Blue Writings: Self-Doubt, Self-Reliance, and Sad Inspiration

This, surely, was the greatest test of my writing.

I am not, officially, a depression patient. (The time at the doctor's office where I failed the test doesn't count -- who the hell circles "never" instead of "sometimes" for Do-You-Ever-Feel-Sad questions?) There is no clinical diagnosis attached to my mellow, melancholic nature. No significant presence of tell-tale signs to link my off-days with WebMD-listed symptoms. No daily feelings of worthlessness (since age 19), regular insomnia (unless it's writing-spree-induced), or impaired concentration (well, aside from ADD-esque tendencies). The Thinking Frown is misleading; in general, I am a happy person -- easily pleased, easily awed.

Yet some months ago, as I was finishing my final undergraduate semester, I found myself in an odd place. Some strange little anguish had been seeping its way into my system. Much of it was likely a simple case of Senior-Year Blues -- graduation denial, job search bargaining, the usual stages. But this little anguish had nestled itself in other areas. It had found the guilt-producing sector of the brain and choked out the geek-on-steroids motivation that I'm used to. "Where is your inspiration?" it whispered. "What are you going to write now?"

I had no idea how much of a transition that semester would be. I had a significantly lighter academic load (una clase en español), and thus a lot, lot more free-time. It was the first time since my sophomore year that I hadn't been in a writing course, with some kind of paper or creative work due every week. As a hardworking student, I thought the transition from deadlines and scary professors to independent writing would be seamless, even welcome. Think how much more time I'll have to write, I thought, and how much more freedom to write what I want. I was foolish to think that. I soon began to realize that, for the first time, I was on my own. I had no threat of a lowered grade, no one to hold me accountable but myself. And oh sweet mother of Faulkner, it sucked.

It's a chicken-and-the-egg scenario, but whether strange little anguish caused it or vice-versa, inspiration was scarce in those days. Who would have thought that those nasty deadlines were actually helping to force the ideas to come? Now the ideas lay low. Ghosts of them flickered by every so often, long enough for me to jot a few words in my notebook, but nothing more. On one blizzard night, I fled the house and discovered pieces of the sky crumbling in white, and thought: I have something now. But returning indoors to my laptop, the resulting strained phrases were disheartening: they were words only, not life, not flame.

This, surely, was the greatest test of my writing. To still feel dependent, to survive a dry spell, to make my writing entirely my own.

When inspiration came at last, it was through somewhat unusual means. An open invitation to students popped up on social media for participation in a small study, involving three days of writing flanked by two in-depth surveys. "Why not?" I thought, wishing to assuage the guilt of being unproductive. I didn't know what to expect, especially after submitting the 20-minute pre-survey of psychoanalytical proportions. The rules were simple: you get one prompt for all three days, then write deeply about it each day for 15-20 minutes. (Diary time. Whoopee.) The evening before Day 1, the prompt came: write about the most upsetting experience in your life.

Oh. Something erupted. Strange little anguish temporarily lost its hold, and glimmers of inspiration were flashing wildly before I was even prepared to write. Oh, I realized, I can do that. The next morning, I got up earlier than usual, grabbed a notebook, and wrote the first day's work. These were handwritten notes, not prettied-up. No delete button, no stopping to look up words in the thesaurus. No limitations except to explore my feelings deeply. When I finished, I hesitantly put down the pen and sat back, looking down in shock at the scrawled notes.

Oh my God. I just wrote something good.

Feeling like I'd stepped off a roller-coaster, I glanced over at the clock, wondering where the time had gone. Oddly, in the rush of energy, I didn't question the possibility of what just occurred. I didn't ask how I was finally able to break the cycle after months of wordlessness. Because somehow, in the settling calm, I knew the answer.

This, surely, is the greatest test of my writing. To write about sadness. 

Inspiration doesn't want to come to me in pretty things, not right now. With strange little anguish in my skull, I could only write by indulging it (in it?), by channeling that despair toward the page. I was forced to dig deep through that despair and find it in past forms -- my age 19 feelings of worthlessness, my writing insomnia miseries, the trenches that carved and twisted me into a sad little person who needed writing (and eventually, into the easily-awed writer I am today). Is it a sorry predicament that pain is the easiest thing to write about? No, not right now. That's what's growing and growling most strongly in me at the moment, so best to feed it while it's here.

This, surely, is the greatest test of my writing. To live with despair a little while. To ride out the storm.

                                

Emma Moser 

Blog: antiquedwriter.blogspot.com

Twitter: @em_mo_write

Facebook.com/antiquedwriter

 

Pain

By Scott Morgan

Writers love pain. New York Times bestselling authors who have their books bought for movies love storytelling, but writers love pain. We use it as a way to connect with other people. We use it to humanize ourselves. We use it to motivate us.

It's understandable. Pain is a natural story generator. Creative writing, after all, is propelled by drama and conflict.

But after the ten or twelve years I've just had, I have no more use for pain. I don't know that I feel it anymore.

So is it coincidence, then, that I don't write that much anymore? Is it coincidence that the end of my pain ‒‒ and the subsequent sensation of general indifference ‒‒ coincides with my utter disinterest in trying to convince the world that I'm right?

You see, I don't want anymore. I have no real sense of desire for anything. Not in that burning, aching, I-have-a-goal sense, at least. So I have no compulsion to convince you that I'm right.

The upside is, I can't be hurt (though I'm often annoyed). The downside is, I can't be swept away. Can't fall in love. With anything.

So this makes me wonder: Is it really pain that makes us write or paint or sing so beautifully? Or is it the ability to feel pain?

I don't know. I have a theory that I'll save for the end. But first, I'd rather bore you with six things I believe about pain.

1. Pain makes us sensitive. Pain brings us together because when someone feels what has hurt us, we want them to know they're not alone. It's a noble impulse. It means we want to help, in some small way, to heal someone who suffers.

2. Pain makes us competitive and arrogant. Like everything, the pain we feel boils down to a pissing contest. We take a perverse joy in having had it worse than others and living to tell the tale. Sure, your dog died ‒‒ but my father died. When I was a reporter in 2001, I learned quickly that people who didn't live in the Northeast (I was in New Jersey) had developed a form of 9/11 envy. They didn't have a story that involved someone being there; they didn't personally know someone who was killed. And those who did have a more inside connection to that day were quick to brag how much worse it was to know what it was like first-hand.

3. Pain makes us cautious. I know. "Duh." Of course pain makes us cautious. It's supposed to. We're supposed to learn not to lick a hot stove twice, it's a survival thing. But it also makes us reticent to take new chances. Pain can make us brave in one way (like when we share our pain) and fearful in another (like when we hide, rather than go out in the world and try new adventures).

4. Pain does not make us creative. There's an old joke: A guy asks his doctor, "Hey, when this cast comes off my arm, will I be able to play piano?" The doctor says sure and the guy says, "Great, I never could before." If you can't write to begin with, you won't be able to just because you got your illusions dashed and your heart broken. If you can write, you can channel your pain into good stories, but if you can't now, you never will.

5. Pain makes you toxic. As creative writers, most of us like to believe in the movie version of pain ‒‒ the one that postulates that when we are brooding in cafés, extremely attractive and sensitive strangers will come over to us and save our souls via 80s movie montage activities and sad-but-satisfying sex in the rain. The truth is, the more in pain you are outwardly, the farther away from you people in cafés will sit. At most, one of the wait staff will tell you that you look sad. But the truth hits you soon enough ‒‒ no one wants to be around a person who's in pain. You might as well have boils on your face and a flask that says "AIDS" balanced precariously on your chin. True pain is very lonely, and no one cares.

6. Pain does not make us unique. We all like to be different. Just like everyone else. And somehow we like to think that our painful experiences make us unique. They don't. Most of us have at least a tangential relationship with horrifying things. I was once asked in an interview which word I hate the most. I said cancer. Everyone who heard me nodded and said "Oh, yeah." Your pain is only unique to you. It's pain's universality that makes it so powerful in storytelling.

Which brings me back to my theory. I don't think it's pain that makes for great stories. I think it’s hope. Love. The ability to feel the belief that things will get better or that by writing our pain, catharsis will show us the solution to our problems.

The slowing of my creative writing isn't because I feel pain. It's because I don't feel anything. Too much pain has taken my ability to feel wonder and naïveté, and love.

My point in all this? Embrace your love, not your pain. It is your wonder, your awe, your passion that fuels you. Not your pain. Even if you're writing painful things.

This post originally appeared in the blog Write Hook in May 2013.

Scott Morgan grew up in New Jersey, but we won't hold that against him. He is the author of Character Development From the Inside Out, How To Be A Whiny Beeyotch: 71 Writing Excuses Meet the Back of My Hand, and the collection of short stories, Stories My Evil Twin Made Up. His latest published work is the short story, Precious. 

A visit to his blog, Write Hook: Write for the Jugular, is well worth any writer's time. 

Joy, Interrupted

The conception of this anthology was inspired by my own grief journey. After the death of my daughter in 2003 from SIDS, I noticed is that there wasn't a book that addressed the many different interruptions of the joy of motherhood.

So, I decided to edit Joy, Interrupted: An Anthology on Motherhood and Loss.  It includes tales of mothers whose joys had been interrupted, deferred or delayed. Women who had miscarriages; daughters who talked about the pains of being adopted; women struggling with the loss of identity while mothering; men and women who were taking care of their dying mothers.

I learned to see my experiences in a larger, more universal, context.  Some of these universal themes addressed include: coping with the death of a child; relationships between mother and child (including adoption and estrangement): caring for disabled children: and having to mother one’s own mother because of an illness. In reading about other dimensions of loss, I saw new opportunities for coping, for making meaning out of pain, and for healing.

The anthology showed how motherhood and loss exists in the space between grief and joy.  We remember and hope for the joyous aspects of mothering at the same time we mourn the loss. It is my hope that this anthology can allow others to move closer to joy. I hope this anthology can reveal how each loss reaffirms the many possibilities of motherhood, even when joy is interrupted.

I believe these voices  open up our views about the space between joy and grief, and what the act of mothering can entail. I see this anthology as a prism reflecting a multiplicity of voices. Each voice meant something to me, and I anticipate that some of the pieces will mean something for others, as well.

This book is intense and isn't meant to be read cover to cover. I believe this book is one you put on your nightstand, and in your darkest hour you turn to it for processing your grief.  I think we all need those moments to grieve openly, while still being able to function, and hopefully, feel joy once again.

The contributors demonstrate courage in baring their souls.  They teach us how creativity can exist even in tragedy. They show us how even through our tears we can find some meaning in life.  They share their stories after going through the fires of loss.  They are proof that we can rise up out of the ashes of grief.

So, this book is ultimately about motherhood, loss, and healing.  I believe it can do the same for others as it did for me, moving us closer to joy, even when it has been interrupted.

More info about the book
The book on Amazon:
If you are interested in reviewing the book, I can send you a free PDF copy.  It is available to buy now but hasn't been shipped to anyone yet.
                                                     

You can contact me, Melissa Miles McCarter, at fdfarmpress@gmail.com or go to the website of my small press at http://fatdaddysfarm.org
I am on facebook at http://facebook.com/Melissa.miles.mccarter
My twitter handle is @fatdaddysfarm
 

Confidence Tools for Coping With a Broken Heart

 

When your heart gets broken the last thing you feel is confident. However daily life has to continue and somehow you have to find the confidence to act as if you are functioning as normal. This is one of those situations where you might have to pretend for a little while but eventually your confidence will come back. In the meantime here are some tools to help you through. 

When my heart got broken years ago, I just fell apart. The result was that I had to spend a long time getting back up. I had no techniques to get me through the pain. I don't know if I even felt pain, it was more of a numbness. I certainly didn't manage to function as normal. In fact I hid away for three months! When I finally did resurface I felt lost and confused. I certainly had no confidence. 

Now obviously if you are at the beginning stages of suffering from a broken heart, I can't make that go away with a single post. Actually no one can make the pain go away, it is unfortunately something that you will have to work your way through. I could offer you coaching but for now I am going to give you some simple tools to hopefully help you get back on your feet and to calm some of the overwhelming emotions. If you take care of you and your emotions then your confidence will eventually come back. 

• Breathe - Yes I know that sounds obvious, we have to breathe. Consciously focusing on breathing helps to calm the body and the mind. When we are stressed or emotional the majority of us have a tendency to hold our breath without noticing. This can cause panic in the mind and cause further stress and emotions. Breathing slowly, stomach expanding as you breath in and stomach falling as you breath out, can have an instant calming effect.
   
• Find a space for the pain - The breathing exercise above frees space in your mind and body to create a safe space where you can leave your pain for a while. Let me explain. When you sit in the stillness of breathing and focus only on breathing, you gain a sense of having more space within. After a while this sense of space becomes more permanent. You can use this sense of space for the following technique: When you feel the emotional pain arise, stop for a moment and take a deep breath. Remind yourself that this pain is due to your broken heart and it will eventually pass. Take another deep breath. Now breath normally. Find the space within you. Breath in and out, as you breath in expand your space within and place your emotional pain there for safe keeping. With practice this is a very effective tool.
   
• Spend time doing something you enjoy - At this vulnerable stage it is important that you nurture your wellbeing. This includes doing things you enjoy and pampering yourself. I could go on and on about how important this is for your health and confidence levels but instead I am just going to say, be good to you! It really makes a difference!
   
• Surround yourself with loving, understanding, supportive friends and family. People who will lift your spirits, enjoy your company, and boost your confidence. Stay away from confidence zapping people.   

I will be publishing a new e-book in the next couple of weeks on the subject of confidence during separation. If you would like to be reminded sign up on the home page of my website www.gracefullynatural.com and you will also receive a free 50 page confidence e-book. 

How did you find confidence after your heart was broken? 

Kama Frankling – Author and Confidence Coach

Stepping outside of my comfort zone or How to become one Tough Mudder.

Last weekend my son and nephews entered in the Tough Mudder race in Southern Calif. For those of you who do not know what a Tough Mudder race is; allow me to explain.

It is an obstacle course – not unlike those Navy Seals use for training. You jump into vats of ice water, then hoist yourself over walls, army crawl through mud, while being zapped by electrified wires (NOT KIDDING). Some people actually run it as a race, some walk it. They are held throughout the country (Google it), but this one was at a snow resort, so I’m guessing fewer people were actually racing up Black Diamond mountains. The entire race took my son with his team of six, approximately five hours to complete.

Through poor planning on the part of the organizers, they ran out of bananas, parking meant taking a shuttle to the ski resort and then after the long tedious race, when all you want to do is lie down and sleep, they had a 2½ hour wait to get onto a shuttle to return to their car. Since the sun was setting and they were wet and mud-covered, they were handed space blankets to keep warm.

It sounds to me that this is not really a race as much as an endurance test. No one in their party attempted to be the first to cross the finish line, They just wanted to be able to have the opportunity to say they survived the Tough Mudder from start to finish.

Now, I am proud they did it and happier still that no one was injured. But, I pondered why anyone would push themselves to the limit.

Why must people climb the tallest mountains wearing oxygen masks? Why must someone swim across vast expanses of water (even shark-infested), if they haven’t fallen overboard? Why do people push their bodies to extremes?

Trust me: I don’t get it. There was a period of two years when I was working out with a personal trainer. I felt it was my duty to keep my multiple sclerosis in check, by being at my fittest. I worked with an excellent trainer who was well aware of my strengths and weaknesses. I did get stronger and I did lose weight. But, after my workout I went home and collapsed. Then I was in pain for the next two days. "But it’s a good pain" – that’s my husband talking. I gave him looks of daggers, because to me PAIN IS PAIN. Then I would return to the gym and begin the same routine all over again. Workout, collapse, limp around in pain for two days.

Well, I finally got it! If my MS was going to create pain anyway, I didn’t need to cultivate it in a gym. So, I stopped going. Lo and behold, I have been pain-free since. Not of course, free of my MS pain, which I will always have. But free of that good kind of pain that kept me grimacing for days on end.

I strongly advise most of you NOT to listen and follow my newly-acquired way of thinking. Exercise is good for people with MS. Just not this person. And that becomes my choice. I choose not to push myself to my limits. I prefer to stay within my comfort zone.

Now I may not be one Tough Mudder (as it were), but I am pushing myself outside my comfort zone in a different way. Not with my body - oh no, I’ve learned my lesson - but with my mind. My creative mind.

With my first novel, “Once in Every Generation” I was well within my comfort zone. Even though it was fiction, it was semi-autobiographical. I knew what it was like to step into the spotlight and I knew what it was like to get diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. I also wrote within the genre of which I read. I like books about interpersonal relationships.

Here’s where I am leaping (giant leaps) outside my zone of comfort: the novel I am working on now with great intensity and excitement is a combination of contemporary and historical fiction. Though based on the life of a real person, it combines real life characters with fictionalized events. The research has been extremely inspiring for me.

You will read about a true person who survived the Holocaust, only to have to relive it in her elder years. There is mystery, drama, humor, and even a chase scene throughout the backstreets of London.

Totally outside my comfort zone! And as I type I can feel the adrenaline pumping. I look forward to sitting down at the keyboard and writing. This has become my Everest, my pushing the limits, my Tough Mudder race (without the mud). And I can finally understand why people push themselves outside of their comfort zones. I finally get it! Yes, I am one Tough Mudder, after all.

Lauren B. Grossman

http://www.laurenbgrossman.com
http://laurenbgrossman.blogspot.com/

http://www.facebook.com/#!/lauren.grossman1 

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Loss

Last year was a year of loss—many losses. From Dad’s death (my wonderful father-in-love) on January 3 through the loss of my mother on July 26, and so many others in between and since, the year seemed to whittle away friends, family members, and the families of friends. I counted 28 of those deaths before the end of February, when I stopped counting. But it didn’t end then. There’s been at least one a week since.

Losing those I love has provided some powerful reminders for me.

Don’t take anyone for granted. My father died when I was seven. I went to second grade one morning, and when I came home that afternoon, he was gone. Forever. It was a lesson I never forgot: People die. You never know when or how.

This is the reason that my husband, Larry, and I tell each other, “I love you” on awakening each morning. We try never to part without a kiss, and reunite the same way. And we can’t go to sleep without another kiss and the words, “I love you.” When Larry traveled, he’d usually call home just to say goodnight. On a couple of occasions when he didn’t, I’d call him. If we couldn’t get through or were unable to make contact for some reason, we didn’t sleep well.

Youth doesn’t insulate you from death. People can die at any age. My father’s death taught me that one, too. He was thirty-seven. His mother was twenty-three. His grandmother, thirty-eight. And my maternal grandfather was fifty-four. All far too young.

This point came home last year when our dear friends’ daughter died very suddenly at forty-two. Erin practically grew up in our home. I used to tease her that even though her parents thought she was theirs, she really belonged to us. On my birthday last year, among many other notes was one from Erin which said, “Happy Birthday Mama! Have a great day!” It told me that she knew she was loved. What a gift that was the next day when we received word that she was gone.

Several months later, I created a movie for her folks’ 50^th anniversary and added family photos including Erin. I wept when I saw them. I miss her very much. But at least I knew that I loved her. And she knew it as well.

Tell the people you love that you love them—often. Years ago, another daughter of dear friends died at thirty-one after an illness of a couple of years. Several months before her death, I saw Peggy. Our conversation ended with a hug and my saying, “I love you, Peg.” She stepped back, looked me in the eye, and said, “I know you do.” What a gift!

Far too often the people we genuinely care about either don’t know it or don’t believe it. I keep hoping the repetition of the words will eventually reinforce the very genuine affection I have for the people in my life.

Many years ago now, another dear young man died in his early thirties. Looking at the large assemblage at his memorial service, I couldn’t help but wonder if he had any idea how many people cared about him. I doubted it. John just never seemed able to accept that others cared about him. And that has always made me sad.

There is a ritual I indulge in with many of the people in my life. Whenever we part, I always tell them I love them. I mean it. I wasn’t able to say goodbye to my father or to tell him I loved him. As long as I have breath, I want my loved ones to know without a doubt that I do.

My niece and goddaughter both caught on to this early. Whenever I talked to them on the phone, I’d end with, “I love you.” And they’d answer, “I love you, too.” However, as they got older, both of them would try to sense the end of the conversation so they could say the words first. They still do, and I love it that it still matters to both of them.

Life goes on. Even with the pain of loss, life continues for the survivors. Hopefully it is richer for the presence of all the special people in our lives—including those no longer living. My personal belief is that we will see them all again when we join them and that the love we shared in this life will remain between us. In those moments of grieving and sadness, this confidence is a great comfort.

Everyone suffers loss. Everyone grieves. The only way we can honor those we have lost is to live the remainder of our own days well. And that’s what I’m attempting to do now.

Remember, friends and family, I love you. 

Lorna & Larry Collins
Read about our books 31 Months in Japan: The Building of a Theme Park, Murder... They Wrote, Murder in Paradise , Lakeview Park, Snowflake Secrets, Seasons of Love, An Aspen Grove Christmas and award-winning Directions of Love at www.lornalarry.com. And look for Ghost Writer coming this summer!