Ohmygosh. I want to do this. I started a group to do the Artist's Way, but it never got off the ground. I also never read the book past the first week because I met with the same resistance even though she stated that it needn't be a religious thing.
I'm in a similar place in life. I have seemingly unending health issues cropping up that are both rare and incurable (not to mention frustrating). My husband is significantly older and wants to retire. I can't work, but haven't applied for disability. I don't know what I'll do without his medical insurance. Eek.
I've always been a writer and storyteller, but I've been stuck and blocked lately. I need to do something.
I too have experienced a few chapters of The Artists Way in the group and did morning pages for what seem like a year maybe...and since I have on and off written daily in my sketchbook journal. The spiritual connection always kept me at arm's length and a bit skeptical. I love to write...fine it soothing and yet stimulating...I love to jump on the platform so to speak! I have played with the writing of a book....seriously considered it...and there it lay. A heap of thoughts. I would enjoying engaging in this companion buddy reading of The Artists Way again....but the timing is just not good for me. The next six weeks are busy with preparing for a big show and open studio event....I will read the weekly postings and reflections on the group's journey. Maybe there will be another opportunity later. Meanwhile, I've ordered the book and I can tag along through your experiences and writing. I so much enjoyed reading your Stack writing. Thank you.
I read your post Amy late at night and felt immediately the urge to read this book. Now, sitting here on a rainy and very windy day, reading the words and can’t believe how it speaks to me. I love the idea of writing 3 morning pages.
I wrote until I became a mother by the age of 35. Now I am close to retire and my fingers tickle but I don’t know how to find my way back on paper and words. I started last year the weekly illustrations but before summer ended I stopped and since then I cannot go back to my routine. As you and Julia say ‘start now and don’t look back’. I guess I must learn to accept that a gap is not something to overcome. It just continues somehow.
I am living in Switzerland and would love to connect with all of you. Whether it will be on Substack chat, posting comments about the book or about our review about the book by chapters. Thank you for bringing this up. -Marion
Amy, what ideal timing! Within my current 100-day project (writing about right brain planning) I am uncovering a desire to write with more clarity [succinctly].
Julia Cameron and Natalie Goldberg are favorites for me. Goldberg's book, Living Color, unlocked a new level of understanding my own creative practice. She offers insight regarding how "letting something larger take over" enabled her to step out of the way and "let painting do painting."
Amy, I would like to read along! I have this book but haven’t read it beyond the first chapter. This fits well with some projects I am currently trying.
The last few days I have been contemplating if I should join. I read the Artist's Way and did morning pages in the past for quite a while and at the start of the year I considered starting again but I didn't. I also have been thinking about starting a blog of some kind (I had one a long time ago)but I didn't. I have the book Write for Life but I haven't read it yet. So, after a lot of thinking about why I would join, how I can fit it in my schedule and commit to it, I decided that I would like to read along. I couldn't let pass this great opportunity to discuss the book and the process with others. Thank you Amy.
I have experienced great results working through The Artists Way & a few of Cameron’s other books & im looking forward to working through this book with a group. Thanks for putting this idea out there Amy!
Dear Amy, there's a lot to unpack in your post. Let me start with “The Artist’s Way." The interesting thing about that book is that Cameron applies it to a 12 step program.
However, I didn't start writing daily exercises because of that book. As I describe in my Substack newsletter (https://frangardner.substack.com/p/welcome-to-the-first-edition), many years ago I read in Janet Burroway’s “Writing Fiction,” a description of a practice:
"Dorothea Brande suggests that the way to begin is not with an idea or a form at all, but with an unlocking of your thoughts at the typewriter. She advises that you rise each day and go directly to your desk (if you have to have coffee, put it in a thermos the night before) and begin writing whatever comes to mind, before you are quite awake, before you have read anything or talked to anyone, before reason has begun to take over from the dream-functioning of your brain. Write for twenty or thirty minutes, then put away what you have written without reading it over. After a week or two of this, pick an additional time during the day when you can salvage a half hour or so to write, and when that time arrives, write, even if you 'must climb out over the hands of your friends' to do it. It doesn’t matter what you write: what does matter is that you develop the habit of beginning to write the moment you sit down to to do so.”
I did this religiously when I was writing and editing at The Oregonian. It helped my writing then and informs it today. The practice is invaluable no matter where you get the inspiration.
Julia Cameron merely refined the process.
I would like your timeline, please.
There’s so much more to say on this, but how much time do you have to read comments?
I hope this doesn't repeat the long comment I left yesterday, but I don't see it here.
I wrote that I have been doing morning exercises since maybe 1996. This precedes Julia Cameron by at least a decade. I read about the process in Janet Burroway’s “Writing Fiction,” where she quotes the writer Dorothea Brande about getting up every morning, going to the typewriter and writing for maybe 20 minutes. That seems like a good idea and I’ve done it intermittently ever since.
Because of the MS, I type rather than do longhand.
It changed my life.
Plus, it really helped my writing at the Oregonian, and it has made it very easy for me to keep up my Substack writing.
As for Cameron’s book, she took that practice and pasted it into a 12 step program, which I found very interesting. But it wasn’t original with her.
Ohmygosh. I want to do this. I started a group to do the Artist's Way, but it never got off the ground. I also never read the book past the first week because I met with the same resistance even though she stated that it needn't be a religious thing.
I'm in a similar place in life. I have seemingly unending health issues cropping up that are both rare and incurable (not to mention frustrating). My husband is significantly older and wants to retire. I can't work, but haven't applied for disability. I don't know what I'll do without his medical insurance. Eek.
I've always been a writer and storyteller, but I've been stuck and blocked lately. I need to do something.
I too have experienced a few chapters of The Artists Way in the group and did morning pages for what seem like a year maybe...and since I have on and off written daily in my sketchbook journal. The spiritual connection always kept me at arm's length and a bit skeptical. I love to write...fine it soothing and yet stimulating...I love to jump on the platform so to speak! I have played with the writing of a book....seriously considered it...and there it lay. A heap of thoughts. I would enjoying engaging in this companion buddy reading of The Artists Way again....but the timing is just not good for me. The next six weeks are busy with preparing for a big show and open studio event....I will read the weekly postings and reflections on the group's journey. Maybe there will be another opportunity later. Meanwhile, I've ordered the book and I can tag along through your experiences and writing. I so much enjoyed reading your Stack writing. Thank you.
I read your post Amy late at night and felt immediately the urge to read this book. Now, sitting here on a rainy and very windy day, reading the words and can’t believe how it speaks to me. I love the idea of writing 3 morning pages.
I wrote until I became a mother by the age of 35. Now I am close to retire and my fingers tickle but I don’t know how to find my way back on paper and words. I started last year the weekly illustrations but before summer ended I stopped and since then I cannot go back to my routine. As you and Julia say ‘start now and don’t look back’. I guess I must learn to accept that a gap is not something to overcome. It just continues somehow.
I am living in Switzerland and would love to connect with all of you. Whether it will be on Substack chat, posting comments about the book or about our review about the book by chapters. Thank you for bringing this up. -Marion
Amy, what ideal timing! Within my current 100-day project (writing about right brain planning) I am uncovering a desire to write with more clarity [succinctly].
Julia Cameron and Natalie Goldberg are favorites for me. Goldberg's book, Living Color, unlocked a new level of understanding my own creative practice. She offers insight regarding how "letting something larger take over" enabled her to step out of the way and "let painting do painting."
Amy, I would like to read along! I have this book but haven’t read it beyond the first chapter. This fits well with some projects I am currently trying.
Hi Amy,
The last few days I have been contemplating if I should join. I read the Artist's Way and did morning pages in the past for quite a while and at the start of the year I considered starting again but I didn't. I also have been thinking about starting a blog of some kind (I had one a long time ago)but I didn't. I have the book Write for Life but I haven't read it yet. So, after a lot of thinking about why I would join, how I can fit it in my schedule and commit to it, I decided that I would like to read along. I couldn't let pass this great opportunity to discuss the book and the process with others. Thank you Amy.
I have experienced great results working through The Artists Way & a few of Cameron’s other books & im looking forward to working through this book with a group. Thanks for putting this idea out there Amy!
Dear Amy, there's a lot to unpack in your post. Let me start with “The Artist’s Way." The interesting thing about that book is that Cameron applies it to a 12 step program.
However, I didn't start writing daily exercises because of that book. As I describe in my Substack newsletter (https://frangardner.substack.com/p/welcome-to-the-first-edition), many years ago I read in Janet Burroway’s “Writing Fiction,” a description of a practice:
"Dorothea Brande suggests that the way to begin is not with an idea or a form at all, but with an unlocking of your thoughts at the typewriter. She advises that you rise each day and go directly to your desk (if you have to have coffee, put it in a thermos the night before) and begin writing whatever comes to mind, before you are quite awake, before you have read anything or talked to anyone, before reason has begun to take over from the dream-functioning of your brain. Write for twenty or thirty minutes, then put away what you have written without reading it over. After a week or two of this, pick an additional time during the day when you can salvage a half hour or so to write, and when that time arrives, write, even if you 'must climb out over the hands of your friends' to do it. It doesn’t matter what you write: what does matter is that you develop the habit of beginning to write the moment you sit down to to do so.”
I did this religiously when I was writing and editing at The Oregonian. It helped my writing then and informs it today. The practice is invaluable no matter where you get the inspiration.
Julia Cameron merely refined the process.
I would like your timeline, please.
There’s so much more to say on this, but how much time do you have to read comments?
Dear Amy,
I hope this doesn't repeat the long comment I left yesterday, but I don't see it here.
I wrote that I have been doing morning exercises since maybe 1996. This precedes Julia Cameron by at least a decade. I read about the process in Janet Burroway’s “Writing Fiction,” where she quotes the writer Dorothea Brande about getting up every morning, going to the typewriter and writing for maybe 20 minutes. That seems like a good idea and I’ve done it intermittently ever since.
Because of the MS, I type rather than do longhand.
It changed my life.
Plus, it really helped my writing at the Oregonian, and it has made it very easy for me to keep up my Substack writing.
As for Cameron’s book, she took that practice and pasted it into a 12 step program, which I found very interesting. But it wasn’t original with her.