Writing -- and life -- is about balance

By now, most people have heard that my husband lost his job. His position, along with the rest of the staff, was eliminated. Rather than cry a river, we're making the best of a crummy situation and getting resourceful. For now, we are OK.

For now.

It's so easy to get comfortable, to sink into a life that is familiar, like an old pair of sweats, and never want to leave. To think of change is to unravel. Our backs go up and we start to get defensive of that life that we grew to love so dearly.

In my last writing course, Fearless Writing, I talked a lot about taking risks, doing things differently and trying new things when all along I was doing the same thing every day as I do now. Sure, I take more risks than most but the big picture stuff, it all remains wrapped around me like a cozy blanket.

I don't want to sit on just any cushion in life. I like this one, the one that is perfectly molded to fit my body, thank you very much. I can no longer question why my daughters both are so attached to their little bear blankets that they've had since infancy. Of course they still need those. Of course.

And yet my cushion has been sucked out from underneath of me and we're having to adapt to the changes to the life we were so desperately clinging on to with no inclination it would change. The changes of routine and cushy bank accounts and getting used to a New Normal are upon us.

So much of this lesson has to do with writing. It's not easy to write when things are really good. It's always easier to let the tears flow and drip down onto the page. But that's not what a writer should do. A writer has to return to the page day after day for the good and for the bad. It's only in between all of that when we start to see ourselves and our writing for what it truly is in the balance.

I'm so looking forward to the writing retreat that I'm hosting so that we can walk in the balance together.

Like a grumpy bear -- it's time to wake up

It has been a long, sloggy, wet Spring. And I feel much like a grumpy, hungry bear right now. A bear in need of nourishment and sunlight and energy to run and play, again.

This is exactly why I am hosting a writing retreat on a friend's very tranquil, very majestic farm. It's not a working farm but a lot of acres of rolling hills, intense beauty and nature all around.

That's how I get my energy, that's how I get filled up inside. Being outside, staring up at the sky and then writing it all down so fast -- as if it will slip away from memory if I do not.

We need creative nourishment almost as much as we need food and yet so many just ignore that little facet of their being. That same being who goes without a break, without something wonderful to cling on to ... will just slumber on, trod on, drag on watching the clock and crossing off their to-do list.

Do they dare to step outside and let their feet touch the dew-drenched grass? Do they stop and just lounge on the hammock or are they busy mopping and sweeping the floors? Do they ever just sit and do nothing, nothing at all?

Well, writing is on my to-do list every day and while I may not get to it every single day, I sure do want to try. And, believe it or not, we have more time than we think to write or paint or do any other Art we wish to do. This retreat will point that out in a few different head-bonking ways.

Please join me in Waking Up. Please join me in dragging ourselves out of spring and springing forth into summer. Please join me to write all day in the wonders of nature.

Peace.

Wake Up! A one-day writing retreat:

Forget the coffee. Wake up to the life that is already happening all around you. Pay attention. Let go. Be free. This one-day retreat on a farm in Glen Rock will help you discover 12 writing tools you can use anywhere, anytime in order to live a more mindful, creative life.

We often, as artists, think we don’t have much time to write or create. And yet, so much of art and creating is about noticing -- noticing the way the morning breeze hlps the curtains dance to the songbirds outside. Noticing a stranger’s wrinkled smile. Noticing a loved one’s broken heart. Art is what happens when we’re too busy to pay attention. This retreat will help discover a life worth writing about – every day.

Who should register? Writers. Wannabe writers. Artists. Creative souls. Anyone. You. Your friends. A beginner. Advanced writers. Painters.

Anyone can write just for one day!

June 25th – 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.
Cost: $45 Seating is limited! Sign up on the left-hand sidebar.

A reflection on five years

Five years seems like a little bit of time to be a mother. Only five. Just five. And yet there is so much wisdom about people, humanity, growing up, raising kids, and life hidden between my ears now after just five years. Enough wisdom to guide me through most obstacles with ease.

It's impossible to give that wisdom -- just pass it like a bowl of mashed potatoes at the dinner table -- to another new mom. We can tell her that sleep deprivation sucks, which is does, but she won't understand what we mean until she is in month five and the baby wakes her up three times in one night again and she had really just started into a rhythm and now her whole day is off and that will set her whole week off. It's really hard to describe that feeling unless you've been there.

We can tell her that it gets harder when they aren't an infant but she won't believe us and why should she because all that crying -- all that crying! -- is such a difficult thing to get over. And yet they will say they hate you, and they will have a hard time with a friend at school that will break your heart, and they will be left out or left behind and your every muscle will tighten with the pain of it all.

But, lo and behold, our girls now sleep through the night. Just not every night. Because there are trips to the bathroom, bad dreams, lost bears, mixed up sheets, and the ever-so-scary illnesses.

And, they are over little squabbles in a matter of seconds not minutes unlike me, who has only realized recently that I have a really interesting relationship with ATTACHMENT. I'm practicing detachment, actually, and will write more about that later.

It's easy now, though. It's easy to tell my girls now that it's OK and move on. It's easy to comfort them now. They just need the comfort of a little help (gosh, don't we all?).

My big lesson right now at five years is not about motherhood at all. It's about peoplehood and how amazingly beautiful they are with all their flaws and ridiculousness. It's about lessons every day about how to manage being around certain ones (yes, even my children) and about taming the gremlins that some of them carry around with them like little monkeys each day.

I don't meditate every day but I do every week. I don't practice Zen every hour but I do practice it every day.

It's enough for me right now. It's all enough.

The Practice of Now

In the midst of the darkness of being so alone caring for our twin infants, light came by way of a book: "Momma Zen: Walking the Crooked Path of Motherhood."

With no family around, my husband working long, long hours out of town and no mom friends, I was lost. It was a dark place. (I have videos to prove it wasn't as dark as I remember it, though.) In fact, I can look back and see now how justified my feelings were with so little support.

In fact, I wrote a lot about it in the blogosphere.

But, Karen Maezen Miller's book, which was given to me by one of my freelance editors, brought light to my soul with her simple ways of turning being a mother into a Zen practice. That practice continues today as I just let go to Trust. She is my friend, old Trust. She tells me to sit back with a bucket of popcorn and wait for the answers.

What makes Karen so good for mothers is that she often confesses to this being a difficult practice to do -- and she's a Zen Priest!

I often think, Okay, if Karen sometimes gets angry and she's a priest, than I can't be that terrible of a person. Walk away, decompress ... return later, calmed.

I've always been honest. Maybe too honest. The jury's still out on that one. I'm starting to claim my honesty as a source of beauty. Sometimes, my honesty is the only thing refreshing in the room, frankly.

And, part of that honesty has been saying that being a mother is the most difficult job of my life. It's hard work being a parent and if we're not trying to help mothers and fathers in the village, we'll continue to have troubles.

A lot of the reason parenting is difficult is because I make it so. I worry a lot. I am a control freak. I like things the way I like them. So ... in other words ... I have issues.

But, most of the time -- not all of the time -- I take Karen's wisdom mixed with my own version of Buddhism and Zen and Spirituality and Faith and I try not to screw things up by letting things like a big pile of the most fine, powdery silver glitter sprinkled all over the dining room floor bother me. I just really enjoy the Now a lot better when the rooms are clutter-free and the floors are clear of debris and that the air going into my lungs isn't filled with silvery glitter. That's just me, though.

I met Maezen online four years ago when I did a random search of her book and found that she had started a little blog! I was literally jumping up and down when I found that. I've watched that little blog turn into a household name for many of my smart, fantastic blog (and now Twitter) friends even as I've taken a big backseat role in the blogosphere. I still love it so!

And for four years, I've wanted to meet Maezen and give her the big hug that she deserves for helping this one mom -- and many, many more, I'm sure -- find comfort in the everyday of motherhood. I also want to thank her for these valuable lessons that are getting me through difficult times in my career as well. In fact, I'm a better person over all because of this Zen message she spreads.

I'm happy to report that this Saturday, I will finally get to meet her in Washington, D.C. and give her the thanks she deserves for being the other honest woman in the room. I'll have all copies of my books and I'll be ready to listen to her lesson in person. Because I need it now just as ever.

And I have a feeling I always will ...

The Sit-and-Do-Nothing Rule

This post is inspired by a comment left on my last blog post about how to truly savor downtime and not feel guilty about it:

"Thanks for this! I found it from Tara Gentile's tweet, and I like it. My question is, how do you feel about your downtime? I've had an issue lately where everytime I have a little downtime, I end up feeling guilty for not doing something productive during that time--and yet, I'm still always yearning for that time to myself! It's such a destructive process. It would help if I had accomplished all the to do's before I have my downtime by scheduling all tasks like you suggested."


It is so. very. hard.

And, at times, I still suffer from that guilty vibe as well.

But, mostly, I have been able to really sit-and-do-nothing for a few minutes a day -- which hoenstly, in my world, is usually writing a list, doodling, writing, reading an inspiring book or meditating.

Nothing.

I see you twiddling your thumbs right now. I see the sweat from anxiety forming on your upper lip. I see your leg starting to twitch.

I learned the sit-and-do-nothing technique with little kids. The well-intended advice is always "nap when they nap" ... but I always felt there was too much to do, or at worst, I couldn't actually sleep.

So I implemented -- on the rare occassion -- the sit-and-do-nothing task. Close your eyes. Think about nothing but the sounds in the room. Breathe. Let your mind wander. Wander some more. Wonder.

This is a tool I use more frequently now when I am overwhelmed with too much to do or too many things I want to do.

Let's say I have a half hour and I have an hour's worth of work to do -- in other words, a typical half hour of my life. In fact, I often feel like a squirrel in the middle of the road -- you know when they can't decide what side of the road to run to -- the one they were aiming for or the one they just left? So, I instituted the sit-and do-nothing rule. Sit and do nothing not even watch TV, not even surf the Internets, not even talk to a person. Sit and do nothing and, like magic fairy dust falling on your shoulders, the answer: it always comes.

Usually, the answer is to make dinner and never even get to the rest of the list ... but I digress.

Sit and do nothing. That's it. It really is that simple.

Man, the best ideas come to me in those moments.

And I'm a much more relaxed crazy person after a sit-and-do-nothing. Still crazy. Still nutso. Still trying to do more than I can do in a single bound. But a little tiny bit saner.

Peace to you and your sit-and-do-nothing state.

Time is abundant

There's this idea among human beings that I used to employ myself.

If only I had more time, I could do ... X Y Z.

More time and I could write my novel. More time and I could edit my short story. More time and I could find that unique job I've always wanted.

I've been waiting around for more time all my life.

Last year, when I finally finished my novel after 10 years, I learned the most valuable lesson in my life. Time is abundant. Even for busy working moms like myself. We can do this. We can make dreams a reality.

Sometimes it means saying no and I've had to do that in some heartbreakingly hard ways this week, too. Sometimes, it means saying yes.

This year, in nothing short of good New Year's Resolution-style, I made a commitment to something, well, someone.

Myself.

I vowed to fit things in that I've just never had the time for in the past. Writing is one. Exercise is another. Downtime is the last.

How though? How can I, in a single day or week, work 40-Plus hours, be a great mother of twin girls, remain as a volunteer in my community and still be a writer and a wife and someone who cares and takes care of her body? How is that humanely possible?

Until two weeks ago, I lived under this immense assumption that it wasn't possible and, lo and behold, it didn't have to be possible. By even considering doing all of these things in a single day, I was crazy. I held my own expectations up in the clouds.

And then I had a wee bit of an epiphany. What if? What if I can do it? What if I can be all of these things in a single week?

I thought it over and journaled about it and experimented with some ideas. And then it occurred to me. I didn't have to do it all each day. I just needed a schedule.

I set out to fit it all in Monday through Friday. I work out/do yoga three mornings at 5 a.m. and I write/edit two mornings. I also add a little writing and editing in at night after the girls are asleep and that's also when I get some much-needed downtime to do nothing. And, my reward for doing all of this during the work week? I get to do whatever I want on Saturdays and Sundays. The result is much less stress. No more wondering when it will happen. No more wondering how it will happen. No more trying to squeeze it in during valuable weekend family time (unless I want to).

I'm not sure why this never came to me before or why I made fitting it all in so complicated.

But now that I'm so regimented, I truly believe that time is abundant. But I have to get up and say yes, yes this is going to happen today. Or it doesn't happen.

2011: A Year of Re-Reading

I covet books like people. Books have been and may always be my trophy lover. I display the best, the brightest, the ones that profoundly and amusingly changed me proudly on bookshelves. I dust them. And rearrange them. And breeze through their pages now and again with awe and admiration.

But I never re-read them.

Ever.

Until now. This year, I have decided is my year. A year to re-read. A year to go back to the basics and seriously consider these books that have led me on a passion for writing novels. I want to study these favorites in a way only I can now: As someone who has written a novel.

We have all said it and heard a million times -- to be a writer, you must first read. A lot. Well, I have read a lot. But that doesn't mean that I'm always retaining some of the reasons why these books are so great.

Let me be clear. I am not reading the BBC lists or the NBC lists or even the Nobel lists.

I am reading my list. These books that I am re-reading have stayed with me since Page One. Some have moved across state lines and into and out of up to a half dozen or more places I've called home. One has been with me since middle school.

These are not just any books. These are 12 books that led me to write my own. These are the ones that inspired me along the years in my own relationships. They are the books that light me up.

I've decided to do this in four parts. Each week, I will write about a different aspect of these books from a writer's standpoint (setting, narration, character arc and plot).

I'm pretty excited to take on this project. And while it's not 365 books or even 52 books -- and while this is not an exhaustive list of books that I have loved or been awed by -- I am sure that I will learn a lot about writing and reading on this journey. I plan to share a lot with my readers as well!

I am not sure why I never re-read books. Perhaps because the idea of knowing the ending makes it hard to keep my interest. That's why this will be a fun project. I'm reading just for the wisdom I can glean as a writer, as a novelist, as someone who hopes to have one of those shiny, beautiful trophies of her own.

PHOTO CREDIT: RACHELLOVESTOLAUGH