A writing life can get out of whack
This is my short essay on enjoying my writing life, included in WRITES OF PASSAGE, an outstanding collection of essays on the writer’s journey put together by Sisters in Crime and published by Henery Press.
“I’m one of those writers who loves to write. It was the joy of writing that prompted me to climb a tree with a pad and pen as a kid and sit up on my favorite branch to spin stories. Sixty-plus books later, I love to write as much as ever. That doesn’t mean it’s always easy. A writing life can get out of whack for any number of reasons. No writer I know is immune, including me. So, I asked myself what do I do that allows me to enjoy writing as much now as when I was a kid? Is there any one thing? Any one practice? The answer is yes: I make time for “discovery.”
A few years ago, I took off to Ireland for my own personal writing retreat. It was a spur-of-the-moment trip. Next thing I knew, there I was, alone in a tiny cottage on the southwest Irish coast with my pads and pens, figuring out how to light a turf fire on a rainy, chilly autumn night. My Irish sojourn wasn’t a getaway to meet a tight deadline, and it wasn’t a vacation. It was three weeks I set aside for creative discovery—for consciously and intentionally standing back from producing, doing, inventing, measuring, making things happen. It was time away from the usual walls: page counts, word counts, hours-at-writing counts. It was time away from the external lures and pressures of publishing, platforms, website updates, reviews, Facebook, Twitter, wandering on the internet.
My cottage made setting these boundaries for myself easier: it had no wifi and only limited (and expensive!) “data roaming” access. I had to walk into the village to get on the internet. The five-hour time difference between Ireland and the East Coast also worked in my favor. There’s magic in being fully present in the moment, whether it’s on the page at hand, or whether it’s walking in the Irish hills, listening to sheep baaing in a green field or watching a rainbow arc over the bay.
Those three weeks in Ireland crystalized for me just how important discovery is in my creative life. I have always given myself time away from “producing” and “doing,” whether it’s an afternoon walk, an internet blackout, not counting words and pages—or another getaway to an Irish cottage. Discovery is what sharpens, greases and fires up our creative gears, our senses, our powers of observation, our openness, even our trust in whatever drove us to write in the first place. For me, it’s the foundation of creativity, and it’s essential to the joy of writing.”
Enjoy your day!
Carla
