so you want to be a writer
November 11, 2012 § Leave a Comment
if it doesn’t come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don’t do it.unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don’t do it.if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your typewriter
searching for words,
don’t do it.if you’re doing it for money or fame,
don’t do it.if you’re doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don’t do it.if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don’t do it.if it’s hard work just thinking about doing it,
don’t do it.if you’re trying to write like somebody else,
forget about it.
if you have to wait for it to roar out of you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you’re not ready.don’t be like so many writers,
don’t be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don’t be dull and boring and
pretentious, don’t be consumed with self-love.the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to sleep
over your kind.
don’t add to that.
don’t do it.unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don’t do it.unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don’t do it.when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by itself
and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.there is no other way.
and there never was.
Imagine Now.
November 3, 2012 § 1 Comment
The Holstee Manifesto
October 24, 2012 § 2 Comments
Make.Break.Collect.Connect
August 20, 2012 § Leave a Comment
Everything was made.
Each invention shows that the world is malleable, from the simplest stone tool to the screen you’re using to read this. We make what we want, break things in the process, collect what we like, and connect what we discover to get us closer to where we want to be.
Read the visual essay here>>
5 takeaways for every Designer
July 2, 2012 § 1 Comment
..
Always inspiring with jam-packed goodness, this year’s HOW Design Live Conference in Boston didn’t disappoint. Kamren Charpentier, a Missouri-based designer summarizes five interwoven key points from amazing speakers at the event, that every creative should be privy to.
Make a connection.
Be authentic.
Tell me a story.
Live and breathe creativity.
Designers : Don’t fear the code.
The Act of Innocence
June 28, 2012 § Leave a Comment
..
Reading a bit of my current bedtime favorite: Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. In the section on Giving Anne talks about the importance of innocence and naive conscience. She believes this quality enables quiet heroism. It certainly goes beyond writing. It applies to life. To being. I hope you enjoy it.
…
Here is the best true story on giving I know, and it was told by Jack Kornfield of the Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre.
An eight-year-old boy had a younger sister who was dying of leukemia, and he was told that without a blood transfusion she would die. His parents explained to him that his blood was probably compatible with hers, and if so, he could be the blood donor. They asked him if they could test his blood. He said sure. So they did and it was a good match. Then they asked him if they could test his blood. He said sure. So they did and it was a good match. Then they asked if he would give his sister a pint of blood, that it could be her only chance of living. He said he would have to think about it overnight.
The next day he went to his parents and said he was willing to donate the blood. So they took him to the hospital where he was put on a gurney beside his six-year-old sister. Both of them were hooked up to IVs. A nurse withdrew a pint of blood from the boy, which was then put in the girl’s IV. The boy lay on his gurney in silence while the blood dripped into his sister, until the doctor came over to see how he was doing. Then the boy opened his eyes and asked, “How soon until I start to die?”
Sometimes you have to be that innocent to be a writer. Writing takes a combination of sophistication and innocence; it takes conscience, our belief that something is beautiful because it’s right. To be great, art has to point somewhere. So if you are no longer familiar with that place of naïve conscience, it’s hard to see any point in your being a writer. I can almost promise that this quality is still in you, that you are capable of quiet heroism.
This sophisticated innocence is a gift. It is yours to give away. We are wired as humans to be open to the world instead of enclosed in a fortified, defensive mentality. What your giving can do is to help your readers be braver, be better than they are, be open to the world again.
Late Fragment
June 24, 2012 § Leave a Comment
“And did you get what
you wanted from this life, even so?
I did.
And what did you want?
To call myself beloved, to feel myself
beloved on the earth.”
― Raymond Carver
