Hiatus: In the Eye of the Storm

According to the Oxford English Dictionary,  "A hiatus is a gap or a pause taken amid a series, sequence, or process." That is what I'm going to call the long silence of this blog, Coasting Along: A Writer's Journey.  Since last posting on this blog, I have been busy living and writing. However, the pace of life coupled with the arrival of the pandemic in early 2020 have made it necessary for me, along with millions of other people worldwide, to reorder their priorities. 

While often a hiatus is planned for in advance, I give you the idea of taking a sabbatical, in my case the gap was not intentional. One of the perils of being a writer is the tendency to stray away from the task at hand because of other events and demands. During the last two years, for that's how long it's been, I was busy finding a new home and moving, learning how to navigate the waters of the pandemic, and spending inordinate amounts of time redoing and reworking different aspects of my life as a writer. For some, the pandemic and its subsequent stay-at-home orders have meant having more time to be more creative. For others, it has meant feeling like we were crawling through hot tar in our underwear. For me, it was the latter. 

Already used to working from home, there was little to get used to. What was most difficult for me was maintaining the energy, focus, and motivation I needed to do as much writing. My focus and attention was instead lazer-focused on what has been going on in our culture and the political environment. How close we came to losing our democracy and system of government. Anything that distracted me from learning all I could and doing what I could to fight for my country, my energy was drained, and my motivation was diminished. As I look back at the two years, I could catalogue the many ways I channeled my time, but that would not accurately capture the meaning of this time as it had a impact on my life as a writer. 

This morning when I woke up in the wee small hours of the morning (a newly acquired pandemic and political disruption habit), I read an article written by a member of the British military. He wrote about the importance of learning to cope with the effects of traumatic events, for him, PTSD as a result of his experiences in war. For me, as has been the case for far too long, the effects of trauma were more akin to those who experience what is called contact trauma. Primary trauma results from direct experience in a traumatic event or series of events. Contact trauma is when you are directly affected by trauma experienced by those with whom you are in close contact. For example, a spouse might experience contact trauma when her/his partner is in a dangerous situation. A husband or wife whose partner is in an active war zone, or a rape victim's partner. 

Overlap between primary and contact stress  often occurs, especially when many people are experiencing an ongoing traumatic event. The pandemic is an example where large numbers of people, in this case, most of the world's population, experience ongoing trauma and a variety of diverse reactions and responses from their experiences.

I wrote this article last year, and never posted it, as my hiatus from writing my blogs  began before I finished this piece. As 2021 has brought much-needed change and some relief with it, I am now tracing my steps to see where I left off with life, including the blogs.  Today I will publish this piece, but it wasn't the only thing I've written nor will it be my last blog post. It will be, I hope, the first of more regular posts that reflect on my writing life. Hope you are finding ways to continue your creative life as well, and I look forward to a new season ahead.

 On this last day of Winter, 2021, I wish you a fruitful year ahead, a healing one, and one which like a seed planted last fall, begins to poke its first shoots through the ground into the light of Spring. 

Coasting Along: Body in the Gallery Available Now

Cover Shot for Body in the Gallery    C.J. Meyers

Body in the Gallery, the second in the Lenora Whitley Cat's Tale Mystery series, is now available in both paperback and ebook versions online.  For those of you who are writers, you know how much it means to finish a book and get it ready for release. I'm in that rather euphoric state of nearly complete exhaustion and exhilaration that follows the completion of a big project. Yesterday the ebook went live and today I received the news that the paperback is now available to be ordered too.

Thrilled as I am to finish this book, Body in the Gallery, I am also excited for you, the readers, to read this next installment of Lenora "Lennie" Whitley's adventures.  There will be a third book in this series, as well as a new series that I've been working on. A new cast of characters has shown up to tell me their stories, and to urge me to get to work on their first adventure. Suffice it to say, that I'll be doing that shortly, but first, it's time to rest, refuel, and restore.

Creating anything results in generating energy. For some of us, that means we fuel up through the creative process itself.  Often when working on a long, involved project, I find release through writing poetry or playing music.  In my writing mode, when I actually put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard, I do not listen to music. In fact, I need a great deal of quiet and calm. However, once I'm finished with a big project or when taking a break, music helps me release energy and restore.

Writing poetry allows me to operate purely out of inspiration (I edit later, not during the creating process), and music allows me to wake up my senses and gets me into the expression of other moods, feelings, and ideas. Poetry too, is often a way to feel some sense of completion. The book writing, editing, publication process is just that. A process. A long process, and though I do try to take regular breaks and celebrate small steps along the way, until the book is in print and on the shelf or in the hands of my readers, it's not done. If it's not done, I don't rest. At least I don't rest mentally. There's always more to do.

Poetry, on the other hand,  is usually written on a whim. I might ponder an idea for a poem for a while, but when I set to writing a poem, it usually comes as a steady, unhampered stream of inspiration and images. When I later compile poetry into a collection, I edit and smooth out the pieces. By the way, in the middle of writing Body in the Gallery, I wrote and published my fourth volume of poetry, Sea Change Poetry of Transformation. I haven't even gotten around to doing much marketing, as once it was completed and published, I went right back to work on BIG (Body in the Gallery).

BIG is what my editors, readers, and I nicknamed this latest book. The first in the series, Body on the Beach, was called, you guessed it, BOB. Just a 'little known fact little worth knowing' as my daughter's father would say.  Love that expression, as I love so much about language. Another thing you might be interested in learning is how much we fiction writers actually learn as we do our writing. At least I'm guessing most good writer do this. Research is so important. While my sleuth, Lenora 'Lennie' Whitley, is not a trained law enforcement professional. She does, however, work with them.

As a former big city reporter for a major newspaper, she was the investigative reporter. We learn this about Lennie, through some of the contacts she maintains, and some of what she understands about criminal justice. She is, however, not a professional. That means as an author, I have to do enough research to make her character and interactions believable enough. As an author though, I reserve the right to use creative license in hopes that my readers will be able to suspend belief just a bit. It's what poet Coleridge called, poetic faith. We allow ourselves to travel into the imagination of the writer to see through that lens and understand the world as the characters do.  This may not always be in alignment with the facts, man, just the facts.

My editors/prepublication readers keep reminding me what is believable and what is not.  I write about dreams. For those of us who know and work with our dreams, we understand that is a whole other area that requires a suspension of belief. When we are dealing with the bizarre, macabre, and surreal realm of images and messages, we know that we can't take what we dream at face value. At least not always. The truth appears amid stark, conflicting images.

The puzzles or questions our subconscious struggles with, receive clues and answers in ways that often require our own poetic faith in order to comprehend what they might mean in the reality of our waking lives. Lennie has the gift of dreams, and they often appear with no obvious connection to her life or the life of the mystery unfolding around her. As dreams do though, the dream always has some element that points us and our character, Lennie, in the direction of answers, solutions, and clues.

Coasting Along: A Writer's Journey is an irregular blog. Today I am compelled to write, and what is the obvious thing to write about? The process, the art, the challenge, and the joy of writing. Truly, when a writer is done writing a book, it's entirely possible that you'll find that writer writing something else. You see writing is not just the creative act, it is also the life-giving, life-affirming, and life-altering act of love. We writers love the words, and love to use the written word to express what cannot be done in other ways. I admire so much my artist friends who have the talent, discipline, and gift of expressing themselves through their art. And I admire anyone who uses their work as a way to give life to others while enriching themselves spiritually, emotionally, psychologically, and creatively at the same time.

Hope you enjoy reading my latest mystery or some of my poetry. I hope both encourage you to follow your passions and dreams as well.  Don't wait for permission to start something you love. Do it, and do it now. Even if you only just begin. A few steps, a few words, a few strokes of the brush or pen will add up. More importantly, you will release something powerful from within. You will allow your voice to emerge in the unique way that only you can do. Try it. You'll learn to like it and perhaps love it.  Happy creating all.

Visit my Author's Page where you will find all my books, both paperback and ebooks.

A Writer's Journey: Shift, Sort, Soften, Surrender

*In the middle of two consecutive yoga classes, the ideas for this poem came to me, repeating over and over the four words, shift, sort, soften, and surrender. This poem is the start of their journey together.

Taking Flight                                                     Catherine Al-Meten Meyers

A Writer’s Journey

Shift. 

Sort.

Soften.

Surrender.

Shift

Conversion

Revolution

Transformation

Metamorphosis

Transmutation

Flip flop

Renewal

To set apart

To  rearrange

To move from one place to another

To change, alter, divide into parts

To replace and change focus.

Sort

Ilk

Type

Kind

Arrange

Separate

Put into order

Clarify

Evolve

Develop

Clarify

Classify

Put into context

Identify with as family

Characterize

Rank

Determine the nature of

Name as kin, friend, foe, object.

Review.

Soften

Ease

Calm

Quiet

Alleviate

Relieve

Soothe

Mitigate

Mollify

Pacify

Allay

Diminish

Dulcify

Diminish

Assuage

Cushion

Quell

Temper

Mellow

Compose.

Surrender

Yield

Abandon

Give in

Give up

Resign

Relinquish

Abandon

Relent

Renunciate

Capitulate

Acquiesce

Submit to the will of

The Divine

Omnipotent

Omniscient

Omnipresent

Creator

Infinite Spirit

God

Allah

the Almighty

Source.

Spirit

Totem

Father, Mother, Creation

Divine Creative Breath

All in All. 

Eternal

Essence.

Being

Kernel

Aspect

Basis

Lifeblood

Nature

Marrow

Nucleus

Soul

Root

Nature

Principle

Backbone

Crux

Nature

Pith

Reality

Structure

Essentia.

The beginning of the journey.

Copyright@2018, Catherine Al-Meten Meyers.

Quantifying Goals and Dreams: Ready, Set, Question, Go!

Bird House                                  Catherine Al-Meten Meyers

From my early writing days using pen and paper and tapping away on my Smith-Corona, writing tools have changed a lot. Where paper files, notebooks, and file cabinets once filled boxes and boxes, they now take up a much smaller space and serve a different purpose. How times have changed, and my writing process with it. My laptop has taken the place of my typewriter, and though I still do some writing by hand, the electronic systems are my main tools. What I keep paper copies of are final drafts, current finances, and jotted down ideas or journal entries.

Probably the last time I made a concerted effort to organize paper files, I was living in a home in the old Ft. Ord officer's housing. Built originally for families of military service members, the space and arrangements were well suited for good views and ample closet and wall space. I recall setting up my glass-topped desk, and coming up with a color code and system for files. My goal that day just after new years a long time ago was to set my priorities for writing in order as well as my financial business dealings.

At the same time I was being mentored on starting my own business and setting goals for myself. What my wise mentor Robert Kramer taught me was to project money goals forward just like I would writing and research assignments. I was very experienced by that point in setting goals for myself related to assignments and writing, but to do the same thing with my financial plans and goals was new. My way of handling finances was to deal with what I had on hand. Pay checks came at regular intervals, depending on the job. Running my own business, however, was a horse of a different sort.

The very idea of projecting income, that is imagining how much I wanted to earn in the future was shocking to me. My way would have been, to consider how much I could get together or how many hours I needed to get paid work to bring in money. My attempts at using credit were short-lived and unsuccessful. I preferred working with what I had. It felt safer. What it did, however, was block possibilities and opportunities, energetically. When we do not conceive of an idea, it seldom manifests into our reality. It might do so occasionally as if it's a stroke of luck or a fluke, but when we put our minds to something, when we imagine a possibility, it becomes much stronger.

And if we want to see our desires expressed in quantifiable terms, in some form, we need to get a clearer idea of what that looks like. As you want to experience love through actions not just words, so too do we need to see our ideas manifest in some form--art, literature, drama, music, service, program development, a good or a utility. What I learned through the Small Business Administration mentorship program was to learn to quantify not just my services (counseling, editing, writing) or goods (books, articles, retreat/workshops)  but also my time, energy, and resources (human and otherwise).

I remember Robert asking me what I saw myself doing 5 or 10 years down the road. As I was determined to be a full time writer, my goal was to write and publish a book successfully. He then asked me how I would define success. My vague answer of hoping people would buy the book, read it, and like it, led to his next question. "How many books would you have to sell to be successful?" I had no idea, at the time.  He showed me how to estimate and quantify my goals into something measurable. For creatives such as myself, quantifying is sometimes difficult. However, the more successful I am as a writer, the more important being able to get comfortable with this aspect of a career in writing becomes.

Part of my dream was to write a book.  I felt like I had the capacity to do that, but was more concerned with how to support myself outside the academic or business world's systems/institutions. The transition between being partly connected to an institution/business has not been straight forward. At times I took temporary jobs to meet my needs. Finally, when that option disappeared due to the strain it was taking on my health and resources, I left the part time connections. My temporary part time teaching job seemed ideal, however the energy, time, and resources I needed for the work drew from the same well that writing needed. It took it's toll on my health, and created a minor crisis that opened one door and closed another.

While spending an ample amount of time pursuing my new career as a  full time writer and photographer, I kept taking part time gigs, wrote for online news organizations, and helped out raising my Granddaughter before she was ready for school. All of this took its toll and didn't provide me with much of an income.  In January at the start of a new term teaching, I felt really ill and went to a new doctor. At the same time, I had contacted our local social assistance counselor to ask some questions about medical insurance. My contact with these two people, helped turn my life around, in the right direction.

The first person I met was a doctor who has the skills we would all love in a healer. She listened. She observed. And she is a brilliant diagnostician, so she correctly diagnosed a disorder that had been afflicting me for years. I had no idea because the symptoms weren't extreme, at least not on the outside. Internally though, my immune system and certain mineral levels in my body were dangerously affected. The reason I had even sought out a doctor was because I'd fallen over the Christmas holidays. My ankle, which had been broken, was sprained. Stephanie Potts, my doctor, nurse practitioner, told me I needed to stay off my feet for a couple of weeks. She took my blood and I left her office, wondering how I was going to follow her suggestions and still work? Within a few days, she called me to let me know I needed to begin a course of medication, change my lifestyle and diet, and to remove as much stress from my life as possible as soon as possible. Not only did I need to keep my feet up, I needed to address a serious health issue immediately.

So now not only did I need to keep my feet up, I had to take time off to get better. Not knowing what to do, I went ahead and met with
the woman from the social services organization--Sue Perkins. She came to meet me near my home and asked me to tell her about my life.  What was I doing and what was my typical day or week?  I told her about my job, the long commute, my  current health issues.
When I told her, she asked me a simple question. "How much is your time and energy worth to you?" I was stunned. I started to tell her how I had to work and couldn't survive without the job. She said, "That's not what I asked. How much is your time and energy worth to you."  I had no idea what she meant. She then proceeded to ask me to take stock of how much time I spent in all the different aspects of this part time job that I was doing a 2-hour commute each way  two or three days a week. Then she said to add the time preparing (as a teacher there were hours of prep before and after each class), and then she added, how much time I spent recovering from the job.  She had me add all the hours up, and then any additional costs (gas, parking, travel expenses, meals, clothing).

When I'd done this, she said to me, "Frankly, you cannot afford that job. Your health or someone else's safety depends on you getting healthy again." When what you get for a job you do is not worth the time, energy, and resources you put into it, it's time to rethink the assignment. And when your own health is affected negatively by the work or conditions around the work, that's the bottom line or the straw that breaks the camel's back. Decision time. Looking back, it was not an easy decision, but it was the only right decision for me.
All the things I worried about walking away from that job and focusing on getting well and writing, have vanished.  Since that time I have written and published at least 7 books and countless articles and essays. My life as a writer is established, and I'm now at another crucial turning point in my career.

My writing projects require most of my time and attention. That leaves not much time for other areas I've been focused on in the recent past. I've given up all outside teaching, and realize I need more help than I can get or afford right now. The help I need is in marketing and publicity.  I have friends who have volunteered to help, and that has been a miracle to me. To get my books written, ready for publication, and then on the market, I need assistance. How that is going to happen, remains to be seen, but I now have people wanting to carry my books in their shops. Even though it's not my favorite part of being a writer, I do need to spend more time getting the books out and marketed. I'm at one of those steep precipices again...looking out on a vast, broad landscape trying to figure out how to get to where I'm going next. While today, I have no answers and not much of a plan, I am beginning to ask the questions and listen for answers and seek signs that indicate to me how to start quantifying my goals and dreams into action.

Opportunities, offers, and events on the calendar call for me to ask some pointed questions and make some decisions that will enable me to move my writing career into the next stage. This year I am finishing the second book in my mystery series, editing and publishing my fourth book of poetry, and going ahead on a new series, one I've been researching and dreaming up for the past year or so. Waiting for an order of books for a local shop, and getting ready to launch the new book with a couple of events.

It's a lazy Sunday morning when I've been anything but lazy or at ease. Instead ideas are popping up and like a pot of boiling water, things are getting ready to take off. It's a feeling I have, that stirred from within. Where it will lead, I am uncertain. But I recognize the movement, questions, and push of times in the transitions stages of my life. Writing is all about expressing and communicating, and writing about writing as I do here on Coasting Along, is one of the ways a writer, this writer, unravels the mysteries and unpacks the questions that help point me in the direction I'm traveling.

Happy New Year to all of you who are heading out on new journeys, longing for new directions, or unwinding from the last big adventure. Take time to breathe and smell the pine, moss, or cactus, whatever is near you and in bloom or growing. Take time too to look at what is growing within you, and prepare yourself to make the best of the gifts of life and freedom that we have.

By the way, my answer to Robert's question about how I saw myself down the road is actually the life I am living and have been living since that time. What we imagine possible becomes so when we put ourselves to work on making it happen.

Squeezing Into a Size Seven

Decades ago, when I was still in high school I think, I went shopping at the Lakewood Center Mall. I was having cramps and felt awful, but for some reason it never occurred to me at that time that it was probably not the best time to go shopping. What ended up happening was I let myself get talked into buying a kelly green, mohair jumper dress. Anyone who knows me that kelly green is not a color I've ever worn, except for the few times I tried to wear that ugly mohair jumper. It was perhaps the worst purchase I'd ever made. Made worse because it cost so much, and I thought it would make me feel better. Learned a lot about impulse shopping that day, but also about trying to put myself in something someone else thought was a good idea.

Have you ever bought a piece of clothing hoping you'd grow to love it or that it would fit even though it was the wrong size to begin with? Remember a time when a pair of skinny jeans or a blouse that fit you 20 years ago, requires a shoehorn to even come close to fitting into? Or for those of us who gained some weight after having a baby, we understand what it feels like to try to squeeze into a pair of pants that no longer fit our image of who we are. We've all probably had the experience of trying to fit into something that just never was right for us in the first place. Our writing careers often find us trying to emulate someone we admire or fitting into some critic's latest "10 best ways to get your work published" articles.

In reality, we each have our own gifts and callings, and we each have to find our own way of being who we are, writer or not. What works for one person, does not necessarily work for everyone. One size or style definitely does not fit all. Much of being a writer, artist, creative person is about convincing ourselves that we can do what makes us happy and fulfilled. This morning I treated myself to an hour of listening to one of my favorite writers, Anne Lamott being interviewed by her writer son, Sam Lamott (if you want to listen, click on  Sam Lamott interviews Anne Lamott). I did this after looking for an escape for my regular morning writing practice. This doesn't happen that often, but some mornings, I just have a hard time getting to work. Working for myself at home makes it much easier to 'call in sick' or get distracted than a 'real job' might afford. Nevertheless, there is a nagging, painful urge I have that always gets soothed when I actually 'do the work'.  And that's what I call writing, the work.

Writing is a real job and it is also a calling. Something we have to do because it is part of what makes us feel whole. It's how I find ways to express myself, to heal, to sort out, to synthesize, and to tell a story or two.  And most of the time, I love it. When I find myself edgy and resistant though, I need only look to see whether or not I'm doing my work in the way that works best for me or not. There is an element of fear that sits somewhere in the recesses of my mind. It's shaped like an inner critic, wet blanket, or the screaming meemies, and it can paralyze me or push me to find whatever I can to lead me away from the next page waiting to be written. Have I said, it doesn't happen often? Yes, of course, which probably means it happens more than I want to admit. Most days, I shove the voice into a corner closet and sit down and write anyway.

Today when I was getting lost in world events and politics, up pop's Anne Lamott's interview, and so I listened. After all I can count listening to a writer talk about writing as writing time, right? It was so interesting however, because her young son, Sam and Anne herself were both talking about the same things that most writers deal with at some point in our writing lives. The interview raised some questions including the following:

How do we know this is the right thing for us?

Is my devotion to my writing career worth the sacrifices and losses I'm making?

How do I cope with failure, rejection, disinterest, and criticism, especially from family and friends?

Am I doing it right?

There are probably more questions than these, but for the sake of an essay, let's start here. The first question, how do I know if this is the right thing for me. Well that is the one question I do have an answer for. I love writing. It's my favorite form of communicating, and I feel alive and fulfilled every time I write. I love for people to read what I write, but I also love the writing simply because it is so much more clear to me than what I can communicate any other way. I find pleasure, satisfaction, and joy in writing. I find connections and deeper paths that link me to greater understanding when I do research and write. I love listening to people's stories and watching people's lives. I'm fascinated by the depth and breadth of characters that are living on the same planet as I am, and the endless possibilities for story telling and narrative. So the answer for me, is yes. Absolutely writing is the right thing for me, and the only regret I have is that I didn't start on my own sooner.

Is my devotion to my writing career worth the sacrifices and losses I'm making?  Again, I would have to say yes indeed. Writing is not the first choice I've made in life that has involved making sacrifices and not following the tried and true way.  I learned early on that the road less traveled was usually where I wanted to go. Those choices often came about after realizing that 'doing what was expected or safe' did not make me happy nor did they fulfill me. I headed out in new directions, and kept searching until I found the path that fit my passions.  I learned that often people gave you advice or criticism based on their own comfort zone and passion, not yours. At different points in time when I was a young woman, conversations that changed my perspective and left doors ajar that led to my dreams, came from those who recognized me and my love for ideas, thought, and writing.

One English Literature professor, recognized me as a poet. When I first entered her poetry class, she warned us, "Don't write any modern, stream of consciousness poetry. I won't like it." I wrote my poetry anyway, and she like it. She liked it so much it inspired her to write poetry and get it published, long before I had the courage to try. She also told me I should write for a living, and encouraged me a long that way.  I didn't think I 'knew' enough, so it would be years before I'd accept myself as a poet. Dr. Claudia Buckner was a voice who stayed with me though, and still makes me realize if I just put pen to paper, I can do it.

In a short elevator ride with two of my Psychology professors at CSUDH, I was asked, "Where are you going to graduate school?" My reply, "I haven't applied anywhere." Honestly, I didn't think I had what it took, including money enough, to go to grad school. Their reply, "Well, as soon as you apply, you'll be accepted right away." Again, I put that encouragement on the back shelf and after fits and starts, years later at the age of 50 I would finally start my masters, then another one, and the a doctorate. It took a long time to build up the courage to try, but once I did, I learned, I can do it.

Another key moment was when I took a graduate course in writing, and ended up being asked if I would share the teaching responsibilities of that class. In front of a roomful of students, Dr. Charles Pomeroy asked me how I thought the class should be done, and for a split second I thought, "Okay, I can take the ball and run, or I can turn it back to him. I can be honest or I can defer." I was honest and found myself in a new job, and with a greater sense of what it took to be brave and step out into the moment. There were many times when my ideas or talents were not well received, but the moments and encouragement (better than advice) I remember were those that allowed me to step out into my own identity and define myself for myself while recognizing that others saw my capabilities.

Had I listened to the worriers, doom and gloomers, or those who were set on a different track than I , my journey would have been different.  When I went ahead in spite of fear, the outcome has been good. I have learned too that life is dynamic, and what works at one stage of life or in a particular job or relationship, does not necessarily work in all cases. Being flexible and willing to change and take risks helps me stay grounded in the present truth--the reality of the now. That does not mean I don't plan or learn from the past; it means instead that I know plans aren't necessarily going to happen as I expect or want. Getting okay with that is vital to being a writer, for me.

How do I cope with failure, rejection, disinterest, and criticism, especially from family and friends?

Not well. Who does? It's one of the hardest parts of being a writer is not having those who matter most to you take you seriously or even like what you do. I don't know which is worse. We have to do our art in spite of what others think. People's reactions to our art like anything else, is to a large extent based on what's going on in their own minds, hearts, and lives. And it has to do with their interests and tastes. Some people can't imagine you doing your art, because it doesn't fit with the image they have of you in their heads. We're not really responsible for how others judge us or our work.

What matters to me about the writing I do is the response of others who are willing to talk to me about it. It feels fabulous when someone who read my book, "couldn't put it down".  What higher compliment?  Not so flattering is a good friend who has the courage to tell you they found a flaw in the text of a book that no one else had told you about. I love that my friend David caught a mistake that I missed, and told me so I could fix it. Someone who says, "I don't like mysteries" I tell, then you probably won't like this. Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. Books are like films. We all have different tastes. Some won't pick up a book if it looks too long, others if it's too short.

So what do we writers do? I thought I was going to be able to write cute, short, cozy mysteries like some of my favorite authors. However, once I started writing novels, I found that wasn't my style. Should I try to contort my style of writing to fit a formula that isn't mine? My answer for myself is 'No'. Writers have very different ways of laying our their works. Some plot and plan meticulously, others let the characters flow. We have to do what works for our own individual style. We also have to nurture and protect our work keeping it out of the way of harsh and cruel criticism. We need to be cautious and discriminating about who we allow to see and help us with our work. To put a piece of a budding idea out to be lambasted by someone should be avoided at all costs. This means, not every friend or family member or colleague is going to be the right person to read, edit, review, or critique your work.  Be careful who you listen to, and avoid anyone with a poison tongue or pen who tries to tear your work apart.

Find honest brokers--those who know their way around a piece of writing and who can offer constructive assistance. All others, keep away from your baby projects. I think of one good writer friend who allowed a writing workshop leader critique her manuscript and tell her to start over. That is not helpful nor is it a professional way that anyone who purports to be trying to support writers ought to behave. However, it may happen. If and when it does, grab your work, leave by the nearest exit, and go back to a trusted person who won't tear your heart out as they try to save your life. If you've been hurt, as most of us have at one point or another, take time to heal, get some distance, get some support, and keep writing. Don't let anyone to deter you.

Am I doing it right?

Better yet, am I enjoying what I'm writing? What is my body of work? Sometimes we're so intent on what we haven't yet done that we forget what we've accomplished. Whatever stage of your writing life you're in, do an inventory. Gather all the writing you've done together. Essays, research, poetry, articles, books, blogs, letters, whatever you've done. This will give you a better sense of your writings. You can do this for any type of art or other work. Until we recognize what we have accomplished, we are operating in a dark room.

What different types of writing do I like, and why don't I do more of it?  How do I measure success for myself? Again, more questions. And the last question I asked today should provoke more questions you have about your life as a writer, artist, sculptor, musician, or whatever you do that helps you express your identity. Healer, doctor, carpenter, communicator, singer, lover of life.  Give yourself a pat on the back for what you've created in your life, and notice what has given you the most joy, fulfillment, and purpose. If financial success is your primary goal, how is that working for you as a creative person?  Decide what matters most as far as your sense of success is, and measure that against the life you're living.

Then  commit yourself to the time, energy, resources, and dedication it takes to be the writer you are and wish to become. Do this with whatever matters most to you, with whatever gives you purpose, and serves those you seek to enrich and serve. Decide for yourself what criteria matters most, and align yourself with daily work that leads toward that. If you block out possibility simply because you can't imagine things working out differently for you, rethink where you are putting your faith and how you are stopping yourself from doing what gives you purpose, meaning, and fulfillment. Write on. Create. Be happy in that.

Autumn Harvest: Taking Care of Our Tools

Bleeding Hearts and Pines                                        Catherine Al-Meten Meyers

"If you want to see what your body will look like tomorrow, 

look at your thoughts today."--Navajo Proverb

Autumn is harvest time. A time for gathering in what has been growing and what is coming to fruition over the summer and start of the season. It's a time for preserving and preparing for the days and nights ahead. Days are growing steadily shorter as nights and darkness fill in more of our lives. Yesterday while it was still dark the lights of the school bus drew my attention to the house across from the end of the drive. Children were leaving for school already, in the dark. Our bodies, minds, emotions, and spirits are waking up to what has been growing in us all year.

Up here in the North, a good portion of our time for a good deal of the year is a time of darkness. Darkness doesn't mark  the end of the day, but defines a difference in the kinds of activities, the level of energy, the types of food and clothes and shoes we need to sustain and warm us. It's a time when cold chills our bones, and when we wrap our fingers around hot cups of tea, coffee, chocolate, or soup to keep those fingers nimble and ready for the work of the day. A few years ago, I noticed a couple of writer friends wearing fingerless gloves. I discovered the gloves were used by writers to keep their fingers warm. I got some, and now see them as a vital part of my wardrobe, my writing tools.

Fingers and hands to writers, are our tools. Our entire body, mind, and emotional make up are our tools as well. Our imagination, intuition, and intellect serve us well. All of these parts of ourselves serve us well when we take care of ourselves in the midst of living. We are reminded how hard we can be on ourselves when we get so busy we forget to take care. Something happens, and we think, "Well how did that happen?' We might have a fall or catch a cold, feel our neck or back seize up, or forget to take care of some simple but necessary task. Letting something burn on the stove or forget the laundry in the washer from two days ago. I'm not saying any of this has ever happened to me, but they could have.

Life tends to creep up on us, and before we know it, our lives are turned upside down because a simple thing or two have turned into a crisis. Why does this come up at this time of the year? With our bodies, when seasons and weather change, and when the climate or environmental changes call for adjustments or changes in our lives, it is a good idea to take a little time to reflect on what we have gathered in our experiences and daily lives. What have we accumulated and what are the effects of this accumulation? What can we reasonably do without, or what do we need to organize, tend to, or eliminate altogether? This has to do with things, but it also has to do with habits, patterns, and ways of looking at life.

Much of what we do on a day to day basis is unconscious. We don't stop to remember how to wash dishes, or drive a car, or button a blouse every time we do it. We know how and we go through the motions, unconsciously. We do the same thing in the way we respond and react to life and people in our lives. As we review our lives, it's a good idea to look at what kinds of relationships we've made part of our lives. How much of our day do we find ourselves distracted by something or someone? What is calling for attention in our lives? Where do we need nourishment, compassion, connection, and where could we use more space, room, quiet, or places of calm? Becoming more conscious of what lies beneath the surface, can be helpful in staying more attuned to what we carry with us.

Whenever a seasonal shift occurs, it's a good time to reflect on what, in the past, has been a soothing, comforting, energizing, or fulfilling experience. For example, it may be that getting outdoors becomes more enjoyable, as it does for me, when the weather cools off. Being outside is something that I enjoy most in Autumn, and so when I see that I've become too much of a cave woman, I venture out. I take my camera, my sketch book, or a notebook and plop myself down on a bench after a long walk, and work. I photograph the colors that can only be found in Autumn at certain times. Some of us get into the holidays, others of us get into the natural worlds' majesty. Whatever 'it' is that grabs you and fills you with joy, do that now.

Nourishing and preserving our bodies, also involves feeding our souls. Doing what gives us peace and joy. What fills us with satisfaction and makes us feel good from head to toe. From inside out and outside in.  Putting on a sweater for the first time in the season, and putting summer clothes away until next spring. Making a big pot of soup or stew and sharing with friends. Every year for a few years now, I've been inspired to make homemade chicken soup. While I love to eat it, the making has become a chore that marks the beginning of a season of tending to the health and well being of myself and others. It's a time when we need to tend to those who need support and to support and care for those parts of ourselves that require assistance and ongoing love and support.

Some of us have chronic issues that remind us through pain, when we've neglected ourselves too much. We, as writers, need to pay attention to the calls and cries of our bodies, minds, and spirits, for in those twinges and pulls, those highs and lows, those frustrations and nightmares, we get hints of what the darkness inside us is longing to bring into the light. Pain is a signal that something needs tending too. Depression or feeling blue, is a call from the soul to face some shadow piece, some part of ourselves that we might be afraid will be too difficult to cope with. We may need support and help to do this. We may simply need to start taking care of our tools--body, mind, emotions, psychological issues, and spirit--in a more intentional, consistent manner.

While I do not believe we should feel responsible or guilty for illness or other challenges we face, I do fee we are co-creators of our health. Raised as a Christian Scientist, I have been well versed in how illness is a reflection of imbalance in our thinking. And again, that doesn't mean, we must be made to feel we have done something wrong or aren't 'good enough' if we struggle with imbalances. Imbalance is part of living a spiritual life in a physical world and body. It's who we are. What we can be responsive to though is how we take care of ourselves. Because we believe all is well and we just need to 'know the truth' doesn't mean we can dart out in front of ongoing traffic and expect to be 'saved'. We might be saved from our own ignorance or false theological thinking on occasion but that's not what is meant by being a reflection of the Divine being.

What is meant, I believe, is that we are given gifts of intellect, wisdom, experience, training, knowledge, intuition, and reflection to pay attention to how we are living and treating ourselves and others. We can prevent ourselves from placing ourselves in dangerous situations, eating and drinking irresponsibly, pushing past the limits of good health and good sense. We can take the necessary time we need to heal, repair, and learn new ways of using our tools so that we can adapt to changes and adjust to times when we have to slow down or take breaks. When we push ourselves past the limits of our human endurance, we will suffer. Paying attention, becoming more conscious of what our bodies are telling us, and then taking steps to cope with issues that are endangering us, is key to maintaining optimum health and well being.

With this in mind, pay attention to illnesses that linger, pains that signals an injury, lack of range of motion that shouts out to you. Autumn is a time when our bodies send out signals, and when we can build into our lives, some simple ways to help us pay closer attention and take better care of what is going on with our essential tools--our body, mind, emotions, spirit.

With this in mind, my choices this fall have included increasing my yoga practice to include more yoga therapy classes (focus on coping with chronic and troublesome issues like osteoarthritis, regular wear and tear from sitting and writing, and others serious conditions like pulmonary and cancer-treatment conditions, pre and post operative rehab). This Fall I have begun to   address  issues that have gotten progressively worse with my hand. Getting physical therapy and learning how to do things differently is a beginning. What really matters is how I adjust and change to meet changing needs. I've adjusted my writing, sleeping, exercise, and work schedule. I've changed some of my meal habits, to more directly reflect my needs and lifestyle, and I've been noticing where my life lacks certain necessary support and connection. We don't fix everything by making a few changes, but we start living more in alignment with good health and well being when we make awareness and change a regular part of our routine.

Some of us get so fixed into a particular pattern or set of habits, that we think we have no choice. Seasonal changes remind us that we need to mix things up now and then, and so taking some time right now to reevaluate all areas of your life, is probably one of the best things you could do for preparing for what is ahead. Review doesn't mean you have to change everything. It simply means we take time to look at what we're doing, ask ourselves why we're doing it, and then ask if it's adding to our optimum health or not. If something is detracting, numbing, or deadening you in any way, consider how you could change it. For example, if you're putting up with chronic back pain, thinking that's normal (it's not), consider what you could change to prevent the pain and what you could do to deal with the pain when you get it.  Then do something positive about that.

Living our lives as writers and creative people demands a lot of self discipline. Our schedule and work style doesn't have to look like anyone else's but in order for our lives as creatives to provide us with optimum health and well being, we need to be paying attention to our whole selves, not just the mechanical or imaginative pieces. Take time to get a good massage now and then. Enroll in a yoga class that deals primarily with shoulders, neck, and joint pain. Get up and go for a walk every day or jump into a pool and do some laps. Get down on the floor and stretch out. Take action.

To do this requires being intentional, and that is something only you know how to do. a million good ideas are useless without the desire to act on one of them. Give yourself the best chance to live a healthy, productive, fulfilling, and well balanced life by taking charge of your own health and well being. Be intentional and start now.

A good place to start considering how this might help you and your health, is to read what Dr. Caroline Myss has to say about taking care of your body.

Carolyn Myss Taking Care of Your Body

Why Reading Matters to a Writer

Buds and Blossoms                               Catherine Al-Meten Meyers

Reading has always been one of my passions. Perhaps because my Mother read to us every night before we went to sleep, the lure of fiction and the hidden worlds have had a great influence on me. Besides the love of reading, my Mother instilled in me a passion for taking time to indulge that love. She left me with small leather bound copies of Omar Khayyam's poetry alongside a love of opera, theater, and love of cultural differences. And an expansive view of life, the world, and Spirit. She taught me to love and respect the creative people, musicians, poets, writers, artists, and mystics. And so I do. She also gave me room to expand my world beyond the one I was born into.

Going to the library was one of my earliest memories of feeling free and excited. My first trip to a library was a bookmobile that parked in front of a five and dime store in the Triangle shopping area of the outskirts of Long Beach in the early 1950s. I remember getting my first library card, and sitting on the floor of the bookmobile, amid the aroma of old and new books, adding to the stack of books I took home weekly. Reading was, for me, all about relaxing, finding a quiet, inner space to get lost in adventures, someone else's. Favorite memories include hanging out in the local public library once it was built. At the time I was told that thanks to Carnegie, every American had a library within walking distance of their home. It was the 50's, so I took that as fact. Whether or not it is, I don't know. If it's not a fact, it should be.

Reading passions included biography, autobiography, novels of all kinds, and an early passion for mysteries. My parents purchased a multi-volume set of Encyclopedia Britannica. Those large tomes held all kinds of interesting mysteries. I spent hours studying the planets and the solar system in the two-dimensional illustrations and explanations of each planet. School of course required that I read a lot beyond fiction. And for many years, and many decades of higher education and university teaching, I read volumes of books on subjects ranging from botany and geology to ancient spiritual traditions and ethics, and then back again to the sciences with physics and philosophy. Interest spread to archaic and mystical journeys in so many directions, that it was no surprise to me that I was an interdisciplinary student before the term had been coined.

While still in my teens though, I found my reading interests included popular romance and detective magazines, comic books (Archie and Veronica), and fan magazines that gave the inside scoop on Elvis and other heartthrobs. My high school boyfriend once suggested, as men are prone to do, that my passion for romance magazines was coloring my teenage perspective. Of course it was. At a time when we are seeking identity and wanting to know what life and love is all about, what wouldn't be interesting about the gory details of love gone wrong or Love's labors lost?

My tastes ranged. I read Shakespeare along with True Confessions. I read the Hardy Boys along with Nancy Drew. I read Sir Arthur Conan Doyle along with Dame Agatha Christie, and I was influenced by Pearl Buck and Victor Frankl, perhaps more than any other writers. I knew the King James version of the Bible, with all its thees and thines, and those, and I still prefer my 23rd Psalm in that language. I also enjoyed time alone in my Mother's friend's bedroom, door closed, sneaking a peak at a best seller, the scandalous Peyton Place. No one ever censored my reading, but I somehow knew there were some books that I had no experience that matched what happened inside their covers.

At nearly every level of education, reading was required. The more advanced my studies, the more narrow the scope and yet the deeper and more far-reaching, if that makes sense. As a dual major at the undergraduate level, English required that I read tons of fiction, old and new. Psychology took me in a different direction altogether. Side by side this dual track became the norm. As an instructor, I always required 'reading for pleasure' to enhance the courses. That meant I was reading a lot of what students brought to me. When I taught junior high and high school, I discovered works I'd missed, and my reading lists grew endless. When I graduated from university, I had some free time and began wanting to read the books I'd heard of but hadn't had time to read. The Prince by Machiavelli, which I had imagined a huge book that would challenge my abilities, I found was  simple little, easy-to-understand volume that delighted me. The Decameron, the chronicle plays of Shakespeare, and rereading Austen when I was finally worldly enough to enjoy her writing.

All through school and university years, I loved drama. I acted, helped write scripts, and produced a few plays when I was young. I had wanted to be a stage actress, but was shamed out of it by Miss Bush who encouraged me to go into Home Ec. They eliminated Home Ec as a major before I graduated high school, and I would never have chosen that direction anyway. No, I knew my future had to be wrapped up somehow in books and communication. For years, I put aside my personal writings, unsure and unwilling to show it to anyone. My scholarly writing was good, and ended up to be my strength. I'm not going to go into what led me to become a writer, at least not today. Today I'm so excited because I've discovered something that I thought I'd lost to the past. The pleasure and joy of getting lost in reading.

A couple of months ago, I was invited to take my pick of what was on my friend's book shelf. I recognized a couple authors and found some I'd heard of but never read. I brought home about 8 books, and started my way through the stack. What I discovered was that I was no longer reading fiction for the sheer enjoyment of getting lost in someone else's tale. No, instead I was finding myself engrossed in the writing styles of the different authors. It just so happens, I picked all female authors. Not intentionally.

The first book I read was one by Willa Cather, one of the first authors I'd read as a pre-teen. My Antonia and a couple others, had kept me company for one whole summer. This summer The Professor's House was where I discovered how Cather got into the head of a male university professor and convinced me she got it right. I was amazed.

Next I read two books by Anne Lamott, one of my favorite writers. I had, however, only read her non-fiction books, the ones about writing and creativity. This summer I read her fiction, and was struck by how she invited me into her life and view of how you turn the pain of your life, the loss, the destruction and disappointment, into something you can laugh at and recover part way from. Then I went on to read another of my favorite writers, Amy Tan. It felt as though she was inside my head or I in hers, when she talked about the process of writing. As I try today to write about how profoundly I have been affected, as a writer, by what I've been reading, by Tan and Lamott, by Cather and Kingsolver, I find myself incapable of doing so. It's like trying to recreate a spiritual awakening or fill someone in on the most profound mystical experiences of your life. It simply can't be done.

Reading the works, the fiction and memoirs of contemporary women writers, has the effect on me of solidifying my calling. It's as if I had been traveling on the road to some literary Damascus, been struck blind by my own limitations, and then healed. To have our eyes open to what it means to be who we are, and to find those who understand the same struggles, desires, and need to bring the past and present into something healed and lasting, into something dreamed of or hoped for or not quite understood. Writing is all that, and so much more. It is the voice box of a silenced voice. It is the sensorial expression that travels across synapses, through nerve centers and down into the waiting fingers to bring life to thought, to memory, to vision, to imagination. In hopes that it will bring wholeness and catch someone's eye long enough keep on reading.

Yesterday, I picked up Barbar Kingsolver"s Animal Dreams. I may be one of the few of my generation not to have read her yet. I have always been out on the periphery of her work. What did I expect? After reading Lamott and Tan, I expected something close, I guess. That's not what I found. One of the reasons I even kept reading past the first few chapters, was because of something Amy Tan had said about reading other authors as a way to learn more about her own craft. To get better. That wasn't my original intent, but that is what happened. The transition between reader and writer and back to how they go together. A good friend of mine was in the film industry for many years. she worked as a film editor. I remember watching movies with her, and being slightly disturbed that she couldn't seem to watch a film without noticing the camera angles, lighting, and missed cues or slightly off sound tracks.

Last night and early today, I made the transition. After picking up Animal Dreams and reading the first few chapters, I was sure I wasn't going to like it. It seemed too full, to rich with imagery and minute details. I'd set it down, and get busy with something else, and feel myself drawn back. To keep reading. To see what was next. To see if anything ever started to 'happen'. I found myself drawn deeper and deeper into the landscape of her mind, her characters' minds and lives. Into the harsh environment and the quirky, strange people who the main character felt distanced from. I met her sense of alienation and outsideredness (I know there's no such word). I kept reading, and as I read I noticed how she explored or let her characters explore their psyches, wounds, and preconceptions and judgments. I went to sleep.

About 2 a.m., I woke with a start.   Nothing was wrong. The cats were both sound asleep, and yet I couldn't go back to sleep. Again, I was drawn to Animal Dreams. I turned on the light and read, for how long, I do not know. It was late or early as the case may be. I finally turned off the light and went back to sleep, waking at nearly 10 in the morning. After feeding the cats and making my tea, I kept on reading. Just about an hour or so ago, I finished Kingsolver's book. I feel like I've eaten a huge banquet. And what I discovered from her was the ability to weave reality into fiction in such a way as to be unselfconscious and raw. When I finished the read, I was satisfied in a very deep way, and now feel like I need more.

Oh I don't want to stay up all night every night reading. What I do want though, is that magic of getting lost in a piece of writing to the point where you wonder what the difference is between your adventure in another's life and your own? The more we get lost in the land of fiction or  some other sense of reality, we hope, I think, for something of redemption. Something we can take with us to help us forgive ourselves of our hard places, or forgive others of their lack, in our eyes. We seek wholeness, and yet what comes from reading and then writing, and then starting the cycle over, is an endless landscape that breaks off into millions of directions, without an end in sight.