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intuition personality and story reading notes

Intuition: how to understand and master it – a review of ‘The Inner Tree’ by Maura McCarley Torkildson

January 10, 2019

Want to understand and enhance your intuition? The book ‘The Inner Tree’ will help you with the science, experience and practice of intuition. Read on!

Einstein wrote, “The intuitive mind is a sacred gift, and the rational mind its faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”

from The Inner Tree by Maura McCarley Torkildson,  Foreword by Randy Fauver PhD

intuition

As a personality type practitioner with INTJ preferences and Introverted Intuition as my lead cognitive process, intuition is an area I have explored personally and professionally. But intuition always retains its mystical qualities even though I use it all the time. Learning to trust and understand intuition and how it works remains a challenge. Carl Jung said of the Introverted Intuitive:

So the introverted intuitive has in a way a very difficult life, although one of the most interesting lives, but it is often difficult to get into their confidence.

C.G. Jung Speaking: Interviews and Encounters p311

I can vouch for that. Anyone who is very intuitive – introverted or extraverted in orientation – will know that intuition continues to feel mysterious and hard to pin down. And for those who are not naturally intuitive, I am sure working with intuition can feel even more mysterious.

So I was very grateful to receive Maura McCarley Torkildson’s excellent new book ‘The Inner Tree: Discovering the Roots of Your Intuition and Overcoming Barriers to Mastering It‘. It is a fascinating read, shedding light on intuition from a range of perspectives including evidence-based ones. Here are some thoughts on the book’s key focus and value for those interested in exploring intuition further.

The evidence about intuition

The book commences with a foreword by Randy Fauver, PhD, Professor and Researcher in Consciousness Studies and Integrative Medicine.  This insightful piece both stands alone and sets the context for Maura’s book beautifully. It highlights that intuition is about mastering and developing intuitive abilities but also about understanding the science and contexts for its practice.

Randy Fauver explains lessons around inner life, signals and synchronicity and provides stories of intuition in practice. But it was the evidence and research-based information about intuition that I found so fascinating. Linking in with ‘The Inner Tree‘, the central image of intuition in the book, Fauver explores scientific support for nature, shamanic healing and unifying states of consciousness.

The most exciting part of his foreword is about the science of non-ordinary ways of receiving intuitive information. He explains three key ways we might receive intuitive information: the pineal gland in the brain, the heart and the gut.

Reading through, it all made sense. For example, we talk about “gut reaction”, “having a gut feeling”, and “not being able to stomach something”. The scientific reasons why this might be so are explained with supporting research. There are more receptors for emotions in the gut than anywhere else. No wonder we perceive things in this way so directly. However, as Fauver explains, we often doubt our reactions because they don’t align with cultural concepts of perceiving, especially Western ones.

The mystery and science of intuition

The most mindblowing part of the foreword is a discussion about memory at a cellular level. Fauver cites “numerous accounts of organ transplant recipients experiencing changes in their personality that coincide with the characteristics of the organ donor.” (Fauver, 2018: xxxi, in Torkildson, 2018). As an example, an eight-year-old receiving a heart from a ten-year-old girl who was murdered is able to assist police to identify the male attacker of the girl who died. The evidence she provides aligns with the murderer’s confession.

These insights helped me get a better handle on intuition at its most mysterious from both a scientific and practical perspective. Knowing that intuition involves these three key receptors: brain, heart and gut was so enlightening.  I also gained a stronger understanding of the challenges of working with intuition because of the cultural overlays we operate in. As Fauver says in closing:

All science can do is to strengthen your belief in the existence of intuition; Maura’s book can lead you to directly experience the incredible power of intuition.

With many references sprinkled throughout this outstanding book, I look forward to reading more of the scientific studies cited.

intuition

The practice of intuition

With the scene set, we launch further into Maura’s gift of a book on the practice of intuition. Her focus is on the lived experience of developing intuition. She also provides insights into the barriers we can face in developing intuition and how to overcome them. The cultural bias to not trust our intuition, especially in western society, looms large as a background issue. It explains why we can find experiencing and talking about intuition so challenging. As Maura says in her preface:

Nowhere in my life was I ever urged to look inside myself for truth. (p.xxxvii)

My life transition has encouraged me to embrace my intuition via tarot and oracle work as a practice of wholeness. This started because of feeling half-hearted in areas of my life especially the more corporate ones. Maura has also found that feeling empty led her to look inward. Creativity, coaching and listening to signs as guides emerge as key aspects opening her up more to intuition.

Understanding intuition and tools to work with it

Maura discusses the Tree of Life and symbolism of The Inner Tree to explain this need to go inward. She explores this from the perspective of experience, myth and meditation. There are meditation practices and activities to help apply the learning. She outlines the steps of embracing intuition:

With intuition, the secret is to notice it; second, is to trust it is real; and third, is to take the risk of acting on it (which deepens your trust). (p9)

Maura discusses many practical issues: grounding, presence awareness, patience, flow and joy. These are emotions and processes I have also experienced on my intuitive journey. Having a framework, language and practice for making meaning from them is so powerful.

‘The Clairs’ are discussed: clairsentience, clairvoyance, clairaudience, clairgustance, claircognizance and claircreative. All different psychic abilities, they are examples of how information can present itself in our experience of intuition. It is valuable to reflect on how we might be receiving information as a way of understanding and honouring intuition.

Barriers to the development of our inner tree of intuition are explored including the emotional body, grief and shame, working with shadows and managing fear and ego. Practising working with our emotions in various ways is shown as central to opening ourselves up to intuition. Practical tools for working through this are generously provided including Presence Awareness Meditations (with audio links), Body Awareness Practices and Body Maps.

Maura shares her “unconventional” experience of a fairy ally appearing in a matter of fact and accepting way, saying this is how it is. (This story is included in Mystical Interludes II – review coming soon.) She also provides tools for working with the shadow side of life such as jealousy, fear and the ego emphasising their role in intuition and wholeness.

intuition

Building our intuitive muscle

The final section of the book bringing all of this together into holistic practices. The mystery of intuition sits side by side with the scientific evidence presented:

The universe works in mysterious ways and we don’t usually have the whole picture. (p149)

Developing trust in our intuition emerges as a key practice as does trusting the ways we choose to connect with it. Tools and practices such as curiosity, journaling, working with others, connecting with the gifts of nature, synchronicity and oracles are all ways to build intuitive muscle. The process is described as one of relationship and connection as well as strengthening the practice.

‘The Inner Tree‘ helped me make sense of my evolving intuitive practice. Even as a personality strength, it’s something I have struggled to understand and own. My experience is of developing intuition day in and day out, sharing it with others and sifting through my feelings about it all. The strangeness in thinking I can provide intuitive insights for myself and others via sharing Tarot and Oracle work has been a key barrier to work through. Not to mention, pushing through thoughts of what others might think about it!

I have learnt to trust that my work makes sense on another level beyond me. And I have learnt to trust that not having the whole picture is perfectly fine. On a day to day level, it makes sense and helps me make meaning of my life and creative practice as it evolves. And if my work can help others on their journey, then why not share what I learn?

The Inner Tree – support for intuitive practice

So I am very grateful for ‘The Inner Tree’ and the rich wisdom within it. It’s the first time I have read a detailed account of the science and practice of intuition. Maura sensitively articulates the mysteries she has experienced into a soulful framework we can work with. This is such valuable support for developing intuition.

With its combination of science and practice, ‘The Inner Tree‘ is a resource for understanding intuition as a skill and way of absorbing information. It provides the language, structure and reference points for its practice. In this way, it helps us make sense of experience and build knowledge of how to grow intuitive skills.

‘The Inner Tree’ is a gentle handbook and companion for entering these mysteries with its mix of science and experience. It’s helpful for those who find intuition is not a natural preference. It is insightful too for people who prefer intuition but appreciate support to make sense of how it works. Some people might find the science a bit much; others might find the spiritual dimensions a bit much. But it is the strength of the two taken together as a thread throughout this book that is its key value. Hopefully, everyone can shift a little from where they are in reading it.

Wherever you are on the journey of working with intuition, ‘The Inner Tree‘ offers insight and wisdom for further navigating this journey. There are scientific papers to discover and chase up. You will read about intuitive sources of information you might be excited to recognise and explore. There are numerous practices you can embed further into your life to bring your intuition alive. This book is a welcome addition to the literature on intuition and personality and to the practical genre of self-discovery and self-leadership writing.

Thought pieces + footnotes

Maura McCarley Torkildson, M.A. is an author, speaker, artist, intuitive and Soul Creativity Support Mentor at MauraTorkildsonCoaching.com

The book is available at: ‘The Inner Tree: Discovering the Roots of Your Intuition and Overcoming Barriers to Mastering It‘.

Maura Torkildson has shared her Wholehearted Story on Tackling Trauma with Empathy and Vision on Quiet Writing. Hop over to read!

The Inner Tree was provided as a review copy by the author in return for a fair review and sharing of it. I am grateful to Maura McCarley Torkildson and Citrine Publishing for sharing this book with me.

My thanks too to Peter Geyer for assistance with the wording and reference for the Carl Jung quote.

Via Amazon.com.au:
The Inner Tree: Discovering the Roots of Your Intuition and Overcoming Barriers to Mastering It

Via Amazon.com:

Via Amazon.co.uk:

You might also enjoy:

Intuition, writing and work: eight ways intuition can guide your creativity

Introverted and extraverted intuition: how to make intuition a strong practice

Being a vessel – or working with introverted intuition

Overwhelm, intuition and thinking

When the inner voice calls, and calls again – my journey to wholehearted living

Music, intuition and messages of songs

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creativity reading notes writing

9 writing books to inspire your creativity and craft

September 30, 2018

If you want to be writer, you must do two things above all: read a lot and write a lot. There’s no way around these two things that I am aware of, no shortcut.

On Writing, Stephen King

writing books

9 writing books to inspire your creativity

Here are nine writing books to inspire your craft and creative spirit with a taste of what each focuses on.

1. Still Writing: The Perils and Pleasures of a Creative Life – Dani Shapiro

I love a sub-title and include them all for this list! This one for Still Writing sums up beautifully what this book is all about. It provides vignettes on the craft of writing and living a creative life, day in, day out. The best books on writing take you inside what it’s like to live a writing life, as well as giving you advice and tips for the journey. Still Life takes us through aspects of the writing process as a lived experience structured around Beginnings, Middles and Ends. It’s gentle and encouraging, full of gems to inspire your journey.

Act as if. Act as if you’re a writer. Sit down and begin. Act as if you might just create something beautiful, and by beautiful I mean something authentic and universal. Don’t wait for anybody to tell you it’s okay. Take that shimmer and show us your humanity. It’s your job. (p32)

2. The Situation and the Story: the Art of Personal Narrative – Vivian Gornick

It took me a long time to work out what genre I wanted to write in. This book helped me work out that it was personal narrative. ‘The Situation and the Story’  is a deep-dive on the art and technique of personal narrative. Growing out of 15 years of teaching in MFA programs, it covers examples of the craft of personal narrative such as Loren Eiseley’s magnificent, ‘All the Strange Hours: the Excavation of a Life’ and Beryl Markham’s ‘West with the Night’. If like me, you aspire to write personal narrative or memoir, this is a fabulous handbook for the craft.

The presence in a memoir or an essay of the truth speaker–the narrator that a writer pulls out of his or her own agitated and boring self to organize a piece of experience–it was about this alone that I felt I had something to say; and it was to those works in which such a narrator comes through strong and clear that I was invariably drawn. (p25)

3. One Year to a Writing Life: Twelve Lessons to Deepen Every Writer’s Art and Craft – Susan M Tiberghien

This books is structured around a one year journey through and to a writing life. There are 12 genre-based lessons to deepen your writing craft. They are focused around areas like: journal writing, personal essays, opinion and travel essays, short stories, dialogue and poetic prose. These 12 workshops drawn from over 15 years of teaching combine inspiration and teaching and focus on creative practice as a habit. The idea is that as you work through the 12 lessons, one a month over a year, you shape the habit of your creative practice.

A person who writes has the habit of writing. The word habit refers to a routine, but also to a stole, to a costume befitting a calling. In the same way that a monk puts on a traditional habit, so the writer puts on a traditional habit. As writers we find where we are comfortable and with a stole over our shoulders, we write. (p ix)

4. If You Want to Write: Releasing your Creative Spirit – Brenda Ueland

This is a 1938 classic on releasing the natural writing spirit that is within all of us. It takes a very egalitarian and encouraging stance. Chapter 1 is entitled ‘Everybody Is Talented, Original and Has Something Important To Say and the book continues this theme and spirit. This is such a wise  book on writing and creativity, often cited in people’s lists of favourite creativity books. It is heart-filled and conversational in style, inspiring confidence and the ability to write with every page.

I want to assure you, with all earnestness, that no writing is a waste of time,–no creative work where the feelings, the imagination, the intelligence must work. With every sentence you write, you have learned something. It has done you good. It has stretched your understanding. (p15)

5. Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within – Natalie Goldberg

Another writing classic, published in 1996, Writing Down the Bones is made up of short zen-style reads that focus on freeing us up to write. She focuses on simplifying and streamlining the process rather than adding rules. It’s about voice and story stripped back to their essence as a starting point  for creativity. And it’s all very common sense and practical, instilling confidence. If like me, you’ve acquired years of other people’s voices and corporate styles, this book is a palate cleanser and reminder to get back to your own writing voice, style and message.

Writing practice embraces your whole life and doesn’t demand any logical form: no Chapter 19 following the action of Chapter 18….It is undirected and has to do with all of you right in your present moment. Think of writing practice as loving arms you come to illogically and incoherently. (p13)

6. On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft – Stephen King

Another writing book that often appears as a favourite on the art and life of writing, this classic by veteran author Stephen King is part memoir and part writing class. Very down to earth, it’s honed from years of sitting down to write and creating book after book. King takes the fluff out of writing practice and encourages us to as well. His memorable and direct advice on adverbs has stayed with me: “The adverb is not your friend.”

If you want to be writer, you must do two things above all: read a lot and write a lot. There’s no way around these two things that I am aware of, no shortcut. (p145)

7. Your Life as Story: Discovering the “New Autobiography” and Writing Memoir as Literature – Tristine Rainer

Tristine Rainer’s The New Diary was a seminal book inspiring my creativity and is featured in 36 Books. Your Life as Story continues the theme of life story as writing practice and creative source. Tristine Rainer’s specialty is autobiography and in this book she focuses on the evolution of autobiography as literature. The techniques for its practice are outlined including: genres of the self, truth, finding your voice and elements of story structure in autobiography. It’s a valuable read on the craft of memoir and autobiography for aspiring and practicing writers in this field.

If you complete even one short autobiographic story or essay, you will know the delight of creative alchemy, of making a gem out of life’s dross. (p16)

8. Writing the Natural Way: Using Right-Brain Techniques to Release your Expressive Powers – Gabriele Lusser Rico 

You might know of Betty Edwards’ book Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. This is the writing equivalent of that book and focuses on using right-brain techniques to release creativity in writing. Published in 1983 and structured in a course-based way, the strategies are a useful addition to your creative tool-kit. Practices include: clustering, recurrent, re-vision, image and metaphor, creative tension and language rhythm. With insights on how the brain works throughout, it’s a great book for inspiring confidence in new-found ways especially if your left-brain critic is a very loud and powerful force.

Just as two heads are better than one for solving problems, so two brains are better than one when it comes to writing naturally.

9. The Successful Author Mindset: A Handbook for Surviving the Writer’s Journey – Joanna Penn

Joanna Penn’s The Successful Author Mindset focuses on mindset and the long-haul creative journey of being a writer. Writing is a lonely journey with self-doubt and your inner critic ever-present in shifting ways. This books covers the landscape of mindset issues writers encounter. It offers suggestions for recognising and tackling these issues, based on Joanna’s years of experience. Including excerpts from Joanna’s diary over her years of writing and self-publishing, it focuses on the emotional journey of being a writer. It’s about creativity for the longer term and riding the emotions over time.

Embrace self-doubt as part of the creative process. Be encouraged by the face that virtually all other creatives, including your writing heroes, feel it too with every book they write.

writing books

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If you enjoyed this post, please share via your preferred social media channel – links are below.

You might also enjoy:

How to read for more creativity, pleasure and productivity

How to know and honour your special creative influences

Honour you lineage by Sage Cohen – from ‘Fierce on the Page‘

Creative practices in my toolkit to make the most of this year’s energies

Words to inspire from Steven Pressfield’s The Artist’s Journey

Work in progress – being one and creating one

creativity inspiration & influence reading notes

Words to inspire from ‘The Artist’s Journey’ by Steven Pressfield

September 27, 2018

On our artist’s journey, we move past Resistance and past self-sabotage. We discover our true selves and our authentic calling, and we produce the works we were born to create.

The Artist’s Journey, Steven Pressfield

artist's journey

The Artist’s Journey

I’ve just read The Artist’s Journey: The Wake of the Hero’s Journey and the Lifelong Pursuit of Meaning by Steven Pressfield. It’s a new book and follows The War of Art on resistance and Turning Pro on moving from being an amateur to a professional.

The Artist’s Journey is about how in shifting to being more professional in our habits, we move from the hero’s journey to the artist’s journey. This focuses on our pursuit of meaning, our calling and our ‘daimon’:

On our artist’s journey, we move past Resistance and past self-sabotage. We discover our true selves and our authentic calling, and we produce the works we were born to create.

I’m a big fan of The War of Art and Turning Pro, both books being pivotal in my artistic and creative development and featuring in my 36 Books that Shaped my Story. What I love about this book is how it relates our artist’s journey to our lifelong muse and voice. Each piece in our body of work is a piece discovering our voice and story:

We find our voice that same way. Project by project. Subject by subject. Observing in amazement as a new “us” pops out each time.

This is such a great book by Steven Pressfield, more spiritual in focus than the previous two books in this vein. It’s as if the journey continues through resistance and past it. We turn more professional and sit down to write and in this we discover our artist’s journey. It’s another book to read over and over.

Words to inspire you

Here are a few words to inspire you from The Artist’s Journey:

On hero’s journey + artist’s journey:

What counted was that I had, after years if running from it, actually sat down and done my work. This was my epiphanal moment. My hero’s journey was over. My artist’s journey had begun.

On gifts:

What gift do you bring for the people? You will learn that, now, on your artist's journey. Share on X

On your subject + niche:

You have a subject too. You were born with it. You will discover it on your artist's journey. Share on X

On style:

Style is inseparable from voice. It evolves out of subject and point of view and blends seamlessly with medium of expression.

On the “true work”:

The thesis of this book is that the artist’s journey, which follows the hero’s journey chronologically, comprises the true work, the actual production, of the artist’s life.

On “write what you don’t know”:

The conventional truism is “Write what you know”. But something mysterious and wonderful happens when we write what we don’t know. The Muse enters the arena. Stuff comes out of us from a source we can neither name nor locate.

On process:

The artist's journey is an alchemical mixture of the airy-fairy and the workshop-practical. Share on X

On skills:

On the artist’s journey, we develop skills. Skills we did not have before. We teach ourselves these skills. We apprentice ourselves to others wiser than we are.

On body of work:

You can practice your art. You can produce, over time, a body of work that is the produce of your calling, the fruit of your authentic being, the full expression of your truest and highest self.

Other posts and a podcast chat on The Artist’s Journey

You can read more from The Artist’s Journey in How to Undertake the Artist’s Journey.

Marie Forleo has shared her thoughts on the book here.

You can also learn more about The Artist’s Journey via this fabulous The Creative Penn podcast chat with Steven Pressfield:

The Artist’s Journey with Steven Pressfield .

Here’s a beautiful snapshot of me in action, quietly writing in a sacred creative space at our recent retreat in Hoi An, led by Kirsten Pilz of Write Your Journey. The retreat was a critical step in my continuing artist’s journey, finding my voice and gaining confidence. This image is by Nigel Rowles and used with permission and thanks.

artist's journey

Keep in touch + free Reading Wisdom Guide

You might also enjoy my free ‘Reading Wisdom Guide for Creatives, Coaches and Writers‘ with a summary of 45 wholehearted books to inspire your journey. Just pop your email address in the box below.

You will receive access to the Wholehearted Library which includes the Reading Wisdom Guide and so much more! Plus you’ll receive monthly Beach Notes with updates and inspiring resources from Quiet Writing. This includes writing, personality type, coaching, creativity, tarot, productivity and ways to express your unique voice in the world.

Quiet Writing is on Facebook  Instagram and Twitter so keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community. Look forward to connecting with you and inspiring your wholehearted story!

You might also enjoy:

Creative practices in my toolkit to make the most of this year’s energies

How to know and honour your special creative influences

NaNoWriMo – 10 lessons on the value of writing each day

Doing the work: 21 valuable quotes to help you show up

Practical tools to increase writing productivity

Free ebook – 36 Books that Shaped my Story

#quietwriting – growing creative community and connection

inspiration & influence reading notes

Reading as Creative Influence – 36 Books that Shaped my Story

September 1, 2017
36 books

My free ebook ’36 Books that Shaped my Story: Reading as Creative Influence’ celebrates the books we love as our creative legacy and the clues they give as to what is emerging in our story.

Get your copy of 36 Books that Shaped my Story now!

The story of ’36 Books that Shaped my Story’

I’m excited to be sharing the story of the ’36 Books that Shaped my Story’ with you!

This was my first free resource I created here in 2017. But it’s so powerful, I’m sharing it again now in case you missed it. When working out the special free ebook gift to share, I wanted something that summed up the heart of Quiet Writing. I wanted to create something that sparked creativity, shared generously and provided a springboard for reflections.

And I kept coming back to books. Sharing books that made a difference to me, how they influenced me and shaped my life. Because I learnt that reflecting on this can be a source of growth.

Words are at the heart of Quiet Writing – the words we read, the words we write, the words we say to ourselves or another person such as a trusted friend or coach as we form our vision and process our journey. The words we listen to as we read, as we engage with another fully and the words we want to write.

And story is the shape the words make – the narrative we weave through the body of work that we create through career, our creative endeavours and our passions. This story is unique – no one has read the same books as you in the same way; no one has the same life experiences as you; and you are the only one to combine your passions and experiences in the way that you do.

Gathering special books around us

I’ve always gathered special books around me as a sort of altar, a source of strength, a connection to influence. They are like a wise chorus of silent voices surrounding me. So when I read Sage Cohen’s essay, ‘Honor your lineage’ in her book, Fierce on the Page, it rang special bells of resonance. Sage explains:

I have always been magnetically drawn to the books I need as teachers. Recently I cleared a shelf and, with great reverence, placed on it the books I most love – the ones that have shaped me in the way that water shapes stones, almost imperceptibly over time.

She invites us to gather the books we most love around us and to sit with them and appreciate how they have influenced our vision and sense of direction, especially in our writing life.

And importantly, she flags that in the light and strength of these books and words, the heart of what we want to write is lingering:

I wonder if that’s really all our writing asks of us: to know what we love, to listen, and to give ourselves over to what presents itself.

What I did to shape 36 Books

So that’s what I did – I gathered the special books that have shaped me over time. I spent time with each of them, honouring what they have brought to me. And it became a fascinating and deep exercise. Choosing them, remembering what they have given me, unpacking and unravelling it a little more. I organised it into a continuum, seeing how it fitted in the context of my life – an insightful joy. And I learnt so much about myself and the recurring themes in my life.

It became a deep excavation and navigation of what I love and how it drives me.

And that is the heart of Quiet Writing – it’s about gathering the threads of our lives, finding the connecting pieces and weaving them together.

I communicate this heart and this spirit, through writing and coaching, the twin hearts of Quiet Writing, so we can work with it in a supportive way to shine. For when we find those connecting pieces, those values, those desires, those long held passions and values, they can help us negotiate the next phase more successfully and work out what we really want to do and feel.

free ebook

What to expect in ’36 Books that Shaped my Story’

So what can you expect in ‘36 Books that Shaped my Story: Reading as Creative Influence‘? It’s a 94 page pdf. It starts with a personal essay about the rationale and process drawing the threads of the experiment and experience together into key themes.

The second part then tracks through each of the 36 books individually and shows how they appeared in the context of my life and the legacy and influence they have provided. There are also suggestions as to why you might want to read each book.

Taken overall, the book shows how the books you love can be a:

  • source of writing inspiration
  • timeline for reflection
  • prompt for memoir
  • way of gathering evidence about your body of work over time
  • guide for understanding what you really love
  • pathway for noticing the key themes of your life
  • key to the influences that are your guiding light and
  • a narrative for your life.

I think you will find it a valuable read about the value of books and reading as creative influence and as a way of finding clues to help you enrich your quiet writing life.

How to get your copy of ’36 Books’

Just pop your details in the form below to receive your copy of ’36 Books’!

It’s 94 pages of deep-dive reading on books and the insight and clues they can provide us for living a wholehearted life.

If you are a book lover, this is for you!

Get your copy of 36 Books that Shaped my Story now!

You will also receive my regular ‘Beach Notes’ newsletter. It’s full of inspiration about books, writing, story, narrative, voice, personality and all things quiet writing. I send it out 1-2 times a month. You’ll also get early advice about Quiet Writing coaching, writing and learning opportunities.

I hope you enjoy ‘36 Books’. It’s an opportunity for us to reflect on our thoughts on reading, books, creativity, influence, story, narrative and writing. These are all fabulous inspirations central to Quiet Writing and the community here.

I can’t wait to hear your feedback – happy reading and reflection!

Read more!

You can read more about creative influence in this post:

How to know and honour your special creative influences

You might also enjoy:

How to read for more creativity, pleasure and productivity

Being ‘Fierce on the Page’ – a book review

On the art and love of reading

How to craft a successful life on your own terms

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inspiration & influence introversion reading notes

In praise of comfort reading

August 18, 2017

Comfort reading is a ritual, like worry beads or a nice hot cup of cocoa at bedtime. It relies on repetition and familiarity. It makes unbearable times bearable.

Jane Sullivan

Turning Pages – The authors you read when you need a bit of comfort

comfort reading

Here’s a round-up on comfort reading. Find out about the comfort books people read and reread, and why for when it feels a perfect time to hunker down with a good book.

What comes to your mind with the words ‘comfort reading’? I think of revisiting the books we love and that special genre or author that just makes us go ‘ahhhh’ and rest up, all cosy, hot chocolate or cup of tea in hand.

So here are some links and thoughts on comfort reading including my favourite comfort reads. So if you’re feeling unwell or just in need of some rest and respite, here is some inspiration for reading, comfort style.

I hope you find some time to rest and read. Would love to hear about your comfort reading preferences and practices too!

Podcast on comfort reading

A podcast that features and praises comfort reading is:

Reading the End Podcast Episode 10

There’s a great list of books on the show notes plus thoughts on what makes a comfort book. The hosts reinforce that there are different categories of comfort books: ones that put things in order eg. Georgette Heyer books; episodic books that don’t require so much effort; books for when you are sad and books that represent ‘wholesome olden times’! They include one of my comfort book authors, Rumer Godden. It’s a fun listen and a great list! It reinforces that comfort reads are contextual and different for everyone, though there may be common themes and authors that reappear.

There were surprisingly few podcasts on this important issue!

Another option is to let the guys on The Casual Academic do the reading for you and read along when you can or just learn from them. I really enjoy this podcast when I just want to listen and learn about literary fiction but I’m finding it hard to do as much reading as I would like in the genre. Always interesting and educational, as well as fun, I’m sure having a laugh is important in this type of reading.

comfort reading

Books and reading notes

In line with my post on reading more productively and accountability here, I finished David Whyte’s Crossing the Unknown Sea: Work as a Pilgrimage of Identity. This was a very special read that will stay with me for a long time. There’s so much richness on work life and our identity as we express it through work and how we can be lost and found there. It’s a book I will continue to revisit and explore. I also enjoyed reading Sharon Blackie’s If Women Rose Rooted: The Journey to Authenticity and Belonging.

Book and blog notes on this week’s theme of comfort reading

It was fun to explore what other people have said about comfort reading and their suggestions. But first, my favourite comfort reads.

I love a book that I can just curl up inside, a setting that I love, a love story or psychological engagement, something that takes me into people’s lives as I watch the events and relationships unfold. I like the warmth of people connecting or a narrative that takes me into a place where I can just be or watch, especially engaging with character and place.

So here are my comfort reads and authors:

Maeve Binchy

A long-time love, there’s just something so cosy about curling up with a Maeve Binchy book. They are all wonderful; the ones that come to mind are: Tara Road, Quentins, Circle of Friends, Evening Class and A Week in Winter. I love how the characters often reappear as familiar faces across different novels. They’re grounded in a spirit of realism as well, as Maeve Binchy explains:

I don’t have ugly ducklings turning into swans in my stories. I have ugly ducklings turning into confident ducks. 

Jojo Moyes

Jojo Moyes has become more famous with Me Before You which came out as a movie. This is fabulous as she is an excellent writer and I love stepping into the world of her books. All her narratives have that sense of comfort in story and love engagements but in various settings and environments. Enjoy any or all of: The Ship of Brides, Silver Bay, Peacock Emporium, Foreign Fruits, Silver Bay, Night Music, The Girl You Left Behind and The Last Letter Your Lover. 

Daphne Du Maurier

I’ve shared my love of Daphne Du Maurier and especially my favourite novel, Rebecca. My Cousin Rachel is a great read too and enjoying attention due to the recent film adaptation. But also really engaging are The House on the Strand, Don’t Look Now and other Stories and The Birds and other Stories. Du Maurier’s short stories are especially good reads when you just want a shorter bite.

comfort reading

Liz Fenwick

Being a great lover of Cornwall, Liz Fenwick’s novels are often my first choice when I’m looking for a holiday read or just want a relaxing chill-out read. I love books that take me to special places and Fenwick’s novels are enjoyable and engaging reads with a mix of love, family history, intrigue and Cornish landscape. I’ve enjoyed: The Cornish House, A Cornish Affair, A Cornish Stranger and Under a Cornish Sky.

Rumer Godden

Rumer Godden is another special author whose books I seek out when I’m needing comfort. My preferred stories seem to be ones like The Black Narcissus and In This House of Brede that involve nuns and the drama and personality of cloistered communities. They are books I reread and enjoy, often at times of illness and bedrest!

comfort reads

 

Blog/Twitter/Instagram posts and interactions:

For thoughts on comfort reading, here are some excellent posts:

Booksellers share their best comfort reads and tips, via Readings a fabulous Aussie bookshop, including fantasy, Agatha Christie, Harry Potter, poetry and Anne of Green Gables (a recurrent recommended comfort read!)

In The appeal of comfort reading, Psychologies Magazine explores what makes a comfort read we return to:

‘I can read it over and over again,’ people said, and perhaps that is the most important thing of all. Like prayers, our comfort reading becomes a ritual. I may find something new in the Anne [of Green Gables] books every time, but the words themselves never change. Our comfort reads are talismans, touchstones, that will never let us down.

In The Irish TImes, The Guyliner postulates on why he reads the same books over and over again:

They’re not cerebral, they’re not impressive, but they wrap themselves around me every moment, even when I’m not reading.

Rebecca is one of the books he returns to, with such a beautiful response to it:

Gloomy and glamorous and beautifully written, I always come back to Rebecca. I never want it to end, and always wish we could find out what happens next. With each reading, I will the second Mrs de Winter to tell Mrs Danvers to sod off, to speak up and be confident, to enjoy her time as the lady of Manderley. But, of course, she never does – she can only be herself.

In Turning Pages: The authors you read when you need a bit of comfort, Jane Sullivan says that comfort reading is a ritual and notes the authors who pop up consistently: Raymond Chandler and L M Montgomery (of Anne of Green Gables fame). Of Raymond Chandler, she says:

It worked because I knew that voice. I’d read the book before, I’d seen the movie, I knew what was going to happen. And the voice took me into a familiar world: guns, hooch, faded glamour, treacherous dames in seamed stockings, telephones on the wall, guys wearing hats and trenchcoats in the warm California rain.

Sarah Bessey shares 10 books she reads over and over. It’s a fabulous list and includes Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead, Barbara Kingsolver’s The Poisonwood Bible and Kate Morton’s The Forgotten Garden.

In Comfort Books. Is this even a thing? The Bloggess queries why her comfort books are “full of murder and angst and bizarreness and are not really what anyone in the world would consider to be a happy or relaxing read.”

It seems we revisit books for all kinds of reasons and different ways of sourcing comfort. Do share your thoughts on your comfort reads in the comments or on Instagram or Facebook – would love to hear!

On Quiet Writing and Tarot Narratives

On Quiet Writing, we explored the art of efficient blog post writing in a guest post by Benjamin Brandall, How to write a blog post when you have almost no time. It’s been really well-received, providing practical strategies for being organised with blog posts and getting the actual writing done.

My Tarot Narratives on Instagram have continued to be a rich source of inspiration and insight for my creative journey. Thanks for all the interactions! Twyla Tharp’s reminder today, from The Creative Habit, was around working environments and habit:

In the end, there is no one ideal condition for creativity. What works for one person is useless for another. The only criterion is this: Make it easy on yourself. Find a working environment where the prospect of wrestling with your muse doesn’t scare you, doesn’t shut you down. It should make you want to be there, and once you find it, stick with it. To get the creative habit, you need a working environment that’s habit forming. (p17)

Have a fabulous creative weekend!

comfort reads

Feature image via pexels.com

Keep in touch

Subscribe via email (see the link at the top) to make sure you receive updates from Quiet Writing and its passions in 2017. This includes MBTI developments, coaching, creativity and other connections to help express your unique voice in the world. My free e-book on the books that have shaped my story is coming soon for subscribers only – so sign up to be the first to receive it!

Quiet Writing is on Facebook – Please visit here and ‘Like’ to keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community. There are regular posts on intuition, influence, creativity, productivity, writing, voice, introversion, and personality including Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).

If you enjoyed this post, please share via your preferred social media channel – links are below.

You might also enjoy:

Creative and Connected #9 – on the art and love of reading

Creative and Connected #8 – ways to honour your unique life blend

Creative and Connected #7 – how to craft a successful life on your own terms

Creative and Connected #6 – how to be a creative entrepreneur

Creative and Connected #5 – being accountable to ourselves and others

inspiration & influence planning & productivity reading notes

Creative and Connected #9 – on the art and love of reading

August 12, 2017

Read in order to live.

Gustave Flaubert

reading

Here’s a round-up of what I’ve enjoyed and shared this week on various social platforms on the art and love of reading. My post on How to read for more creativity, pleasure and productivity has been really well received this week. Thank you so much for the feedback about how this post has inspired thoughts about reading practices. Above all, it was so lovely to connect with kindred souls who share my passion for reading.

So to further share that joy, here are some podcasts and reads that celebrate the art and love of reading.

Podcasts on the history, art and love of reading

I listened to two podcasts about reading this week and they were perfect counterpoints about the historical contexts of reading and current ways to enjoy reading.

In Our Time: Culture – Reading – BBC Radio 4

In this discussion from 2000, Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of the politics and practice of reading. The podcast covers the history of reading in social and political contexts with a particular emphasis on how women were banned from reading in times past and how it was seen as a trivial activity for them. This historical perspective makes you realise how far we have come. I always feel a responsibility to take these hard-won rights forward.

Guinevere de la Mare and the Silent Book Club – on the Secret Library Podcast with Caroline Donahue

This was such a great podcast chat on a movement I had completely missed – the Silent Book Club. Developed in response to the occasional pressure and social nature of book clubs, Silent Book Clubs involve just turning up together to a venue and reading. It emanated from Guinevere turning up with friends to a bar and just reading over a glass of wine. And this is the flavour behind the Silent Book Club. With Chapters growing all over the world, it’s a word of mouth trend that celebrates just sitting in a public place with others and reading. I can’t actually think of anything more appealing right now. Introverts unite! I notice there is no Australian branch so I think I’ll start a Sydney one – if any local people are interested, let me know. Happy days!

 

reading

 

Books and reading notes

My reading week

In line with my post this week and reading more and the accountability here, I finished two books I’ve had underway recently. Jojo Moyes’ Paris for One was such a fun read, full of chance encounters that result in quirky life changes and fresh perspectives. I loved the last story especially.

I finished listening to The Writer’s Guide to Training Your Dragon, by Scott Baker as an audio book. As a result, I’m weaving dictation into my days via my iPhone and Mac Pro as I work. It’s so easy and a stepping stone to using dictation more fully for writing and transcription.

I’ve continued savouring David Whyte’s Crossing the Unknown Sea: Work as a Pilgrimage of Identity in a slow read (probably too slow) on work and identity. It does, however, feel like it’s mirroring my life, so maybe there’s a reason for the slowness of my reading, so my life can keep time. A favourite quote this week:

To find good work, no matter the path we have chosen, means coming out of hiding. Good work means visibility. (p146)

reading

Book notes on this week’s theme of the art and love of reading

Alberto Manguel is an author to savour on the art and love of reading.

His  A History of Reading takes us into the heart of the experience of reading through a series of interconnected essays. It focuses on his personal response to reading from all angles, such as: learning to read, picture reading, being read to and reading from various standpoints such as translator and author. It’s a beautiful reflection and treasure trove on reading.

In ‘A Reading Diary: A Year of Reading Favourite Books’, Manguel decides to reread some of his favourite books, one month at a time. It’s a journey over a year, blending memoir, journal writing and reviewing into a reflective reading experience. There’s a lovely review of this book here.

One thing I have found as I revisited my books about books and reading this past week is that the authors are all so witty and funny.

A favourite book of mine in this genre is the fabulous Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader, by Anne Fadiman. This 1998 book was recommended to me by a fellow bibliophile and it’s a book of essays celebrating the love of books. It’s so very funny in the way that only a book lover can appreciate. My favourite essay is ‘Marrying Libraries’ about how Anne and her husband are merging their book collections into one after a time together and the conflict and negotiations that ensue. So many great thoughts and laughs:

Books wrote our life story, and as they accumulated on our shelves (and on our windowsills, and underneath our sofa, and on top of our refrigerator), they became chapters in it themselves. How could it be otherwise?

I’m a huge Nick Hornby fan. No other writer makes me laugh out loud as much, and so I was delighted to stumble across his collection of essays on reading, first published in the US Believer Magazine. The Complete Polysyllabic Spree is the full collection of these 28 monthly essays on the books he has bought and read. I just smile the whole way through reading these essays. They are a romp through reading, including the classics, with humour as the connecting thread.

Some of Nick’s thoughts:

If reading books is to survive as a leisure activity – and there are statistics to show that this is by no means assured – then we have to promote the joys of reading, rather than the (dubious) benefits.

and

I’m a writer, and I need to read, for inspiration and education and because I want to get better, and only books can teach me how.

In terms of novels about books and love of books as a connecting factor, there are two main ones that stand out for me:

84 Charing Cross Road, Helene Hanff – My copy has disappeared, ironically, but it’s a slim volume celebrating books as a connecting piece between people, in this case, a London antiquarian bookseller and a New York based reader. Based on the true story of their connection and exchange of letter over nearly 20 years, it’s a celebration of books, reading and the connections they inspire.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, Mary Ann Shaffer – This book is focused on post-war Guernsey and is told entirely through letters between various correspondents. It tells the story of connections between columnist Juliet Ashton and the members of the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society, as they live under German occupation. Mary Ann Shaffer wrote this book, her first novel, when she was 70. Sadly, she didn’t get to see it in print. It’s a heart-warming story of friendship, love and books across the miles.

reading

Blog/Twitter/Instagram posts and interactions:

On the art and love of reading, Joanna Penn’s post on Habits of a Book Junkie in a Digital Age is excellent on digital reading strategies and trends including how to review books.

I shared the beautiful piece by Kerstin Pilz, on Tiny Buddha, How a 10 day silent retreat helped heal my grieving heart last week. Inspired by Katherine Bell’s guest post here: Our Heart Always Knows the Way, the first of our Wholehearted Stories series, Kerstin has written a fabulous post on how life change is all about hard work and not luck in Why luck had nothing to do with my self-directed life.

On Instagram, there’s been plenty of activity around Susannah Conway’s The August Break focused around noticing, community and inspiration. Yesterday’s prompt was lavender. Not being able to think of any lavender in my immediate surroundings, I went back to my recent iphone shots and found this skyscape I had forgotten about:

 

reading

Another thought would have been the Murasaki-Shikibu lavender ink I write with every day – I thought of this hours after! It’s a great month of prompts for noticing and seeing afresh, also connecting with special memories, sacred objects and new people.

I also shared that my favourite novel is Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier. Here’s me thinking it’s an unusual choice. Clearly not, when it’s been voted UK’s favourite book from the past 225 years. I’m so glad so many people are discovering its pleasures!

On Quiet Writing and Tarot Narratives

On Quiet Writing, we have been exploring the art and love of reading in the post on How to read for more creativity, pleasure and productivity

Here are some other relevant posts on Quiet Writing on books and reading:

“You are the authority on you” – a review of Danielle LaPorte’s White Hot Truth

Reading Australian Women Writers in 2017

Being ‘Fierce on the Page’ – A Book Review

My Tarot Narratives on Instagram have continued to be a rich source of inspiration and insight for my creative journey. Thanks for all the creative interactions. Thomas Moore’s SoulMates keeps popping up lately. Here was a key quote that emerged:

I’m not suggesting that all psychological experience is interior, but it’s clear that the dynamics, dramas, and characters of the individual soul play themselves out in the external world, so that relationship is always a dialectic between inner and outer, a dance between actual people and one’s own life of the soul.

Have a fabulous creative weekend!

Creative and Connected is a regular post each Friday and the previous posts are below. I hope you enjoy it. I would love any feedback via social media or comments and let me know what you are enjoying too.

Feature image via pexels.com

Image 2 of ‘Compartment C, Car 193‘ 1938, by Edward Hopper, in Edward Hopper by Rolf Gunter Renner, Taschen

Image 4 of ‘The Quiet Room’ c1929, by Sir George Clausen from ‘The Reading Woman’ Calendar 2017

Keep in touch

Subscribe via email (see the link at the top) to make sure you receive updates from Quiet Writing and its passions in 2017. This includes MBTI developments, coaching, creativity and other connections to help express your unique voice in the world. My free e-book on the books that have shaped my story is coming soon for subscribers only – so sign up to be the first to receive it!

Quiet Writing is on Facebook – Please visit here and ‘Like’ to keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community. There are regular posts on intuition, influence, creativity, productivity, writing, voice, introversion and personality including Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).

If you enjoyed this post, please share via your preferred social media channel – links are below.

You might also enjoy:

Creative and Connected #8 – ways to honour your unique life blend

Creative and Connected #7 – how to craft a successful life on your own terms

Creative and Connected #6 – how to be a creative entrepreneur

Creative and Connected #5 – being accountable to ourselves and others

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