August is poetry postcard month, and though I’ve resisted the temptation for a few years, this year I’m back at it, thanks to timely pressure from my friend Carla. Here are my excuses. 1. I’m teaching a class this summer. 2. I’m busy with my daughters in the summer and any semblance of a routine […]
“Your first task as a creative person is to ‘mind your mind’ and think thoughts that serve you. Doesn’t it make sense to speak to yourself in ways that help you create more deeply and more regularly, that allow you to detach more effectively from the everyday chaos of ordinary life, that decrease your anxiety […]
My friend Beverly sent me this list, with a note, “Works for novels, too.” Billy Wilder’s ten rules of good filmmaking: 1: The audience is fickle. 2: Grab ‘em by the throat and never let ‘em go. 3: Develop a clean line of action for your leading character. 4: Know where you’re going. 5: The […]
A conversation this morning about fear and what to do with it, and then this quote in my afternoon reading: “The pain is in the aversion. The healing magic is attention. Properly attended to, pain can answer our most crucial questions, even those we did not consciously frame. The only way out of our suffering […]