Something Other Than Writing/Anyone Can Play Guitar

Spring speaks to certain sense of rebirth—at least in places like Maine where inhabitants are forced to endure the bleakness that inevitably comes during winter. When life gets reduced to finding a way forward post-tragedy, then any extension of hope can serve as a stand-in for a talisman.

Writing as a central element dates back to 2002 for me. That’s when, in a job that I hated, I latched onto cultivating my craft as a writer. I wanted to become a writer and I was willing to put the work in.

After Mark was killed, writing was all I had to sort through the randomness and pain that a tragic death like his delivers to the father left behind. I initiated the process of using narrative as a tool to find a few shards of meaning from the randomness of what I’d been dealt.

For two years I’ve written and rearranged words in an effort to craft a story centered in grief and loss. I recognize that none of it provided much solace for the emotional agony I’ve been feeling. In fact, like has happened countless times over the past 17 years of writing, editorial arbiters either ignored my writing, or sent back notes that served as the publishing world’s version of the “thanks but no thanks” notice of rejection. Continue reading

Positively Podcasting

Are you into podcasts? I know a lot of people are.

I worked on an article this week that I was assigned by the editor at the auto trade magazine I’ve been writing for since 2015. She wanted me to gather some podcasts for their end-of-the-year “best of” issue.

Mark was a big fan of podcasts. When he’d email me from the road last fall and winter, he regularly shared something he learned from one of the rotating podcasts he was listening to. Sometimes he’d tell me about a topic covered by Rich Roll, one of his favorites. Do you remember on Day 009 how excited he was when Roll tweeted about him? He also liked Malcolm Gladwell’s  Revisionist History. Because of his enthusiasm for these podcasts, I started listening.

Over the past year, I’ve gotten out of the habit of listening to Roll and Gladwell. The past few days, I immersed myself in the world filled with innumerable people broadcasting and streaming outstanding and maybe more important to me—uplifting content. I don’t want to let the “cat out of the bag” in terms of my future article, but I will share a few things I learned by simply taking time to fill-up with something more positive than the latest angry tweets from our president.

I’ve been a fan of Gladwell’s for a long time. He’s such an outstanding writer. I fell in love with his writing after reading several of his long-form pieces he wrote for The New Yorker. He had a talent for taking a topic that you thought you knew something about and turning it on its head. I then read The Tipping Point, How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. I still can’t believe that book is more than 15-years-old. Continue reading

Making Time to Slow Down

My mother, Saint Helen of Immaculata, had a saying that I heard ad infinitum growing up—that saying was, “haste makes waste.” I’m not sure where she picked that one up and I’m guessing it wasn’t one I imagined I’d come back to—but I did, especially after acquiring some life experience.

Quality takes time. There are other idioms like, “anything worth doing is worth doing well.” I remember that one being part of St. Helen’s repertoire, also.

I’m finding that the things that have acquired staying power in my own life are things that haven’t happened overnight. Writing, health awareness, cultivating skills that never go out of season, these things take time.

I’ve written about Malcolm Gladwell and his 10,000 hour rule. It’s about putting the time in and recognizing there’s a commitment to the long haul.

Unfortunately, much of our culture runs contrary to that. We want fast. We demand convenience. We’re impatient when we don’t win $1,000,000.00 in the lottery.

Success sometimes runs contrary to convenience.

Success sometimes runs contrary to convenience.

Continue reading

Learn from the past

Einstein receives attribution for the maxim that “doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results” is one definition of insanity. If Einstein’s true, and his body of work supports his veracity, then a good many people are just plain bonkers.

Over and over again humans choose paths leading to dead-ends. Even when given a second (and a third and a fourth…) chance, they regularly choose futility.

When I began writing, I was forced to fake it ‘til I made it. Without clips, clients, or any kind of substantial work, I learned to bluff my way forward. I ended up getting work, some of it offering valuable experience to someone finding his way as a freelancer. Continue reading