The Writing Nag

Collage to Inspire, Reduce Anxiety and Have Fun

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 13:34:00 +0000

I just finished my first collage for this packet work. When it was finished to my surprise I had another idea for a poem. In my relaxed state of cutting paper, arranging colors, words and pictures I let go of my anxiety.

When facing a creative block or feeling stressed about your writing the urge to flee or do nothing (resistance) can be overwhelming. Sometimes a walk around the block is enough to get me to the next level. But when it doesn't work I discovered last semester that working with paper, scissors and glue reduces my stress and provides another creative outlet.

You'll need magazines, scrap paper, scissors, glue, a small block of time, and an open mind. This collage is for you, don't think too much about how it compares to another artist's work. It can simply be fun.

1.Go through magazines and pull or cut out images you like, don't think too much about this,pick colors, pictures, words that speak to you.

2.Randomly place pictures, words, scrap paper, into a pattern that pleases you. Some beginning collage artists suggest looking at magazine ads for layout ideas, but this can also be intimidating. Don't glue anything yet.

3.Leave the collage unglued for a couple of hours or even a day.

4.When you come back glue the images in place. You might find a new layout looks even better after an incubation time.

5. Set the timer for thirty minutes and write about your collage.

Now get back to work!

Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

Learn More About The Art of Collage.

Learn More About Resistance and Creative Blocks.

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 11

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 13:31:00 +0000

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 10

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 21:31:00 +0000

"The leaves fall, the wind blows, and the farm country slowly
changes from the summer cottons into its winter wools."
Henry Beston, Northern Farm

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 9

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 13:50:00 +0000

"Even if something is left undone, everyone must take time to sit still and watch the leaves turn."
Elizabeth Lawrence

The Courage to Create

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 00:03:00 +0000

“Another word for creativity is courage”

Having a blog and regularly posting your words or art takes a lot of courage. For many writers and artists it is their first step in "putting it out there".

One of the blogs I regularly visit when I need to smile is Travel and Sing,. I was initially drawn to it because of the way she combines words with illustrations.

Yesterday Linda posted this Autumn Thank You Cake in gratitude to her friends and fans. Scroll down and look at her other autumn illustrations!

Thank you Travel and Sing! Your art inspires me!
Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 8

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 20:41:00 +0000

"We fancy men are individuals; so are pumpkins; but every pumpkin in the field goes through every point of pumpkin history”
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Journaling for a full day-A day in your life

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 14:43:00 +0000

Today, set yourself up to journal the entire day tomorrow. That means having a pen and paper ready right when you wake up to record any thoughts or dreams. And continuing on through the day not missing any detail, conversation, thoughts, memories. This is based on a prompt in The Writer's Idea Book by Jack Heffron. He suggests "don't let more than an hour pass without writing."

He also writes "whatever you do, don't stop." If your day gets too busy, jot down words instead of notes. A few days later, or a week later take these notes and write a fictional character experiencing your day or expand your notes into a memoir piece. Now get back to work!

Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

Happy Birthday Karen!

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 14:39:00 +0000

“And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.”
Abraham Lincoln

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 7

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 14:09:00 +0000

"The morns are meeker than they were,
The nuts are getting brown;
The berry's cheek is plumper,
The rose is out of town.

The maple wears a gayer scarf,
The field a scarlet gown.
Lest I should be old-fashioned,
I'll put a trinket on."
- Emily Dickinson, Nature 27 - Autumn

I Remember

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 14:23:00 +0000

“Memory is a way of holding on to the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose.”
Kevin Arnold

In several poetry workshops and in many craft books on poetry Joe Brainard's book I Remember is referenced. His book, the story of his life through sentences or paragraphs that begin with the words "I remember" are funny, sad, nostalgic and honest.

Today set the timer for 30 minutes and write I remember followed by your memory. Don't stop writing keep your fingers on the keyboard or the pen to the paper. Each sentence or paragraph should begin with I remember. One of these long forgotten memories might just spark a poem, an essay or a short story. Now get back to work!

Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 6

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 13:59:00 +0000

"Youth is like spring, an over-praised season more remarkable for biting winds than genial breezes.
Autumn is the mellower season, and what we lose in flowers we more than gain in fruits."
- Samuel Butler

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 5

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 14:14:00 +0000

"There is no season when such pleasant and sunny spots may be lighted on, and produce so pleasant an effect on the feelings, as now in October."
- Nathaniel Hawthorne

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 4

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 14:24:00 +0000

"I saw old Autumn in the misty morn
Stand, shadowless like Silence, listening
To Silence."
- Thomas Hood

A Cake of portable soup

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 15:00:00 +0000

A page of my journal is like a cake of portable soup. A little may be diffused into a considerable portion.
James Boswell

I love this image the hard dense brick of soup-add hot water-and then a full steaming bowl of soup. The idea that your words are condensed but they will bring forth nourishment.

In the memoir book there is a very difficult exercise, today choose a 10 year increment of your life and condense it down to two pages. Within the two pages your sentences must be three words. No more, no less. Now get back to work!

Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 3

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 13:58:00 +0000

Late blooming flowers extend the summer.

"In the garden, Autumn is, indeed the crowning glory of the year, bringing us the fruition of months of thought
and care and toil. And at no season, safe perhaps in Daffodil time, do we get such superb colour effects as
from August to November."
- Rose G. Kingsley, The Autumn Garden

Keeping a Journal, a Diary, a Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:22:00 +0000

What is a diary as a rule? A document useful to the person who keeps it. Dull to the contemporary who reads it and invaluable to the student, centuries afterwards, who treasures it.
Walter Scott

I'm reading a book on memoir from someone who doesn't like to use the word or phrase journaling, her opinion of course. I don't like to use the word diary because a diary to me has a secretive element to it. Maybe because my diary in grade school has a tiny little lock and key and most entries read like this:

Woke up at 7:00, almost missed the school bus because I was tired and couldn't seem to get my socks and shoes on, I tried not to talk all morning which was pretty easy because my mom wasn't up yet but by the time I got to school Debbie was at my locker so I had to talk to her. I think B.W. looked at me today in History class but then again Peter was talking to the teacher and he sits behind me so he could have been looking at him. He never faces forward, always sits turned around in his chair.

To me journaling isn't writing exactly what happened but seeing where the words take you. My journal entry yesterday started when I fell in the pumpkin patch Tuesday after being weighed down by 16 books in my backpack and ended up in NYC in 1980. I let the transition happen naturally and tried not to stop where my thoughts go. I do wish I had my diary from grade school though, it could have been good for a few laughs. A blog serves the same purpose for me, it gives me a place to write daily, but it is much more censored than my journal. How can blogging, journaling or writing in a diary be helpful in your writing? I think it gives you a place just to write and not to think so much about form. It can evolve into a personal essay, a poem or a short story but there is no expectations it can just be words on a page. Journaling can help you get the stuff out there that needs to be said or wants out of your head. As Abigail Thomas writes in Thinking About Memoir "be honest, dig deep, or don't bother." Today write two pages without censoring your words.Now get back to work!

Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

31 Reasons I Love October-Day 2

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:15:00 +0000

I am fulfilled

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:10:00 +0000

I am fulfilled
Originally uploaded by cocoaberg25

I am graceful

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:09:00 +0000

I am graceful
Originally uploaded by cocoaberg25

Positive affirmation and delicious local food in Montpelier, Vermont. All of their buckwheat crepes are named with positive affirmations choose from I am happy, I am fulfilled, I am beautiful, I am graceful, I am loved, I am good. After we ate here my friends thought we should continue the theme at the rest of our cafeteria meals. There is something wonderful about positive affirmations combined with food.

31 Reasons I love October-Day 1

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 15:17:00 +0000

Excavating Memories

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 14:08:00 +0000

“It's surprising how much of memory is built around things unnoticed at the time”
Barbara Kingsolver

Since I'm working on journaling this semester I've been getting up the last two days and writing journal entries, similar to Julia Cameron's morning pages. I'm already surprised what is coming up in just the last two days, with this semester being 15 weeks I imagine that I will be excavating a lot of memories that I thought were long gone.

Today, try morning pages. Commit to writing morning pages this week. After the week you might find that this becomes a great warm up for your other writing.Try not to censor your thoughts as random as they seem. Later you might find a good jumping off point from these seemingly random thoughts. Now get back to work!

Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

Coming Home

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 13:28:00 +0000

“We should come home from adventures, and perils, and discoveries every day with new experience and character”
Henry David Thoreau

There is nothing as wonderful as coming home...my garden has exploded with cosmos, mums, dahlias and scabiosa not ready to turn in for the fall.Pumpkins and gourds are ready to be picked and October is right around the corner.
My study plan this semester will be challenging but very exciting, I will be working on some collaborative work, journaling, collage and new forms of poetry. I am also going to be researching the link between depression and the creative person. Lots of work to be done.
Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

Where Do You Want to Go?

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 18:51:00 +0000

Zest. Gusto. How rarely one hears these words used. How rarely do we see people living, or for that matter, creating by them. Yet if I were asked to name the most important items in a writer’s make-up, the things that shape his material and rush him along the road to where he wants to go, I could only warn him to look to his zest, see to his gusto.
Ray Bradbury

Being here, spending most moments reading, writing, thinking about writing and the writing life is heady. The students and advisers here are amazingly talented, dedicated poets, writers and artists. And it's easy to get intimidated...But I know when I go home that "real life" will interfere with the excitement of studying writing and poetry. As Ray Bradbury says it's that real life stuff that shapes you as a writer, can you still be excited by writing if you work an office job? or work in a supermarket, or a restaurant? Keeping the excitement going can be challenging when real life steps in. Do you take time to research new writers and artists? Go to art exhibits, book signings, workshops? Julia Cameron writes about artists' dates to keep you in the moment...have you had an artists' date recently?

Now get back to work!
Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

The illusion of control

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 19:40:00 +0000

Writing gives you the illusion of control, and then you realize it's just an illusion, that people are going to bring their own stuff into it.
David Sedaris, interview in Louisville Courier-Journal, June 5, 2005

It's Sunday and I haven't written anything since Wednesday. I have a hard time blogging here because I'm not in my space so I'm guessing my regular posts won't happen until next week. Today for a few hours I ran away from campus with some friends and escaped to Montpelier, ate amazing local organic food, bought a poetry book, some postcards and felt like I was on vacation. The photos will have to wait...ahead of me a poetry reading and the beginning of my study plan for next semester.

Today, think about where you could go for a couple of hours and retreat into yourself...it could be as simple as choosing to go to a different coffee shop or checking out the new writing books at the library or the bookstore. Now get back to work!

Lovingly,
The Writing Nag

Education Quote

noreply@blogger.com (Writing Nag) — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 17:57:00 +0000

Why should society feel responsible only for the education of children, and not for the education of all adults of every age? ~Erich Fromm