Menna Van Praag's Blog, page 22

The Tower of London at night – beautiful!

Except for all those historical beheadings, of course

Story time is happy time This is The Little Warthog by ...

Story time is happy time This is The Little Warthog by the very talented Katrin Bauck – who I’m very honoured to have as a student

My Class at the Mind, Body, Spirit Festival

If you want to write a brilliant book, come to my new workshop in London @ Mind Body Spirit Festival on 26th May, 2.30-4.30pm for only £19. Bargain! It’ll be a fantastic event, all in all & I’ll love to have you in my class – we’ll have LOTS of fun!

Pic: The lovely Miss Leah with HOPE STREET @ BookCourt in Brooklyn – yay!!

“I have forced myself to begin writing when I’ve been utterly exhausted, when I’ve felt my soul as thin as a playing card & somehow the activity of writing changes everything.” – Joyce Carol Oats

I wasn’t in the mood to write this morning. I wanted to go into the sunny garden & play. But I’m in the midst of a new, exciting story that needs to be written. Nowadays I’m getting better as deciphering the difference between intuition & procrastination. &, this time, it was definitely the latter So I sat myself down & started to write & kept writing. At first I still didn’t want to but, as I wrote, the story seized hold of me again & I began to delight in it. I rolled around in words, instead of sunshine & I felt great – both doing it & to have done it. It reminded me of this fantastic quote by Joyce Carol Oats. And fortunately, it was still sunny in the afternoon so Oscar, Artur & I went out to play. It was all the more fun since I had a few thousand new words under my belt.

 

Artur & Oscar & me at Wandlebury, Cambridgeshire.

Happy Easter!

I believe we each have access to the same amounts of strength, patience & passion. Of course, we all have different talents, but our innate potential to manifest those talents in the world remain the same. It’s not a matter of intelligence or education. It’s not what you hold in your head that sets your ability to reach the stars, it’s what you have in your heart. Strength, patience, passion & self-belief are the determining factors in life. Luckily we can each cultivate these as much as we wish. The stretch of our reach then only depends on our determination & desire to do so.

Pic: Happy Easter! More amaaaazing chocolate at Selfridges

Today I’m writing about life & death. About a character w...

Today I’m writing about life & death. About a character who discovers all the joys & delights of life once she knows she’s soon going to die. She changes her life, she slows down, she savours every lovely little thing. Happily, writing about this is having the same effect on me. This afternoon I took a break from writing to hang my washing in the garden &, as I walked back across the lawn, a breeze blew a shower of blossom across my path. I laughed, looked heavenwards & said “thank you”. A beautiful moment indeed. & now, back to the story…

Pic: to my absolute delight, I found this in Selfridges on Tues – it’s going to be a very Happy Easter

Have you noticed how your heart wants wonderful things bu...

Have you noticed how your heart wants wonderful things but your mind tells you all the “reasonable” reasons why you can’t/shouldn’t have/do them? I experience this very often myself Two weeks ago I went to a wonderful @TransformationMadeEasy workshop in Hamburg & there I felt the overwhelming & very “unreasonable” desire to attend another one in NYC. For a while my head won the battle & then, happily, my heart triumphed & I booked my place. I’ve been smiling ever since There’s nothing quite so joyful as giving yourself what you truly desire. I invite you to give yourself something you really want – however unreasonable it might be – perhaps you’ll even join me in NYC!

Pic: Lilac “blue”bells in Kensington Gardens, London.

“I’m proof against that word failure. I’ve seen behind it. The only failure a man ought to fear is failure of cleaving to the purpose he sees to be best.” ― George Eliot

For the last 14 years of my life I’ve really put every cell of myself into being the best writer I can possibly be. I’ve encountered A LOT of rejection, disappointment & failure. But George Eliot was right. There is, no matter the outcome, a glorious feeling in giving a dream your all. If you succeed, that magnificence is magnified a million-fold, but believing in yourself & honouring your deepest desires is the true gift. However, if you never try then you suffer the worst sort of failure, worse than any external disappointment: you’ve failed & rejected yourself. And, of course, you never have the chance to succeed.

Celebrating our 16th Wedding Anniversary today! How did t...

Celebrating our 16th Wedding Anniversary today! How did that happen? ) We ate our way around London & had a post-lunch snooze in the sun-drenched park. Then continued our eating tour. Deliciiiious.

Happy Springtime!

I love springtime! Sunshine & warm breezes & sprinklings of blossom confetti in the air & lots of lovely literary inspirations bursting into bloom along with the flowers… I saw this incredible tree today – part white blossom, part pink – then sat among the bluebells to begin a new story…