All writers occasionally doubt themselves when they revisit their work. “You, a writer?!?” our censors scoff, “can your sentences be any more choppy?” “And that ending? Could you conclude in a more predictable way? I thought we did away with ‘in the end’ and ‘all and all’ in 2nd grade?” Suddenly, our work, our whole … Continue reading
“People claim to want to do something that matters,” Ryan Holiday, author of Perennial Seller: The Art of Making and Marketing Work that Lasts once said, “yet they measure themselves against things that don’t, and track their progress not in years but in microseconds. They want to make something timeless, but they focus instead on immediate … Continue reading
When contemplating a piece of work, Julia Cameron advises we’d do better to think whom is this work for? whom will it serve? rather than how will it serve me? Pondering this notion of art as service, I’m reminded of Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke’s luminous Letters to a Young Poet, a collection of his five … Continue reading
“There are two states in which you may exist, person who writes, or person who does not. If you write: you are a writer. If you do not write: you are not. Aspiring is a meaningless null state that romanticizes Not Writing. It’s as ludicrous as saying, ‘I aspire to pick up that piece of paper … Continue reading
When Cheryl Strayed was 33, she sat in a hushed cabin in the Massachusetts woods to write “Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail,” the book that would eventually earn her dazzling literary success and worldwide acclaim. She, of course, had no way of knowing that her memoir would go on to sell … Continue reading
On one of my most beloved advice shows, viewer Renee writes in complaining that her work lacks deeper meaning. After working in healthcare for several years, she worries her work as an artist won’t make the same kind of real-world impact. “I’m a little bogged down with the realization that my purely aesthetic work won’t … Continue reading
Writing is like playing a sport: if we want to get better, we have to practice everyday. If we want to write, for example, we have to write every morning when we wake up (or, depending on our schedule, every afternoon). But we don’t just simply write- we write to improve a particular skill, … Continue reading
Just finished listening to an interesting Dear Sugar podcast about artistic dreams. A listener who calls herself Career Purgatory writes of a common dilemma: should she quit her soul-sucking day job to be a “real” writer or find time to write in her life right now? It’s a prevalent and pernicious myth that to be a … Continue reading
“It is possible to write out of ego. It is possible, but it is also painful and exhausting. Back in my drinking days, I used to strain to be brilliant, to write the best, the most amazing, the most dazzling…Is it any wonder that additives seemed like a good idea, like a secret hidden advantage … Continue reading
After nearly 4 months, I finally finished the piece I was working on. Now that it’s complete, I’m nagged by that dreaded inevitable question: “what’s next?” This feeling is familiar to most writers. We work untold hours diligently, dedicatedly, even obsessively on a project, completely absorbed in an idea only to finally finish and feel … Continue reading
The Blank-Faced Confidante 