For a long time, I resisted reading Murderbot, despite all the accolades (for reasons I’ll get into in a sec). I just finished watching it on Apple+, it’s brilliant, hopepunk AF, you should definitely watch/read it. I’ve read Science Fiction since I was a kid in the 70s, and I’ve been a huge fan of “sentient robot” stories all along…. Read More
Walking the Dark Path America is On
It’s wild to see folks on bluesky wrestling with the knowledge that they’re unlikely to outlive this dark turn in America. And what that means for them, for their kids. I say “wild” because the responses are predictably dark (nihilistic if not suicidal) or tone-deaf (“You gotta keep fighting!”) but so few have walked through what this really means and… Read More
Anger is Not the Opposite of Hope
A nightmare woke me up in the wee hours. My subconscious was once again doing the work of processing the daylight horrors of the world. But my barely-awake body was so full of fear hormones I knew the only way to dispel them was to literally physically get out of bed: move the body, complete the “wake the fuck up”… Read More
Climate-Conscious Gift Giving
In case you didn’t know, I have a podcast/substack! Bright Green Futures is all about lifting up stories about a more sustainable and just world and talking about the struggle to get there. So it’s mostly about stories and climate stuff, both of which inspired me to put together a Climate-Conscious Gift Guide for the Holidays. Subscribe to the substack… Read More
MEDITATION – 1-2-3 Guide to Getting Started
MEDITATION I keep talking about it because I truly believe it’s the antidote to the unique stressors of the 21st century–the “always on” lifestyle, the pressure to always do more, the idea that constant striving is the only way to live rather than a way not to live at all. But people hesitate. Maybe they think it won’t “work” for… Read More
Going into the Cave
I’ve been a Monk for some time now… not the religious kind, of course, and not truly isolated from society, steeped in contemplation–but kinda. And I’ve been easing a bit further into the cave over the last six months. I’m not done with that, apparently, because I’m going to take a bit of a social media break–or at least spend… Read More
Yes, You Can Be Smart And Read Romance
“I’m here to tell you that you can have a brain and still enjoy books with kissing in them. You can also have an economics degree from Yale and write romance novels. You can build a career on entertaining smart women and men with uplifting storytelling.” – Sarina White Bowen Oh yes you can. I’m enamored of this Kobo Writing Life… Read More
Introduction to Meditation
This 10 min TED talk is given by the “Headspace Guy”… that gentle voice you hear on the app. I didn’t realize he was actually the co-founder of Headspace (ie not just voice talent hired for the job) and that he was also a monk. This 10 min video is a wonderful introduction to the concept of mindfulness and the… Read More
GRIT – Passion and Perseverance for Really Long-Term Goals
It’s hard to overstate how important grit is to success in life – for kids and adults. People sometimes look at me and think (or say out loud!), “Well, sure you’re successful at fill-in-the-blank. You’re smart or have a Ph.D. or work hard or fill-in-other-attribute.” Very seldom is GRIT identified as the supposed magic ingredient for my success (however you… Read More
Altered Traits
Made my doctor’s day this morning. I led with: “I’ve been meditating daily since I saw you in September.” I was a wreck then, limping around with major back pain. Today I was effusing about the change in my mind/body over three months of rigorous healing/rejuvenation, including all kinds of exercise, yoga, meditation, at-home PT, etc. She was like, “Now… Read More
What’s Your True North? (Or How To Change Your Bad Habits)
I change goals all the time – but that’s because I’ve rethought what my purpose is and then re-align my goals to follow that compass heading. As we near the end of the year, it’s natural to look back, see where we’ve been, then look forward and set a new direction. I’m in the middle of a seven-week goal… Read More
Mindjack For Real
Amazon “The amygdala, a key node in the brain’s stress circuitry, shows dampened activity from a mere thirty or so hours of MBSR (Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction) practice.” —Altered Traits by Goleman and Davidson This books is a fascinating collection of all the science studies of meditation, including a historical look at how far Western understanding has come. There are… Read More
The First 200 Words Are The Hardest
Because I’m a nerd at heart. Also because humans are made of chemicals so this intrinsically makes sense to me. Translation for the non-nerds: There’s a thing called “activation energy” in chemistry (also applies to any couch you’re trying to move to find the remote)—it’s a lot harder to get the thing (say a reaction) going than to keep it… Read More
Writing is an Exploration of Self as Much as Story
“It is impossible to become like somebody else. Your only hope is to become more fully yourself. That is the reason for practicing meditation in the first place.” —Jon Kabat-Zinn, Full Catastrophe Living So many authors suffer from comparison-itis—I did it myself early on, especially in those first painful years when you’re still struggling to find your voice and yourself… Read More
Tidbits from the Emotional Craft of Fiction Workshop
Emotional Craft of Fiction – book and workshop (you can attend the next one in Irvine, CA in Jan 2018!) My back going out on me kept me from one day of the three in this workshop, but the other two were attended propped up in a wheelchair among friends and relatively pain-free with the help of modern medicine. Not… Read More
No STRESS, just FOCUS
This is my new motto. Also, read this: CLICK HERE TO GET IT “The signs of mental fatigue, such as a drop in effectiveness and a rise in distractedness and irritability, signify that the mental effort needed to sustain focus has depleted the glucose that feeds neural energy….The antidote to attention fatigue is the same as for the physical kind:… Read More
On Reading as a Writer
The Initial Love Affair My relationship with reading is lifelong and fraught with drama. I was madly in love in my youth and early adulthood, mostly SF but also philosophical tracts. Just as I was beginning to want more from books—more romance, more emotional content, more sweeping dramas where humanity was tested at its worst and brought to its best—SF… Read More
Writing Workshops
Once you’re not a beginner at your craft anymore, it’s really hard to find workshops that are worth the time and money invested. EMOTIONAL CRAFT OF FICTION 2017 (How to Write the Story beneath the Surface) I just signed up for this one because I *know* it’s going to be worthwhile. I took a 4 day workshop with Donald Maass… Read More
RESISTANCE: How to Overcome It
I’ve just lost two days to battling Resistance. I’m telling you this to 1- let you know that this still happens to writers who have been writing for years and have many novels under their belts and who consider themselves Highly Trained Resistance Fighters (TM pending), and 2 – to give you some insight into how I do battle. KEY… Read More
DRIVE and Indie Publishing – Part 4 – OUTWARD MARKERS OF SUCCESS
DRIVE by Daniel Pink is all about internal motivation and how autonomy, mastery, and serving a higher purpose are things that fulfill us. I’ve always been very internally motivated. I’ve also always been driven. These are two separate things – you can have ambition but be motivated by external rewards, or you can have internal motivation but no ambition that’s… Read More
DRIVE and Indie Publishing, Part 3 – 10% Time
The idea of 10% time is letting your employees spend 10% of their hours (or one day a quarter – whatever) working on any project they want. The idea is to spur innovation. Now, this doesn’t naturally appear to apply to writers. I mean, we’re on 10% Time ALL THE TIME, right? Well… not really. In a global sense, yes…. Read More
DRIVE and Indie Publishing, Part 2 – Turning Work into Play and Play into Work
“Once we realize that the boundaries between work and play are artificial, we can take matters in hand and begin the difficult task of making life more livable.” – DRIVE by Daniel Pink I write full-time, which I often call “playing full-time” but in reality, I have three teen boys and a husband and home and a life, and it’s… Read More
DRIVE and Indie Publishing – Part 1 – Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose
I have many thoughts about Daniel Pink’s book DRIVE and how its theories of motivation intersect with indie publishing. MANY THOUGHTS. So many I have to break this into parts. A PRIMER DRIVE is about Motivation 3.0 – the autonomy, mastery, and purpose that drives our intrinsic motivation to work, play, live, and create. Motivation 2.0 is your typical carrots-and-sticks… Read More
Writing Craft Books You Need On Your Shelf
my brain on storytelling Inspired by this post by Sarah Allen, “Tips for Editing Your Manuscript from a Real-Life Editor,” as well as an email from a writer-friend asking about reference books on the craft of writing, I’ve put together a list of craft books that have each had a profound impact (at one time, and often ongoing) on my… Read More