Normal is not something to aspire to, it’s something to get away from. – Jody Foster It is never too late to be who you might have been. – George Eliot The word weird is derived from Old English. Originally spelled wyrd it was a concept in Anglo-Saxon culture roughly corresponding to our fate or [...]
Life is “trying things to see if they work.” – Ray Bradbury Mistakes are the portals of discovery. -James Joyce Recently I worked with a client who was really blocked in her writing and painting. Through our coaching we were able to discover that the root of the block was a fear of making mistakes. [...]
Creative activity could be described as a type of learning process where teacher and pupil are located in the same individual. – Arthur Koestler The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources. – Albert Einstein Sometimes creativity just means the daily work of helping others to see a problem in a different [...]
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. – Mark Twain . What if your life where a blank piece of paper [...]
Jan Phillips in her book The Art of Original Thinking – The Making of a Thought Leader, states that “some of the greatest thinkers today are in agreement about the power of our consciousness to alter our circumstances. From biologists to business leaders, mystics to medical professionals, philosophers to philanthropists, individuals are speaking out about [...]
No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader. – Robert Frost One of the great pleasures of writing is that you learn things about yourself and the way you think that you might not otherwise uncover. Former U.S. Poet Laureate and Pulitzer Prize winner, Ted Kooser has a real gift for pulling together [...]
I am celebrating at least three major crises—in energy, economy and climate—now confronting us globally and simultaneously, adding up to the greatest challenge in all human history. That challenge is what, and why, I celebrate. Nothing short of a fundamental review, revisioning and revising of our entire way of life on planet Earth is called [...]
You don’t need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Don’t even listen, simply wait. Don’t even wait. Be quite still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you. To be unmasked, it has no choice. It will roll in ecstasy at your feet. – Franz Kafka When we [...]
I refer to my writing classes and coaching collectively as The Heart of Writing. As a lover of double entendres (a phrase that can be understood in either of two ways), I feel this phrase captures both my intention to provide an experience of the heart or essence of the writing process but also my [...]
I had the privilege of taking a workshop from noted American poet William Stafford not long before he died. Stafford wrote a poem a day for most of his adult life. He would rise at four in the morning, make his tea and toast, then sit on the sofa in the living room and write [...]