mindset Archives

3 practical insights from ‘Chillpreneur’ to inspire creative growth

July 31, 2020

Creative growth lightbulb moments!

You know those moments when you are reading a book and it’s like the author is talking to YOU! Looking for creative growth, the writer just seems to know what you are missing and need to know. A lightbulb moment, critical pieces immediately fall into place. You see something more clearly, as you step into a new way of seeing or thinking. One that helps you move and grow.

I enjoyed LOTS of moments like that reading Chillpreneur by Denise Duffield Thomas. But three practical insights for creative growth made a huge difference to how I work as a creative entrepreneur. And as the title, suggest, they helped me to chill and relax into working in line with my purpose and personality.

So here they are, my three top practical insights for creative growth and entrepreneurship from Chillpreneur:

1. Know your business model

The Chillpreneur solution to finding the perfect business model for you is: Know thyself.
Chillpreneur, Denise Duffield Thomas

Knowing your business model might not sound like the sexiest advice. But this insight was truly game-changing for me. Denise DT outlines four business models:

Maker Model – making physical things eg art, jewellery, clothing.
Service Model – solving problems, doing work for clients eg photography, graphic design, editing.
Consultant Model – helping others achieve transformation via“high- to medium’ touch” ways eg coaching, healing, consulting, advising.
Teacher Model – instructing people in a “low- to medium-touch way” eg authors, bloggers, podcasters, online course creators.

Mixing and matching business model elements helps you find the unique best blend for you. And importantly, aligning your business model to your personality helps you work in a way that is fulfilling and relaxed.

My business model story

Why was this so game-changing for me? It helped me make sense of my identity as a creative entrepreneur and where to focus my energies. It tapped back into my why, passions and body of work over time. Let me explain.

I trained to become a certified life coach in 2016 but I have been a teacher for most of my life. Working in the adult vocational education sector (TAFE) for over 30 years, I’m highly skilled at teaching and facilitating both in-person and online. So I am a teacher at heart. I love to: share my knowledge and resources, structure and shape learning experiences, and make a difference in people’s lives. I love coaching too for overlapping reasons and for how I can foster transformative experiences, listen intuitively, help people find their truth and be in action towards what’s important.

But when I blend that CONSULTANT model/Coaching + TEACHER model together WHAM! Sparks fly as my zone of genius comes together. I’ve blended them together to create the Sacred Creative Collective Group Coaching program. And powerful personal transformations are the result. I love curating, creating and sharing my wisdom in chunks of practical lessons for others. And I can shape and reshape this material in different forms as a teacher in low- to medium-touch ways. This includes blogging, writing books, speaking, creating online courses such as the Personality Stories Coaching program.

This is all in line with my introverted INTJ personality type which has a natural preference for visioning what could be, creating, curating, organising and structuring into practical frameworks for others. So I am working in a way that aligns with my heart and skills. And that feels so much more chilled and satisfying!

Your business model story

So what’s your business model story? There are plenty of examples in Chillpreneur to consider including the story of Nicola Newman, creative mentor for the Sacred Creative Collective. Nicola blends Maker, Consultant and Teacher in a beautiful creative mix aligned to her heart and skills.

TIPS: Find the blend that makes you sing! Check out Chillpreneur Chapter 4 and see which model or blend suits you and the life and creative growth you desire. The mindset it creates makes all the difference!

2. Be a contributor not a guru

As soon as I gave myself permission to contribute to the conversation about women and money, and not have to be a guru or expert on it, my business became fun.
Chillpreneur, Denise Duffield Thomas

How freeing is that thought? How much time do we spend feeling we have to be experts? And how much pressure does that put on us? When we just need to show up and contribute to the dialogue in our areas of expertise or interest.

What’s our unique take? What do we know? What is our experience? How can we share what we know to help others?

Being a contributor means:

learning and sharing what we know along the way.
being a work in progress, valuing our point of view and experience.
not wanting things to be perfect or more complete.
defining ourselves by what we can give, not by what is lacking.
supporting others by sharing what you know.
co-creating with others and tapping into the power of emerging.

It’s valuable to be knowledgeable, experienced and skilled, but let’s not allow that quest to stop us contributing along the way. Be authentic, contribute and share your process and behind the scenes. You never know how your path or learning can help others.

My contributor story

Focusing on being a contributor helped me to share personality type insights as a speaker at the international level. Backing myself, I flew to the UK and presented at the British Association for Psychological Type. In Learned Wisdom: Journeys in Type and Transition I share how I stepped up in my personality work to present to highly-skilled, experienced international type professionals on type and transition.

It put me under pressure but it helped me to invest time to gather the wisdom and learning of my transition experience to help others. By focusing on being a contributor of my unique experience of type and transition, I was able to facilitate new insights for this experienced group of professionals. I received excellent feedback which was heartening. Plus I developed a body of work I can share with others to help their transition through my teaching/coaching blend.

Your contributor story

So what’s your contributor story? Where would it help you to shift your mindset from guru to contributor? What can you share or create that will help others?

TIPS: Reflect on where the need to be an expert is keeping you from growing, emerging and sharing your truth. Journal about the impact of this and how you might change it. Check out Chillpreneur Chapter 1 for further thoughts on this and other mindset shifts for creative growth. Read Denise DT’s 37 Lessons from Becoming a Self-made Millionaire and be reminded: “Who cares if you don’t know everything. You don’t have to be the best to make a difference to someone.“

3. Embrace imperfect action

Embracing imperfect action in your business will reap huge rewards for you.
Chillpreneur, Denise Duffield Thomas

I’m a Virgo like Denise DT so I know all about perfectionism. As Denise says, “we practically invented it!” And Virgos don’t have a mortgage on perfectionism either; your personality type can mean you have a natural preference for “perfect” over “in process” or “imperfect”. This can mean all kinds of over-critiquing, over-doing, procrastination and silence.

Like my mug that says, “Done is better than perfect”, imperfect action is a mindset shift that enables us to move, do, write, create and share without the constant tyranny of self-criticism.

Denise shares the example of “placeholder marketing” – copy or offers she has put out there until she creates the “perfect version”. They end up staying out there and being very much appreciated by her community who don’t see them as imperfect at all. Love that idea!

My imperfect action story

The most freeing aspect of imperfect action has been reminding myself I can update, edit, review, revise and reinvent. Also to recognise when I am doing too much and not expending my energy wisely.

Creating a free resource as an entry point for my community has been a journey in moving away from doing too much and perfectionism. My first opt-in resource was a 26,000-word ebook on the 36 Books that Shaped my Story. I’m proud of it and I am looking to publish it in another way. But it took me ages and was way too much as a first step in connecting with me and my work. For both me and my community.

My Free 10 Tips for Creating more Meaning and Purpose Personal Action Checklist has been the most downloaded free resource I’ve created. Using a spirit of imperfect action and contributing, I distilled wisdom and learning from major life transitions into ten tips. I created this checklist so my community members can craft renewed focus, energy and creativity in their life. Yes, I could easily get put off by thinking about what is not there or if it is enough. But I know these 10 tips worked for me. They’re practical, applicable and I know will work for others. It’s a powerful first step. And if I learn new things or get additional insights, I can always update it.

Your imperfect action story

So what’s your imperfect action story? What could you do now that gets you out there into the world? How could using the idea of “imperfect action” help you? What have you already drafted that you are holding back on? Is there something you want to create but feel a sense of fear about? What would be enough now? How could you save time and energy?

TIPS: Just do it! Enjoy the process of creating and watch out for those inner voices that talk you down. Have responses ready for them. Use the words “imperfect action” in your self-talk to honour being in action. Put your work out there and realise you can always change and improve it later with added experience. Focus on the value of your insights to others.

Share your story!

Love to hear in the comments or via social media – Instagram or Facebook:

about your business model preference or unique blend.
how you are leaning into being a contributor.
and where and how are you choosing to be in imperfect action.

I hope these insights, experiences and tips have been helpful. I’m grateful to Denise Duffield Thomas for the insights gifted via Chillpreneur. It is a book I’ll be revisiting over time to strengthen my creative growth, freedom and abundance. I hope these ideas contribute to your creative growth, freedom and abundance too. Let me know what works for you! And check out Chillpreneur.

wholehearted stories writing

Writing the way through – a wholehearted story

September 27, 2019

In this guest post, Sally Morgan shares her experience of writing the way through cycles and seasons to a wholehearted life.

This is the 22nd guest post in our Wholehearted Stories series on Quiet Writing! I invited readers to consider submitting a guest post on their wholehearted story. You can read more here – and I’m still keen for more contributors!

Quiet Writing celebrates self-leadership in wholehearted living and writing, career and creativity. This community of voices, each of us telling our own story of what wholehearted living means, is a valuable and central part of this space. In this way, we can all feel connected on our various journeys and not feel so alone. Whilst there will always be unique differences, there are commonalities that we can all learn from and share to support each other.

I’m delighted to have Sally Morgan as a ‘Wholehearted Stories’ contributor. Sally and I met via Instagram and shared interests in creativity and writing. In this story, Sally shares how her writing practice has been a tool, process, support and safe place for stepping into wholehearted living. Read on!

Moving into writing

It’s a late-summer morning, still early, and I’m sitting on my patio writing. There’s a comforting weight to my journal, open on my lap, and my pen moves quickly across the page. I’m lost in the writing. This is how I start most days, with Morning Pages, writing at least three pages in longhand. It’s a process I’ve come to trust and value, a meditation of sorts.

It’s still cool on the patio this morning. There’s a hint of a breeze and a faint scent of the ocean. But the sky is a deep blue and the sun, when it filters through the trees, is already warm. I write it all down. The deep green of the cedars lit by early-morning sun. The rich aroma of my morning coffee. The tok-tok-tok of a raven watching me somewhere in the trees. This noticing grounds me, helps me move fully into the writing.

Reminders of cycles

It’s lush out in my backyard, still green, despite the lack of rain. The cedars and firs tower overhead, shading salal and sword ferns and an almost accidental patch of lawn. It’s a wild and unruly space, a perfect place for writing. As I write, I notice that the ferns are a deeper, duskier shade now; they’ve lost their springtime sheen and brightness. Behind them, the creamy blooms of the ocean spray bushes have dried to deep golden, dying away for another year. And now, all around me, I see descent. Dying off. The inevitability of fall. This reminder of cycles.

There was a time when I was less attuned to these subtle signs, when the weeks dropped away until suddenly the holidays were over and it was September. But my writing practice has given me a deeper sensing of the seasons. I watch for the first pale sword-fern stems poking up in spring, the clutched spirals slowly unfurling into bright green fronds. I notice as the fronds take on that darker, dustier hue as summer progresses, how the outer fronds brown and then die off into September. It’s one small way I’m more deeply attuned to the seasons and to the cyclical nature of our lives.

Being aware of seasons

As I write this, I am nearing the end of a short season of rest after a long, full season of houseguests and parties and important celebrations. I’ve become more aware of these seasons and of how I can best embrace each one. During the season of houseguests, I was able to throw myself fully into the fray, into visiting and day trips and shocking quantities of wine. I knew there would be time for rest when our company was gone. There would be time to slow down and step away, time again to drink water. When I am journalling, I am in tune with these cycles in my life, and I can give myself permission to fully embrace what is.

I’ve also come to understand that there are other, overlapping kinds of seasons. After three years of writing nearly non-stop and under deadline at work, I’m not writing much for myself at the moment. There was a time when I would have felt panicked by this, but not now. Now I recognize the bigger patterns, the pushing and then the need for rest. The immersion and the need for time away.

Writing as a safe place

I haven’t always written Morning Pages. I came first to a journalling practice more than twelve years ago, as a way to save myself. In June of that year, my father was diagnosed with terminal cancer. In September, my then-husband announced he was leaving our marriage. I had to write. I was compelled to write, and in that time period, I wrote as if my life depended on it. I hadn’t read Julia Cameron at that point, and I suspect that The Artist’s Way was not the book I needed in that season. But I knew Natalie Goldberg’s book Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within and I followed the rules she laid out in the book: Keep your hand moving. Lose control. Go for the jugular. They were rules that served me well as my life spiralled out of control.

In that season I fell apart. I clung to my friends and to my three little boys like a woman drowning. My journals were filled with disbelief and grief and anger. But in those journals, I found a safe place to descend into despair, a place where I could immerse myself and fully experience my sadness. It was a painful and necessary period in my life. A descent and a dying.

Healing and inner wisdom

And then in late spring, I began to notice the first pale stems of healing. The slow unfurling of hope. The first tentative steps as I began putting myself back together. It was a slow process, and cyclical, one that has taken many years. In that spring, I began to see the learning I needed to take from my experience. I began to see the possibility on the other side of divorce, and to craft a new vision for myself and my little family. For the first time, I sensed freedom and felt hope. There was still much to face – the legal separation, my father’s impending death – but I was beginning to trust my strength and my resilience.

And I was beginning to trust my inner wisdom. By that point, I’d filled a number of journals, and somewhere along the way, a calm, loving voice had appeared in my writing, a voice far wiser than mine. You’re going to be okay, it told me. Your boys are going to be okay. As I wrote, I began listening for that voice, actually asking for guidance. What am I meant to be learning here? What do I need to remember as I move forward? Will I really be okay?

Writing the way through

Just about the time that I was getting back on my feet after the separation, my dad died. In many ways, this was a greater loss for me than my marriage and I expected that my journal would once again be my refuge. But I was shocked to find that I couldn’t write about my dad. I wrote about my concerns for my boys and for my mum, and about all sorts of other tangential things, but my sadness was too deep. Suddenly though, poems began flowing out of me. I’d never really written poetry before in my life, but I think that because I’d been writing so consistently, I was able to connect with an intuitive, deeply emotional part of myself in a period when there was no logical way to approach or express my grief. Again I cycled into descent, and again, I wrote my way out.

In the years since, I’ve fully committed to the practice of journalling, recognizing that it is the most effective way for me make meaning of my experience and – eventually – to grow from it. I’ve written through further heartbreak, through further challenges, and through the many transitions and seasons of my life. Journalling has also helped me to trust my writing voice enough to follow other creative urges, and I’ve continued to write poetry, as well as a couple of unpublished novels, a blog, and a self-published memoir.

Trusting in writing practice

The greatest gift of my journalling practice, though, came during a three-year period when I lost my speaking voice. During that time, I could only talk in a breathless, squeaky little whisper, making most of my daily interactions difficult if not impossible. In that frightening time, as I underwent scores of tests to figure out what was wrong with me, my journal was the place where, if I listened to my wisest self, I could write myself off the edge. It was also the place where I figured out the self-care practices and boundaries I needed in my life to prevent this from happening again. And, of course, it was the one place in my life where I could trust in my voice. Even though my speaking voice was unreliable, I could trust in my writing and in my writing practice.

Over the years, my faith in this practice has deepened to a place where beginning a new journal is a sacred act. I use the first few pages to record gentle reminders about what I need to be my healthiest self, things like stillness, solitude, and self-compassion. I also have a list of what matters most, because for me it’s easy to overcommit. Finally, I include quotes to guide me and reminders from the previous journal. In my current journal, I’ve written, I can trust in my knowing and my inner wisdom. I do not need to seek every answer outside myself.

Writing into a new season

My practice has also evolved. I no longer worry about keeping my pen moving. I write more slowly and thoughtfully, and I make time every day for gratitude and for that wise, loving voice that is always there if I listen for it. But I still write nearly every day, trusting that this practice is one of the great gifts in my life.

I’m heading into a new season now, one that will be both busy and marked by a significant transition, as my middle son embarks on a months-long overseas adventure. I know that I will have moments (maybe days) of sadness and fear and uncertainty. But I also know that I will find solace in my journal. And so, while the weather holds, I’ll find my way out to the patio, journal and coffee in hand. I’ll notice the air as it cools, listen for the first of the autumn birds, and watch for the other small markers of fall. I’ll write into the fall, through the descent into winter. I’ll write about my dark moments and the light, trusting by now that I can write my way through practically anything.

Key book companions along the way

The Light of the World: A Memoir – Elizabeth Alexander

The Artist’s Way – Julia Cameron

When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times – Pema Chodron

The Blue Hour of the Day: Selected Poems – Lorna Crozier

Eat Pray Love – Elizabeth Gilbert

Old Friend from Far Away: The Practice of Writing Memoir – Natalie Goldberg

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

This is the Story of a Happy Marriage – Ann Patchett

Journal of a Solitude – May Sarton

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

About Sally Morgan

Sally is a writer, teacher and mama. She’s on a journey to live a less driven and over-committed life, and to invite more contentment, grace and beauty into her everyday. She’s currently preoccupied with voice, purpose and slowing down.

In her forties, Sally spent a couple of years speed-dating her way through half the men in Victoria, BC. Her memoir, An Alphabet of Men: Dating My Way from Adam to Zak recounts that time in her life. Occasionally she posts to her blog, at www.trustingthejourney.ca. You can connect with Sally on Instagram

Photographs by Sally Morgan, used with permission and thanks.

Keep in touch

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!

1 Comments

inspiration & influence wholehearted stories

Learning to live on the slow path and love the little things that light me up

June 10, 2019

This guest post from Kamsin Kaneko looks at learning to live on the slow path and shifting focus to creativity and the little things in shaping a wholehearted life.

This is the 19th guest post in our Wholehearted Stories series on Quiet Writing! I invited readers to consider submitting a guest post on their wholehearted story. You can read more here – and I’m still keen for more contributors!

I’m delighted to have Kamsin Kaneko as a ‘Wholehearted Stories’ contributor. Kamsin and I met via Instagram and shared interests in creativity, writing and gentle business. In this story, Kamsin shares how her focus has shifted to living in a slower, more focused, creative and wholehearted way in a different cultural environment. Read on!

Living life in the ordinary everyday moments

“Let’s eat out on the balcony,” my husband suggests. We are in the wine section of our local supermarket. It is a warm Sunday afternoon, and we’ve come to buy ingredients to cook dinner as a family.

“Sure. Sounds like a good idea,” I reply. One reason we bought our apartment was the spacious balcony. But we rarely sit out there to eat or use it for anything other than hanging washing out to dry.

This small act of cooking together and eating at home is one of the many small lifestyle changes we’ve been making. We’ve always wanted to do things like this, especially since we have a little boy who just turned five. But we haven’t always made the space in our lives.

We had got into the habit of going to the local sushi place on Sunday evening, which isn’t nearly as glamorous as it sounds in the context of urban Japan. You can wait 45+ minutes to be seated, it’s a popular family choice at the weekend. It’s cheap and easy, even if the quality of the food isn’t the best.

Nothing is better than a home cooked meal

We are home from the supermarket. There’s homemade pizza cooking in the oven, and the wine has been poured. We decide to move the dining table outside. As we’re doing so, our neighbour is taking in her washing. She laughs when she sees us.

The sun is starting to set over the trees and mountains behind our balcony and beyond; the light is perfect, and it is pleasantly warm. The inflatable paddling pool my boy was playing in earlier is still full of water. Alfresco dining by the pool, I quip.

A short while later and the food is on the table. My little boy closes his eyes, puts his hands together, and declares “Itadakimasu” (I gratefully receive this food), with energy and enthusiasm. My husband lifts his wine glass and smiles.

“I’m so happy,” he says.

Shifting focus

If I focus my attention on the thick, ugly pillars that support the balconies, I remember this is still in urban Japan. Power cables criss-cross the sky everywhere you look, and people crowd around us on every side. I grew up in the countryside, at times I miss the wide-open spaces which are so hard to come by in Japan.

So, I focus instead on the food, the table, my family. With my attention focused on the things I love, we are nowhere but right here and right now. Exactly where we want to be. We have created space in our day, and in our lives, to enjoy the little things which had felt so distant in our busy urban lives just a year or so earlier.

Until recently, I felt like I was always making compromises. I didn’t want sushi or a “family restaurant” every week. It meant being stuck in traffic, having to wait to be seated, and a noisy eating environment and unexciting food choices. It wasn’t lighting me up inside.

Our eating choices weren’t the only area we were making compromises. But food is so fundamental to a well-lived life as a family. So why had we been living like that? And how did we get from there to here?

Looking for the answers right here not over there

I grew up attending church and evangelical Christian groups. I no longer believe the fundamental doctrines that they taught me. But I experienced something of the divine, and I wanted more.

I can remember singing songs about loving God with all my heart, all my soul and all my mind. But I felt that there were parts of my heart that were locked away and I didn’t have the key. How could I love God with my whole heart if I didn’t know how to access what was inside?

Over the years, my understanding of faith crumbled and evolved. I am less concerned with trying to name or understand what those early spiritual experiences were. At the current stage of my life, I am more interested in learning to trust and believe in the divine within myself.

Gratitude and moving on

I remain grateful for the community and the guidance and the love of people in those groups. But I no longer believe that God can only be encountered through a specific understanding of Christianity.

Perhaps I thought that I would find God somewhere “over there” in the setting of religious groups and Sunday services. But God was never there. S/he was always here in the space between our intertwined lives. We had to learn to slow down before I could even see that.

I stayed a part of the church even though it had long since stopped meeting my spiritual or emotional needs. We stopped going about a year ago because my heart was longing for more space and more slow simple Sundays. And my husband wasn’t feeling the same connection to the church anymore.

Learning to listen to the longings of my own heart

In the last four years, I have been learning to listen more carefully to the whispers of my heart and act on what I hear. I’d got out of practice in doing that somehow. Through writing, journaling and mindfulness meditation, I started to find an answer to the question of how to access the locked places in my heart.

I was no longer going to give my time to anything which didn’t help my heart to keep expanding. I had wanted to spend more time with my husband and young son. I wanted the rhythm of Sunday as a day of rest.

The irony that by attending church, I wasn’t getting this wasn’t lost on me. But I thought because we lived in Japan, I would never have the slow Sundays I remembered from my childhood in England. Besides, times have changed, maybe no one lives like that anymore.

But we were living on autopilot rather than making conscious choices about how to spend our time. Now we often spend Sundays in our neighbourhood playing outside without any particular plans. We cook a homemade meal together and our little family has never been closer or happier.

Our slow and simple Sundays are one example of the ways that listening to what I want and need has led me into a more wholehearted life. Slowing down and believing that the longings of my heart can be achieved if I approach them with an open mind wasn’t as easy as it sounds.

Learning to believe in the possibility of a wholehearted life

The first step was learning to notice the places in my life where my behaviour did not align with the things I said I wanted. I had to learn to do that with self-compassion and let go of any judgment.

I was tied up in a long list of “shoulds” and “ought to’s” all of which caused my heart to be locked up tighter than ever before. But I started to believe that I had choices about how I spent my time. I could say no to what I didn’t want and yes to what I did.

I had to find processes to gently allow me to listen and believe I could act on what I heard. Journaling and meditation and carefully chosen books, podcasts, and safe spaces online are showing me how to do that.

I had spent too long allowing other voices to drown out the voice of my own heart. It takes time to learn to tune in and act on what you hear.

How writing and early motherhood changed everything

When I was in my early twenties, there were three things I wanted to achieve in my life. One was to travel and live abroad. I’ve lived in China, Japan, Bosnia, and then Japan again. When I married a Japanese man, Japan became my home.

The second was to become a mother. I’d given up on this idea for a long time, but it happened five years ago when I was thirty-eight. It wasn’t an easy process through miscarriage, medical error, and 2.5 years of trying to get pregnant. But my son is the most delightful little person on the planet.

The third was to be a writer. And it was that final goal which has proved to be the hardest. I took my first writing class as an undergraduate back in the mid-’90s and others on and off over the following twenty years. But it was only after my son was born that I began to unpick the places in my heart which had been standing in my way.

Motherhood in Japan was the key to unlocking my heart

As a new mother in Japan, I was stressed out and struggling so far from home. I felt like I was drowning in cultural norms and expectations, which I was never going to live up to. But I wasn’t about to settle for a slow descent into bitterness and resentment, which seemed to be where I was heading. I wanted to enjoy my little boy and life as a mother. But I needed help.

I began to meditate through the Headspace App. And when someone gave away their copy of Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way I began to keep a journal. Something I hadn’t done consistently for years.

Through these two activities, I found the key to access the locked up places in my heart. I’d felt that wholehearted wasn’t something I would ever achieve all those years ago singing about loving God with all my heart. But over time, all the things which had been leaving me feeling overwhelmed, including unhealed trauma from childhood started to feel more manageable.

Writing is leading to radical transformation: that’s why it’s so hard

The more I wrote, the more I understood that I’d neglected the craft of being a writer and I had a lot to learn. Through online writing classes and working with tutors and writing coaches, I started to understand how to create a scene and a character.

I had a background in academic writing. But to tap into my neglected creativity, I had to bring my writing into the world of sensory detail. I had to connect the emotions and the details that ground a story and bring it alive to a reader.

And that is that process of getting out of my head and into the sensory details of everyday life that is allowing me to unlock my heart. In powerful writing, it is often the little details which bring the most magic to the page. The same is true in our everyday lives.

Writing through the dark to find the light

But I didn’t want to feel the painful things. I tried to go straight to being grateful and finding positive affirmations to help me overcome writers’ block and self-sabotaging habits. I didn’t want to feel the painful things that had been locked up inside of me. But the only way out was to go through.

Thank God the Universe provided me with gifted teachers in the process. This time last year I took an online writing course by Martha Beck; there were guest lectures from Elizabeth Gilbert, one of my favourite writers, and it was completely transformative. Hard work and painful but amazing.

The course comprised the most incredible set of lectures which blew everything I thought I knew out of the water. The writing exercises were designed to take you into the hell of your worst moments and keep writing until you brought everything out into the light.

As I wrote, I kept finding feelings of being unworthy, and crippling fears of never being good enough. A numbing fear that if I spoke my truth, I would be judged, criticised, and rejected. I was so good at avoiding those feelings I’d been unaware of how much they were driving self-sabotaging behaviours like procrastination and perfectionism.

I could only learn to be wholehearted by looking at those feelings of shaky self-worth in the eye. And writing through them to find the validation I need within myself. Perhaps I will never believe that I am good enough to be a “real writer.”

But I have learnt to trust the voice inside of me that says I need to write. And if all I ever achieve is to heal the fractured places in my own heart, it will be enough. I pray also that I can gift my readers a tiny bit of courage to continue on their own wholehearted journey.

Key book companions along the way

The Artist’s Way – Julia Cameron

Big Magic – Elizabeth Gilbert

Martha Beck – Finding Your Way in a Wild New World

Loving What Is – Byron Katie

And the poetry of Mary Oliver

About Kamsin Kaneko

Kamsin Kaneko is a writer, mum, teacher, and traveller, not necessarily in that order. She writes about living a wholehearted life of depth and meaning. You can find her on Instagram most days capturing small moments of beauty in the urban sprawl of her home in Japan. Get your free gift: I Believe in the Magic of Everyday Moments. Kamsin Kaneko’s website The Slow Path can be found here.

Photographs #1, #2, #3 + bio image by Kamsin Kaneko, used with permission and thanks.

Photograph #4 of pen on page by Debby Hudson on Unsplash used with permission and thanks.

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 own 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.

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

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.

Quiet Writing is on Facebook and Instagram – keep in touch and interact with the Quiet Writing community.

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

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

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. Click To Tweet

On your subject + niche:

You have a subject too. You were born with it. You will discover it on your artist's journey. Click To Tweet

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. Click To Tweet

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.

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.

Practices and tools to support creative productivity, writing and mindset

September 26, 2018

As part of the #quietwriting hashtag and IG Challenge, we now focus on the creative practices and tools that help our creative productivity, writing and mindset.

Use the #quietwriting hashtag across platforms – for the challenge and beyond – as a way to create, connect and link us together on our ongoing journey to draft, process, create, make space for writing and other creativity and otherwise live a wholehearted creative life. Read on to discover more and connect with creative others about the value of quiet.

The value of creative practices and tools

Quiet Writing focuses on getting creative work done. Whether it’s your reading productivity, writing tools or creative habits, it’s a key focus in my life and learning and what I share here. For this #quietwriting prompt, it will be great to see what members of the Quiet Writing community value as practices and tools to get creative work happening.

We’ve started with creative space and quiet as two key ingredients. But what helps you sit in the chair or stand at the desk and actually get the creative work in process and out there.

Questions like:

What helps with setting the right environment?
How do you count or measure to give you targets and keep you going?
What helps you get started or warm up?
How do you manage time?
What helps you be productive day after day?
Which blocks impact you and how do you deal with them?
What software or apps help you get work done?
Which stationery, notebooks, art and craft tools, pens and pencils are your tools of choice?
How do you keep organised to keep on track?
Do you use music to help you or do you prefer silence?
What sets the mood – candles, tarot, morning pages, tea?
Which people, books and habits have made all the difference in how you work?
Do you set goals to help you be productive?

My practices and tools

The practices and tools that have helped me get writing, creating and sitting in the chair (or standing), in no particular order are:

Morning Pages

They have helped me immensely since I went back to writing 3 pages most mornings in July 2017.

These words from Julia Cameron so true:

The bedrock tool of a creative recovery is a daily practice called Morning Pages.

You can also read Penelope Love’s ‘Wholehearted Story‘ here on Quiet Writing about how Morning Pages became the foundation of her writing life and creative practice.

Working with tarot

Working with tarot and learning to tap into my intuition as an INTJ personality type has been a key creative tool. Every day. I work with tarot and oracle cards to guide my creative and life journey. Learning the symbolism of tarot and using cards regularly helps with blocks, creative practice and especially understand the long haul journey of creativity. Jessa Crispin’s book, The Creative Tarot has been a steady companion on this journey. As she says:

Each reading is, essentially, a story.

Pomodoro technique + Scrivener + Tide App

I’ve written about these three tools that are a key part of my writing habit in Practical Tools to Increase Writing Productivity. They also all go together. Pomodoro is a technique for breaking up time into manageable chunks and having a break. The Tide App is fantastic for working with Pomodoro and provides music and other background days in 25 minute timeframes. Scrivener writing software is my tool for getting all my writing work researched, organised, done, formatted and compiled. More info and links are in the Writing Productivity post.

Bluetooth keyboard + standing desk

After reading Joanna Penn’s The Healthy Writer and thinking about the ergonomics of my writing set-up, I went with a bluetooth keyboard. I use a laptop all the time and that is not good practice for my hands especially as I have osteoarthritis. Working with a bluetooth keyboard makes all the difference. I can set the laptop up higher so it helps my eyes and neck. And my hands are happier with better support on my desktop. I highly recommend it and it’s not expensive. A standing desk is also a great investment to stop that sitting in the same position all day. You can also improvise in various ways to make standing an option for writing.

NaNoWriMo + the metrics of word count

I’ve written more about my experience with NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) here on NaNoWriMo: 10 lessons on the value of writing each day. After years of trying to do NaNoWriMo, I did it and wrote 50,000 words in a month last November. It helped me get my book draft mostly done and taught me so much about the metric of writing. I know how many words I can write in an hour. It helps me break up daunting tasks into manageable chunks and see progress.

Starting a new business + creating my beautiful logo

This is a curious one but the whole journey of starting over with a new business has created its own rhythm, practices and tools. Working out what Quiet Writing all about and its components – writing, coaching, personality type work and tarot – has been such a deep meaning-making structure and inspiration. A process and practice, day in and day out, with all of the creative tools it engenders. I am so grateful for this journey. Creating my beautiful logo and my colour palette as part of a suite of work with Stephey Baker of Marked by the Muse has been pivotal and such deep work. It helped me work out what I stand for, what Quiet Writing means, and why it’s important for me and others. I’ll share more on this process and the logo soon.

Creative mentors over time such as Joanna Penn, Susannah Conway + Sage Cohen

For me, creative mentors are a key part of my resources and inspiration. From the work of others, I can take their ideas and craft my own habits, practices and tools. Two key creative mentors over time, for nearly 10 years now, have been Joanna Penn at The Creative Penn and Susannah Conway. Sage Cohen has also been a key writing mentor and through her I learnt to Write the Life Poetic and be Fierce on the Page via Sage Cohen.

Breaking through resistance over time with Steve Pressfield + blogging

Special mention goes too to Steven Pressfield for his work on resistance and turning professional via his books The War of Art and Turning Pro. I’ve also just read his new book, The Artist’s Journey which focuses on our calling or ‘daimon’ in creativity and life. He also continues to blog which I find inspiring as well. Blogging on a regular basis now for over eight years has been such a central practice to my writing. It’s helped me keep writing, find and hone my voice, connect with others and work out what I want to say. On the way, it’s become a resource for my creative work.

My writing books + reading in my life

Many of the books mentioned in this piece and other key writing books in my life are discussed in more detail in my free ebook, 36 Books that Shaped my Story. You can find more there about how reading and the books I’ve loved have been a key influence in my creativity and writing story.

The right music playlists for the job

The Tide Pomodoro App helps with a kind of muse music that signals, time to write. For other jobs, it helps to have a playlist on Spotify or another app that is your music that inspires you. Create playlists for different creative jobs and moods. Standing and writing with the right music can become a kind of workout! Healthier and a good way to mix up the work and mood. My main playlist is my Flow list on Spotify. It’s always changing and flowing!

My recent writing and yoga retreat with Kerstin Pilz of Write Your Journey

One of my goals this year was to do a writing retreat. So when my friend Kerstin Pilz of Write Your Journey offered up a writing and yoga retreat in beautiful Hoi An, Vietnam where she lives, I was in! We recently spent a blessed and inspiring week of working on our writing and yoga practice in balmy and colourful Hoi An. It was so inspiring and refreshing, all my senses engaged and my writing practice, voice and story-telling renewed. I’ll share in more detail soon but encourage you to think about a writing retreat as a practice and tool for renewal in your life. So grateful to Kerstin, Nigel and the team for this week! Here we writing at the beautiful An Villa. This picture by Nigel Rowles and used with permission and thanks.

Publication and writing deadlines

Sometimes they can feel like a pain, but I am grateful too for the practice of working to deadlines. These might be ones I set for myself like morning pages and blogging each week or it might be external publication deadlines. But having a structure helps me so much to design and manage my timeframes and be in action to create work. Look at NaNoWriMo and how that deadline of 50,000 in a month was so inspiring.

Next?

Yes, it takes a village and a whole bunch of tools and practices to settle into your creativity, be productive and embrace the writing habit. But they all come down to mindset in the end – supporting it and fostering it to get the work done. I want to master dictation next. I’ve been studying and reading about it for a while. I think it will be a great tool to get me writing more and in a sustainable way. Look forward to sharing that with you!

Mindset, habit and productivity

I’ve just finished the first draft of my book, ‘Wholehearted: Self-leadership for Women in Transition.’ Writing that draft has been a study in developing a mindset to get the words down and the creative habit to write page after page. Believing in yourself is such a critical aspect of the journey as my creative mentor Joanna Penn, reminds us in The Successful Author Mindset. Joanna shares her own journey of creativity via her journals. I was amazed how even after writing book after book, each new beginning brings its own feelings of challenge. Joanna describes how you learn to recognise them and ride with it, befriending the ups and downs and the inner critic.

Working on the draft of my book has taught me so much about the value of an outline to guide the way; the metrics of how much I can write in a given time like an hour; and the practical support of tools like Scrivener and the Tide App. It showed me how much can be done by committing time and sitting each day to get the work done. Keeping a spreadsheet, I could see how the hours and words added up to a body of work I could hold and share with the world. I’m working on the editing process now and I can’t wait to share my wholehearted self-leadership skills with you. And see the product of my productivity over time out in the world.

Creative practices and tools in your life

How about you? What creative practices and tools make the difference for you? Which habits help you be in that creative space? What breaks resistance? Which practices help you find joy in creativity and writing?

This is a prompt that I think will yield such valuable insight into how we create, manage mindset and decide to embrace creativity and writing. Steven Pressfield talks about the moment when we ‘turn pro’ and basically stop stuffing around and commit to creating art. Whatever that look like in our lives. I look forward to learning from you and collating your thoughts to share with others.

Love to hear your thoughts and see any images on Instagram – just use the hashtag #quietwriting for the challenge or anytime so we can connect with you. Or share your thoughts in the comments or on Facebook. And check in on the #quietwriting hashtag anytime on social media for inspiration from our community. Just remember too, “Done is better than perfect!”

Quiet connections via #quietwriting

So I welcome your comments here or on social media. I look forward to seeing #quietwriting images that share thoughts and open up dialogue on quiet in your life. Just share an image on Instagram using the tag #quietwriting and follow the prompts each day for ideas. Here are the prompts:

And the #quietwriting hashtag will continue beyond the week of the challenge, so use it anytime to create and connect. You can learn more here about #quietwriting

Just a reminder of the key points:

Quiet Writing is about the strength that comes from working steadily and without fanfare in writing and other spheres to create, coalesce, influence and connect.
Hashtags are such a fabulous way to gather, finding our creative kindred souls and inspiration online.
On Instagram, you can now follow hashtags as well as individual profiles. So follow #quietwriting now and into the future to connect around creativity and your quiet work, writing and making art.
You can head on over to the #quietwriting hashtag on Instagram or Facebook or other social media anytime and see what’s popping up.
You could also post on your own profile on Facebook as well using the hashtag.
Often we write quietly, behind closed doors or in busy cafes, privately. Let’s shine a light behind the scenes and capture the process of writing and creativity in action, wherever we are.

Get on board with #quietwriting + the hashtag challenge!

These are just some ideas and they will evolve as we all contribute. It doesn’t have to be all about writing – it can be any form of creativity. Nor do you need to be an introvert; all of us need quiet writing time to get creative work done.

I’ll feature my favourite images from the tag here and on Instagram and Facebook so share your images for the chance to be featured!

So join the #quietwriting party and let us know what you are up to! Who knows what creative connections you might make to support you on your journey or inspire your next creation?

Welcome your comments and images to inspire and connect our creativity online around the resources and tools we use!

Keep in touch & free ebook on the ’36 Books that Shaped my Story’

You can work with me to help reset your creativity and wholehearted self-leadership. Free 30-45 minute coaching consults chats are available so please get in touch at terri@quietwriting.com to talk further. I’d love to be a guide to help you create with spirit and heart in your own unique way. Consults available now for an October coaching start!

You can download my free 94-page ebook on the 36 Books that Shaped my Story – just sign up with your email address in the box to the right or below. You will also receive updates from Quiet Writing and its passions. This includes personality type, coaching, creativity, writing, tarot and other connections to help express your unique voice in the world.

Quiet Writing is on Facebook and Instagram – keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community.

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

mindset

Creative growth lightbulb moments!

1. Know your business model

My business model story

Your business model story

2. Be a contributor not a guru

My contributor story

Your contributor story

3. Embrace imperfect action

My imperfect action story

Your imperfect action story

Share your story!

Share this:

Like this:

Moving into writing

Reminders of cycles

Being aware of seasons

Writing as a safe place

Healing and inner wisdom

Writing the way through

Trusting in writing practice

Writing into a new season

Key book companions along the way

About Sally Morgan

Read more Wholehearted Stories

Keep in touch

Share this:

Like this:

Living life in the ordinary everyday moments

Nothing is better than a home cooked meal

Shifting focus

Looking for the answers right here not over there

Gratitude and moving on

Learning to listen to the longings of my own heart

Learning to believe in the possibility of a wholehearted life

How writing and early motherhood changed everything

Motherhood in Japan was the key to unlocking my heart

Writing is leading to radical transformation: that’s why it’s so hard

Writing through the dark to find the light

Key book companions along the way

About Kamsin Kaneko

Read more Wholehearted Stories

Keep in touch + free Reading Wisdom Guide

Share this:

Like this:

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

9 writing books to inspire your creativity

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Share this:

Like this:

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

The Artist’s Journey

Words to inspire you

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

Keep in touch + free Reading Wisdom Guide

Share this:

Like this:

The value of creative practices and tools

My practices and tools

Morning Pages

Working with tarot

Pomodoro technique + Scrivener + Tide App

Bluetooth keyboard + standing desk

NaNoWriMo + the metrics of word count

Starting a new business + creating my beautiful logo

Creative mentors over time such as Joanna Penn, Susannah Conway + Sage Cohen

Breaking through resistance over time with Steve Pressfield + blogging

My writing books + reading in my life

The right music playlists for the job

My recent writing and yoga retreat with Kerstin Pilz of Write Your Journey