Category: Dream
Wednesday, Sep 4, 2019 | Big Thoughts, Confessions, Death, Dream, Family, Holidays, Kids, Meditation, Peace, Space, Spirit, Word of the Year, Writing |
My word of the year is SPACE. What I didn’t expect to find within this word is its companion, SILENCE. Silence can be a challenging state to sit within. I don’t always want to hear my own thoughts so clearly, or recognize the distracted and tumbling, tangled nature of my own interior life.
We spent last week, the last week before school started, at the cottage that belonged to my stepmom, and still feels like hers, even though she’s been gone for more than a year now. We love going there, love being there. It’s been a gift to have this place in our lives, and the kids have memories that go back, now, 11 summers. It’s the kind of place that has become a touchstone, and returning is a kind of pilgrimage. Returning is a measure of time passing. While we’re there, though only for a week at most, it feels like we’ve always been there and will always be there.
You can only get there (easily, practically) by boat. About five years ago, Kevin developed an inner ear disturbance that’s triggered by boat rides, and each year the after-effects would last longer and longer (months, even), so for the past two summers, he’s hiked in on a path that literally no one else uses. It’s overgrown. It takes him about an hour and a half. And this year, it was occupied by swarms of insects. He arrived at the cottage looking like a wild man. He wasn’t sure he could manage the hike out, but on Monday, he and Rose trekked the path again, to save his brain.
The corollary to his necessary hike is that I’ve had to learn how to drive a boat (not high on my list of things I wanted to learn how to do). We do what needs doing to get us to this place.
There is plenty of space at the cottage. Space for the kids to play. A big lake for kayaking and adventuring, alone or together. Star-gazing at night. Shelves of books. Late, lazy mornings. Late-night all-family card games. We never seem to need anything more than what we’ve got. Even when meals get creative, by necessity.
Space, silence. Quiet.
I tuned out from the news, from podcasts, from the internet almost altogether. But I did listen to one podcast, On Being, on Sunday. The title was: Silence and the Presence of Everything.
Isn’t that something? How the themes of our lives get tied together by invisible thread? I’d been worrying about space and silence. Silence as a negative. Silence as too much space for my mind to listen, anxiously, to itself.
Silence. Presence. Everything.
“Silence and the Presence of Everything” was about listening. Not active listening for a particular thing you expect to hear, or have been told to listen for, or pay attention to. Listening to what’s there to be heard. Listening without judgement.
An interesting thing happened at the cottage. I managed to write a bit every afternoon, when no one was paying attention; no one even really noticed. What was strange and thrilling was how I would fall into the writing (fiction), almost as if by drifting toward an idea. An image would surface. I would let it drift. I would be resting or sitting by the water. And some small fragment would drift toward me. And then I would get up and write. The writing felt similar to listening.
It didn’t feel active. It didn’t feel forced. It felt like I’d tipped sideways into another time and place and body, and I was just there.
Now I’m here, home again. Dreading a root canal tomorrow morning, but otherwise glad for a day, today, in which I’ve done exactly what I want to do with all my new-found, new-made space: I wrote. I’d gotten up early to exercise with friends and by 10AM when everyone had left the house and the laundry was underway, I felt tired. So I meditated/napped for 10 minutes. And then I got up and wrote. I told myself: Remember to meditate/listen/nap before writing. Drift into what you’re about to do. Listen. It’s okay if listening turns into dreaming. Let yourself drift.
Space = silence. Silence = listening. Listening = drifting. Drifting = door opening to fictional world. Step inside. Space = writing.
Also, space = rest.
I’ll write another blog post (maybe) about what it feels like to let go of the need to pay attention to a particular something, and just be. It’s almost the opposite of striving. I’m such a striver. To be without purpose, listen without demand; it eliminates the task of waiting. It makes silence okay. Drifting toward mystery. Because mystery is okay too.
xo, Carrie
Monday, Jul 22, 2019 | Big Thoughts, Confessions, Dream, Spirit, Work, Writing |
Not every day is a good day.
There are days when you will feel lesser than your usual self. Days when you will wonder what this darkness is you’re carrying and whether you’ll have the patience and the courage to dig into it, and maybe unearth it, learn from it.
You will feel like you have nothing to offer. Yet you will go on offering, as if pulling scarves from your sleeve, rabbits from your hat.
You will wonder at the raw stupidity of your own ambition. You will be infuriated by your flurries of self-delusion. Who did you think you were?
You’ll go for a run, trying to run out your misery, like it could be wrung from you like sweat. You won’t know who to blame. You’ll be all out of scapegoats, so you’ll turn on yourself and say, You, it was you all along, you and your inflated imagination.
And you won’t know what to say in return.
You’ll forget how to be kind to yourself. The mirror will show you failure and worse — self-pity. You’ll feel sick with nerves. Worthless. Empty, vacuous.
You’ll wonder: Is this depression?
You’ll wish you’d never started down this road. If you could go back in time — ah, but you’ll know. You’ll know that even if you could go back in time, you wouldn’t be able to tell yourself not to try, not to imagine, not to do the work. You’ll know this is part of the cycle, part of the deal. You’ll know it actually doesn’t matter how good or bad you are at this thing you’ve chosen to do, and that’s the trouble, that you’re going to keep doing this, this thing, for the rest of your life, and there’s nothing else for it.
You’ll need to pick yourself up, scrape yourself off, and pull yourself together. You can’t diagnose yourself. You can only write about it. Writing is what you’ve got. Even if, today, it means nothing to you.
Even if this is one of those days, one of those anxious, splintering days.
Tomorrow it might mean something again.
And if it doesn’t, wait till the next day. And the next day. You’re imagining an enormous crater where your dreams used to be, but even at the very bottom of that crater, you’ll poke around and find something to entertain you, console you, and keep you alive.
I promise.
xo, Carrie
Wednesday, Feb 13, 2019 | Adventure, Art, Cartoons, Creativity course, Dream, Exercise, Family, Fire, Friends, Fun, Laundry, Lynda Barry, Spirit, Work |
Context: A student introduced me to the Hourlies project, wherein you draw a cartoon marking each waking hour over the course of a 24-hour day. I’m going to assign this as our class’s Reading Week homework. Fortuitously, I decided to test it yesterday/today, on what would become a snow day, and therefore essentially useless to me for other purposes.
Observations: I couldn’t do this project while doing any other project requiring sustained attention. But I’m playing around with ideas for how to do it again — perhaps once a month, or perhaps, when I’ve got time to spare, doing a marathon version over a week; and I’m brainstorming about how to do it as its own standalone project. I really really really did not want to stop today, and in fact made an extra panel (there are two 4:00PMs). I learned a massive amount, which you can see for yourself by comparing the first panel to the last.
Feedback: Welcome, please.
xo, Carrie
Thursday, Jan 10, 2019 | Art, Big Thoughts, Cartoons, Creativity course, Drawing, Dream, Fire, Friends, Lynda Barry, Play, Space, Spirit, Writing |
How often do you sit and draw in public? Or sit and write in public? Can you imagine sitting and colouring in a child’s colouring book in public? That was the first task I set for my students this week. Most students completed it. I did too.
And as I sat at my daughter’s violin lesson, crayoning colour onto a rabbit (who was wearing running gear) chasing a rooster (who was not wearing running gear), I kept hoping no one would notice. As soon as someone did, I felt compelled to explain: this is an assignment for blah blah blah. See, actually, I’m not flaky or weird. I’m doing this for a legitimate reason.
Because colouring rabbits and roosters with crayons is not legit all on its own.
Why not? Because I’m not a child.
When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I grew up, I put away childish things.
I don’t know where that came from — well, I do: 1 Corinthians, chapter 13, verse 11 — but the words just popped into my head, and I want to rebel! I will not put away childish things!
I’m feeling such excitement about making space to make things. I’m feeling excitement because I’m making space! I’m making space for myself, and for others. We’re going to make so many things! We are already making things! I don’t know what these things will be. I don’t know. I’m going to let myself rest in the not knowing.
from Lynda Barry’s What It Is
… To be able to stand not knowing long enough to let something alive take shape!
The two questions Lynda Barry is referring to, in her cartoon, above, are the ones we’re always asking ourselves, the ones that pop into our brains unbidden and stop us from making things: Does this suck or is this good? If it sucks, why bother? If it’s good, what’s it gonna do for me?
You can’t really stop yourself from asking those questions. I mean, the critical brain has its uses. But you can find an answer that will quiet both questions.
The answer is: I don’t know. But I’m doing it anyway.
It’s only week one, but already the work my students are showing me is blowing my mind. I’m seeing in many of them this huge appetite to make things. Like they’ve been waiting for someone to come along and tell them to make things. And these things, these amazing, expressive, funny, sad, wild things are just waiting inside of them to be made.
I’ve never coloured in a public place before, though I often write and draw in public. In order to do this, I claim a built-in excuse: I’m a writer! What a privilege it is to give myself that kind of permission — permission to do these fundamentally embarrassing tasks in public.
Why embarrassing? Because someone might look at what I’m making? A little bit, maybe.
Because no one else is doing it? A little bit, maybe.
Because making things is kind of pretentious, while also being kind of childish? Ah. Yes. That.
At night, our brains dream, constructing metaphors out of images from our daily lives, whether or not we are aware of this activity. And our waking bodies and minds want to do this too — to construct meaning from the material that surrounds us, and that we carry in us. We want also, joyfully and freely, to play. To wonder. To be here and not here. To lose track of time because we’re so occupied by our task.
This is not merely a childish desire, it is a human desire, it propels us and compels us, and sometimes it makes us sick and sad and unhappy, when we bottle it up or it struggles within us, unrecognized.
The desire to make things, to express our creativity, is fundamental. It is human.
On the page with the running rabbit and rooster, I coloured the leaves on the tree green — didn’t even think, just reached for green. Why green? I thought, pressing the crayon into the soft paper, feeling a bit annoyed with myself. Does the grass need to be green, too, and the sky blue? I found pleasure in choosing magenta for the tree’s trunk. But my flowers were yellow. I wanted everything to look pretty. In the end, I wasn’t satisfied with the colours I’d chosen, but I wrote my name at the bottom in purple block letters. A child would turn the page and start colouring another picture.
I’ll do the same. Because I don’t know yet what I’m making. I don’t know, I don’t know. But I’m doing it.
Do you need permission to do this too? If it helps, you can say that I told you to. Make things. Colour in public. Draw your own tiger. You have permission. You always, always have permission.
xo, Carrie
Sunday, Jan 6, 2019 | Cartoons, Creativity course, Dream, Exercise, Lists, Lynda Barry, Meditation, Music, Peace, Play, Sleep, Space, Spirit, Word of the Year, Writing, Yoga |
Puppy photo unrelated to post. Rose with her best friend Murphy, who is six weeks older and three times bigger.
Hello, 2019.
Hello, pleasant glass of white wine near the wrist. Hello, Saturday evening.
Hello, my lovely kind encouraging friends who somehow have found me here, in this online state in which I exist, occasionally, as if I’ve peeled myself apart to become a thing both corporeal and ethereal at once.
Today, this is what I did with a spare hour or so — drew a cartoon showing the Classroom Rules* for my new course. It seemed like a good use off my time. Why not? *with thanks to Lynda Barry for the inspiration
My new word of the year has arrived! Last night, I spoke it out loud at my Word of the Year group, so it’s official.
SPACE
Another one-syllable word: FIRE, 2018; STAND, 2017; PEACE, 2016; LIGHT, 2015. I must be drawn the solidity of the single syllable, because the choice hasn’t been deliberate. I only just noticed. The word SPACE called out to me this past fall, when I felt overwhelmed with tasks and responsibilities. I was craving not physical space, but spiritual space, mental space, space to think clearly and slowly, space to formulate, to spread out my ideas and gaze upon them, space to be whole, calm, peaceful. It has emotional and figurative connotations for me, rather than concrete ones.
But a word has a habit of showing more of itself than one can guess.
What will I make space for, in my mind and in my heart, and in my days? A friend on FB posted 100 things she intends to do this year, but I don’t think my list is so long.
- draw cartoons for class
- draw cartoons for larger project
- listen to music
- find new favourite songs, add to playlist
- revise / rewrite novel project
- write new stories for a partly-completed collection
- read peers’ work, share work with peers
- apply for grants
- go to Lynda Barry workshop this summer
- retreat weekend solo
- retreat weekend with friends
- yoga in front of the fire
- kundalini yoga
- read novels
- host a poetry night
- eat dessert with my family
- cuddle with Rose
- go for walks, be outside
- write in my notebook
- play the piano and sing
- visit my grandma
- meet friends
- connect with people
- lift weights
- cook vegetarian suppers
- play
- meditate
- sleep in
- go to Spain
- take a trip with my family
- go camping
- sit around a campfire
- lie on my back and look at the stars
- let myself dream
Today, I’ve done #1, #3, #16, and #28, and #16 is about to happen! (Panettone!)
xo, Carrie
PS Read this poem by a former student. It’s so beautiful, I keep reading it over and over. Sending huge gratitude to former students who continue to reach out to share their work with me. Thank you, thank you, a thousand times thank you.
Saturday, Apr 28, 2018 | Big Thoughts, Dream, Fire, Kevin, Lists, Organizing, Publishing, Writing |
Yesterday, at piano lessons, I wrote out some plans in an attempt to frame my goals in terms that were clear and measurable.
The template I followed was to name my identity or ROLE (or the identity or role that I wanted to claim), name GOALS for myself within that role, and name STRATEGIES or practical tasks I could do to achieve that goal, or some parts of that goal. The final piece of the puzzle was to BUILD ACCOUNTABILITY into my goals—in other words, involve others.
And I recognized that accountability is where the concept, and shape, of writing communities takes on real life and value.
This exercise helped me understand that my starting place should be with a role and goals; that’s the only way I’ll be able to understand what a writing community, and accountability, means to me, or what kinds of community feed and sustain the goals I’m setting for myself.
Here’s how the exercise looked on the page, roughly speaking.
For role, I started with WRITER.
I named two goals: PUBLISH NEW BOOK + PUBLISH SHORT STORIES/ESSAYS IN (LITERARY) MAGAZINES
Then I named strategies for approaching each.
PUBLISH NEW BOOK: Find publisher for The Swimmer (new novel manuscript); rewrite/edit Francie (novel manuscript in progress); research toward new manuscript; write new manuscript (novel; as yet undefined)
PUBLISH SHORT STORIES/ESSAYS: Contact editors; send out stories; polish stories; maintain a spreadsheet to track submissions; write new stories and essays; apply for grants or writer-in-residence positions
I noticed that there were two distinct categories within each larger goal: 1. strategies for getting published and 2. strategies for writing new work
Ergo, a third goal: WRITE NEW WORK.
And, my strategies for the goal.
WRITE NEW WORK: write on campus (i.e. free from distraction); contact editors (pitch story ideas); write with friends.
What surprised and pleased me about this analysis is the level of accountability (aka writing communities) already built into existing strategies. (Maybe you would find the same?!) For example, built into “find a publisher” is accountability: my agent is involved in this process. I’m not tackling it alone. However, I’ve got little/no accountability built into rewrite/edit my work-in-progress. This is of my own doing: I’m extremely private and superstitious about work in progress. The closest I’ve come to building accountability into this stage is to write/rewrite in parallel with a friend; Kevin is also my first reader on all manuscripts, but he’s not an editor, and besides, our marriage depends on him NOT offering editorial advice on my rough drafts. So here is a gap where I can ask: do I need more accountability at this stage in the process? And my honest answer is: I don’t know. I’ve handled this stage on my own FOREVER, and with measurable success.
But I’m open to considering a change.
I would be even more open, in fact, to seeking earlier editorial feedback on the short stories and essays I’ve been writing. This could be a wise step to add before submitting to magazines. Food for thought.
To return to the goal of writing new work, I wonder, at present, what does “writing with friends” look like? What’s the picture it makes in my mind? Perhaps it means what I’m already doing: Parallel writing at a friend’s kitchen table. Perhaps it means another workshop with Lynda Barry (though not this summer, sadly). I also think it means writing along with my students in class. However, given my current daily commitments, I don’t think it means organizing or leading writing workshops or a larger writing group … but perhaps it will mean that someday.
If you feel inspired or intrigued, I hope you’ll give this exercise this a whirl! Name your role, your goals, your strategies, and the ways in which you plan to build in accountability. How will you measure success?
I will measure success in BIG tangible goals, but also in TINY steps along the way: every time I write something new, including this post, I’ve met a goal. I’ve dropped a pebble on the path. Do cartoons count? YES! Private journal rants? YES! Letters to the editor? PROBABLY, HEY WHY NOT!
Yesterday, I also named and analyzed two other roles: TEACHER and FRIEND/FAMILY MEMBER. I won’t go into detail here. But we all have more than one role, so it’s worth considering how these roles overlap and interplay, and limit or feed each other.
Naming your ROLE will change how you frame your approach. How you see yourself is key, it’s critical, it’s the MOST IMPORTANT PART of this whole exercise. It’s also worth remembering that this isn’t a one-time assessment, but needs to be examined and altered as we continue to grow and change, as new roles are thrust on us, often out of our control, or new circumstances bring loss. Personally, I loved doing this exercise. Maybe you will find it clarifying too?
xo, Carrie
Page 3 of 8«12345...»Last » 