One Writing Exercise That Always Works
I’m still basking in CAMP memories. It’s going to take a long time to come down, if I ever do. To spend a week with other writers learning how to perceive the world more openly, more keenly, more truthfully, to spend a week with other writers re-learnign how to see in the full definition of that word, is quite life altering.
There’s a ripple effect that comes of this much energy! So for the new members who’ve joined us this week, here’s a helpful post on how to find your way around Writing in the Dark, and where to begin.
Meanwhile, about today’s art, the self-portraits writers did were part of that effort to see, really see, and feel the depth of perception that comes of looking closely. So, not an exercise in representational art, but, rather, an immersion in the experience of looking and not looking away, at looking not just at, but into. An opportunity to see and feel something at the same time, and then to depict that thing however it might want to be depicted.
That’s the kind of seeing I want to hang onto here at home, and here in my life. The kind of seeing that allows me to perceive what is in front of me now. The kind of seeing that allows me to rediscover my past from new and more enlightening persepctives (which is what this week’s writing exercise, at the end of this post, allows us to do).
This is the same kind of seeing that allows me to envision my future with clarity and insight. The kind of seeing that allows me to write in the way I want to write—which is to say, use language to capture what is true, beautiful, and strange.
Speaking of writing, I am finalizing my book proposal this week, with determination to have it to my agent before Monday—and that feels pretty good. I remember at CAMP how said we have to picture what we want, in clear, bright detail, if we want to bring it forth. I believe that and have practiced it for a long long time. I wrote about it here when I discovered my old notebooks from when I worked through Danielle LaPorte’s Desire Map and Fire Starters series:
Photos of My Desire Map notebook pages — and more on that process.
More on The Desire Map process here, too.
And having now dug into Melody Beattie’s book Make Miracles in Forty Days and having further begun to map out our subversive gratitude practice based on Beattie’s book, I am seeing so much overlap between Beattie’s practice and what Tia did to bring her book forth. And so much overlap between Beattie’s practice and what Danielle LaPorte coaches us to do in her Desire Map and Fire Starter practices. So much overlap between Beattie’s practice and what neuroscience tells us about the capacity of the human imagination and how it actually functions in the brain.1
This feels like perfect timing to start this gratitude practice—which we’ll begin on Wednesday, September 2. All paid members have full access to the experience. If you want to upgrade in order to participate, you can do that here.
Also, before we jump into the exercise, I five spots remaining for my October in-person manuscript intensive, and I’d love to hear from you if you want to write together:
October 23 – 26, Thursday – Sunday
This small (10 max) in-person workshop is for writers who have or want to have a prose manuscript in progress (essay or short story, memoir or novel) and are ready to workshop it using Writing in the Dark’s signature methods of deep attention, deep curiosity, and active search for opportunity and possibility.
This kind of revision is deep, transformative work for both for the writing and the writer. Your manuscript will change, but so will your understanding of your writing and yourself as a writer. Please see the full description here and don’t hesitate to email me with any questions large or small (writing@writinginthedark.org, subject line: Radical Revision).
And now, the exercise that always works. This is one of my favorite exercises to teach because no matter where I teach it—classrooms, retreats, prisons, my living room, Zoom, etc.—writers always surprise themselves at least a little, while also discovering new registers of their own voice.
This exercise involves returning, imaginatively, to a particular time of life—usually it works best to isolate a specific experience or era—and then carefully