years ago I met a cute guy who owned a small town newspaper. I admit, I wanted to impress him, and since I wasn’t the only woman vying for his attention, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to dust off my writing skills and submit an article he might find worthy of publishing. Much…Continue Reading “What’s it like being a novelist after 18 days?”
I am writing Chapter 8 of my 30-day novel and wondering why I haven’t written a word of dialogue yet. Being an essayist and poet, I don’t have much occasion to write dialogue, so I consult one of several books with which I’ve surrounded myself in the past couple of weeks to “teach” me how…Continue Reading “Yes, I can do this!”
I admit it. I’m one of those people who has spent her whole life composing novels in her head and never writing one. I even try to live my life as if it were a novel. Oh, don’t get me wrong. I do write. I’ve even been published (aside from these blogs), but the idea…Continue Reading “Who knew novel-writing could be this much fun?”
I recently read a post from another life coach that made a case against expending time and thought to uncover your life’s purpose. Her main argument is that we all have life purposes, often more than one, but if we waste time trying to discover what they are, we waste our lives, period. In other…Continue Reading “Do you really need to know your life purpose?”
I just received a forwarded email from a friend on the East Coast. It’s a series of photos showing all of the “fun” employee-oriented perks at Google headquarters: “decompression capsules,” slides that take you from one floor to another, pool tables and video games, massage chairs, a cozy library, only 4-6 people per work area…Continue Reading “How to nourish creativity: Google knows how”