charly's take on writing & more

What the…

Posted on April 17, 2013 by Charly

My feelings on so many books…

Snippet of Words

Posted on April 2, 2013 by Charly

I feel in love, I fell in love, with words again this weekend.

I had time to read and even brought out the pen and paper to write.

I took hours to just read, to start the process of getting acquainted again.

The journey with the pen and paper has been harder, but it is getting better.

I read about yoga, about gender issues, about awareness and about conscious activism.

I wrote about words and how I missed them and how I wanted them to be a part of my everyday again.

Last week, I was lamenting the influx of too many words and the week before, I discussed perfect words.

Words, words, words.

They are on my mind.

Too Many Words

Posted on March 26, 2013 by Charly

I feel like I’ve been spouting too many words lately.

Words to explain how I feel, to express, to frustrate, to entangle, to uncover…

Maybe that is why the blogs have been quiet this week. I don’t have the words for my writing because they have been coming out of my mouth, or into an email.

And I’m tired.

I don’t want to explain myself. I don’t want to comment or share.

I just want to be. I just want to listen. I just want to fade into the calm.

I want my words to tell a story, just not mine and just not tonight.

(Which is funny since I’m using words to tell this story…).

The story I am writing exists, written in absolutely perfect fashion, some place, in the air. All I must do is find it, and copy it. ~ Jules Renard

Perfect Words

Posted on March 20, 2013 by Charly

We choose them carefully, our words. We try to avoid cliche, try to accurately portray an image, a moment, a passing feeling…

In some ways it is a useless endeavor. We fall short, but that is why the reader is there. He or she fills in those shortcomings. We don’t exactly describe the despair a character is feeling, but our reader knows despair, knows his or her despair, and makes the gray, black or white.

Or maybe I’m wrong. Maybe the good ones, those good writers, get it right.

But I wonder if they know they get it right…maybe they are like me, the amateur, always noticing the shortcoming, the inability to find that perfect word, always

Yes. This.

Posted on March 6, 2013 by Charly

Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. They deepen and widen and expand our sense of life; they feed the soul. When writers make us shake our heads with the exactness of their prose and their truths, and even make us laugh about ourselves or life, our buoyancy is restored. We are given a shot at dancing with, or at least clapping along with, the absurdity of life, instead of being squashed by it over and over again. It’s like singing on a boat during a terrible storm at sea. You can’t stop the raging storm, but singing can change the hearts and spirits of the people who are together on that ship. — Anne Lamott

I could not have said it better myself.

This.

That decrease. That expansion of life. That feeding.

Words give me shivers. I have closed books knowing I was forever changed.

I want to write a book that makes you shiver, makes you shake your head, makes you laugh and sigh.

I want to write the book that I wouldn’t want to end.

Desire Mapper of the Week!

Posted on March 4, 2013 by Charly

*cross-posted on Delightful Writes*

If you have been reading this blog for the past few months, you have probably read the name Danielle LaPorte and the words Desire Map several times (If this is your first visit, welcome! Lovely to have you!). I read Danielle’s The Desire Map and immediately fell in love. It is all about helping us get clear on how we want to feel and letting our desires, goals, intentions spring from there. I love this way of thinking and it has helped me get clear on what I want and it has helped me as I coach others.

When you purchase her book, you get the book and lots of support materials. One of those materials is a weekly email…and in that email is a “desire mapper of the week”.

A few weeks after finishing the book, I was contacted by Annika, who is on Danielle’s staff. Would I be interested in being featured as a Desire Mapper of the Week? I’m not sure how or why I was chosen, but I jumped at the chance! I wholeheartedly love the book and am working to incorporate the teachings into my everyday life. The little feature shows how I am trying to do just that (You’ll also notice that it is a little late…I wrote this in the beginning/middle of January. My 40 days of yoga…well…failed and I’ve finished The Art of Attention and moved on Spirit Junkie, which has a different kind of elegance…).

Unfortunately, you can’t see the email unless you’ve bought the book. So if you have, yippee! This week (or about nine weeks after you purchased the book) I’ll be popping into your inbox. If you haven’t, no worries. I’ve posted the feature below or…you can just buy the book and see my smiling face in a few weeks.

Thank you, thank you to Danielle LaPorte and her staff for allowing me this opportunity!

–

What are your core desired feelings?

Bright

Blissful

Calm

Connected

Creative

Elegant!

What have you stopped doing so you could create your core desired feelings? (or another way of putting this is: What gets in the way of feeling how you really want to feel?)

I’ve stopped being as anti-social. I am someone who loves alone, “me” time. I need this time to rejuvenate and to connect to myself. I am the sort of person who relishes that time… sometimes to a fault.

I may want to feel connected to myself, but I ultimately want to feel connected to the world around me. I want to feel connected to friends and family.

So I’ve stopped saying, “Oh, I’m too busy to do that” or “Oh, I’m tired. I’m going to just stay home” as much. I’ve been going out more, connecting. And often, I notice that once I am out, I feel more bright and blissful.

What are you doing THIS week to generate your core desired feelings?

I am wearing my new purple yoga pants as often as possible to look and feel bright.

To feel blissful, I am continuing my 40 days of yoga by coming to my mat day after day. Breathing in bliss and breathing out negativity.

I am having a nice cup of herbal tea before bed to feel calm.

I’m using my coaching and goal setting knowledge and experience (including all the good, juicy info from the Desire Map!) to create a goal setting packet, which will connect me to others and use my creativity.

Lastly, I’m going to put on a white button down shirt, a pair of black leggings and some flats to feel like Audrey Hepburn, who was one elegant woman.

What tunes/books/sites are revving up your core desired feelings these days?

Earth, Wind & Fire

Stevie Wonder

Adele

Alicia Keys

Ojos de Brujo

Spring Awakening soundtrack

RENT soundtrack

This music gets me going, feeling bright, connected, and blissful!

I am beginning to read The Art of Attention by Elena Brower and Erica Jago to feel more connected to my yoga practice and yoga teaching… and it is such an elegant book. I’m thinking some of the elegance will seep out and into me.

Can you share a pic of where you’ve written down your core desired feelings?

My core desired feelings stare back at me anytime I sit at my desk… along with some intentions for the year!

Those Pesky Scenes In Our Heads

Posted on February 27, 2013 by Charly

I was supposed to be meditating.

At the end of a yoga practice the other day, as the teacher spoke of breath and connection, I got an image of someone bringing their yoga mat to the middle of the room, laying it out and taking a pose. And then someone else did the same. Then someone else and someone else and someone else until the room was filled with people .

I then realized it wasn’t a room…

It was a stage.

These people and their mats were actors and their props.

I was choreographing the first scene of a play.

Instead of meditating.

Soon we had the “om” and my scene began to fade away.

But it was there, for a moment.

It may take a yoga class to start thinking about a new play and that new play may be about yoga, but this little writer will take what she can get.

I keep picturing the scene over and over again. When I’m driving (which admittedly probably isn’t the best time), when I’m trying to fall asleep, when I’m trying not to fall asleep, etc. So far it is just that scene. It hasn’t progressed further. No clear characters or conflict have appeared.

Sometimes I worry that it is just a little scene. Just a little ditty. And nothing more.

But, for me, this is how something new starts too. So how am I to know the difference?

Can’t Have One Without the Other

Posted on February 13, 2013 by Charly

It is almost mid-February and I haven’t finished a book yet in 2013. This is probably the longest I’ve gone without finishing a book in years.

This is also notable because I’ve also gotten a month and a half into the new year without writing a single creative piece of fiction.

And I’m thinking the two may be related.

Do you ever notice this?

What I read has such a strong effect on what I write. My desire to read a particular thing probably also connects with my desire to see a similar world created or a similar emotion evoked. So when the only book I’ve even touched in the past few weeks, and still haven’t finished, has been about social psychology and our shopping habits, it makes sense that the world’s greatest novel/play/poem has not been produced.

Or maybe I should just write a book about relationships and shopping…

Except that has already been done. Lots.

Today I have several hours free. My plan to be overwhelming productive has been destroyed by this thing I seem to be suffering from called exhaustion. This exhaustion thing has me still in my pajamas…and in bed. The good news about this is that I am awake enough to type. If I can type, I can write. It may be a short story about the secret world of shopping science, but, hey, at least I’ll be writing.

Let’s hope I can get back to reading fiction…asap.

Writing Goals & Deadlines

Posted on February 6, 2013 by Charly

In order to settle back in here, I’m only writing here once a week. On Wednesdays! In the end, it probably makes the most sense to do that since, well, I still have yet to settle back into my writing. So come back each Wednesday for delightful stories on how I intend to write and often don’t, but one day will and such.

I’m getting there though. If you read any of my other blogs, you probably have noticed my current obsession with goal setting and desire mapping. Basically, I’ve been very focused on figuring out how I want to feel now and in the future and think of intentions, goals, that will not only produce those feelings, but get me to the place I’d like to be in the next few years. Of course, I am sure my life ten years from now both won’t look like my current vision and will…somehow containing everything I want and yet, probably, looking nothing like I expect.

Of course, entrenched in my list of goals, is writing. I have big plans. Big hopes. Two novels. A book on health and wellness. Another play or two. An eBook….this year, I’m focusing on an eBook on health and wellness and another play. That is the hope, the dream.

The beauty of setting the goal is that, in some ways, all I have to do is, well, write and complete the eBook and play. They don’t have to be good. I want them to be good, but if I have to write a ton of crap to get to the good, so be it. In that spirit, I move forward.

The deadline for the eBook is September.

The deadline for the play is December (when I’m also going to have a reading).

Done and done.

Now to write.

Charly Writes