“All too often, it is audacity and not talent that moves an artist to center stage.“
Julia Cameron – The Artist’s Way
After running the Writers Mastermind for a year and a half, the biggest problem I see with struggling authors is not that they don’t have talent or that they can’t learn what it takes to be successful. It’s not believing in themselves, not giving themselves a chance to get good, and not thinking they’re worth wild success—thereby not committing fully to their creative life.
If you always put writing last, if you feel like no one takes you seriously, if you are hiding in the shadows watching others achieve the dream that you know in your heart you are capable of and are meant to live, I am in the same position as you.
That is why this year we are going to go through The Artist’s Way process by Julia Cameron. It is a 12 Week path to higher creativity. Many artists, writers, actors, and other creatives credit Julia Cameron’s method to helping them break through to become their fully realized creative selves. I am a huge fan of her work and her mission.
I’ve started The Artist’s Way process several times and never followed through. Obviously, that was my lack of commitment showing again. Also, I was trying to do it alone.
Julia Cameron generously encourages creatives to form peer-run groups for a collective process, so I’m inviting you to join our virtual circle. Going through it with a group will help others empower themselves creatively while ensuring that I don’t flake out!
How to take part?
With today’s jam-packed schedules, a 12-week crash course will be intense. Instead, we will focus on one of the 12 parts each month. That way, we can deeply invest ourselves in the process and enjoy the journey as well.
If you don’t buy the book, you can still follow along. I will send thoughts and exercises each week (and in the private Facebook group) and we will discuss what we discovered and experienced each week during the Monday Zoom meeting.
You decide your level of participation. If your short on time, just reading and meditating on the weekly thoughts will do you a world of good. If you want to go deeper, then you can complete the exercises in their entirety.
I suggest you give it all you got. Why waste one more year not living to your fullest creative potential?
The Artist’s Way – Online Group
January – Recovering a Sense of Safety
February – Recovering a Sense of Identity
March – Recovering a Sense of Power
April – Recovering a Sense of Integrity
May – Recovering a Sense of Possibility
June – Recovering a Sense of Abundance
July – Recovering a Sense of Connection
August – Recovering a Sense of Strength
September – Recovering a Sense of Compassion
October – Recovering a Sense of Self-Protection
November – Recovering a Sense of Autonomy
December – Recovering a Sens of Faith
Why is it all about “recovering?”
When we are born, we all have the fearless compulsion to create. We don’t think about why, or if anyone likes it, or if it earns money, or if it’s not as good as anyone else’s. Then, as we grow older, people, society, and responsibility stifle our enthusiasm and make our creative selves shrink inward.
In 2022, we recover that boundless, bold, and joyous sense of creativity we possessed as children. I believe once we tap into that, we become limitless and lit with a constant fire that ignites all other areas of our lives.
Note: I am not in any way affiliated with Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way, or her publisher, nor to I claim to be any kind of certified practitioner/teacher.
As stated on her website: “Anyone can teach the course or begin a cluster by following the book and the guidelines below. It is my belief that creative recovery at its best is a nonhierarchical, peer-run, collective process.
There are no ‘accredited’ Artist’s Way teachers. Avoid anyone who offers to ‘certify’ you as a teacher– there is no such thing.”
One of the most difficult parts of writing is figuring out when and where to squeeze it into our busy lives. But writing spaces are crucial, and there is a reason for this. As animals, we like to fall into the groove of routine. It makes things easier on our brains. A habit drops us into mode and eliminates the need to waste energy on making decisions.
A writing space may be a particular corner of the house, a Starbucks, or a closet. Wherever it may be, if you write there frequently, you will notice that once you get there, you are more likely to be ready to write (or ready as you’ll ever be when it comes to writing).
At this time last year, I was on my seventh month of being stuck in Florida due to COVID airport closures. I didn’t know when or if I would ever get home. This sense of waiting spilled over into my writing. Psychologically, everything was on pause. I was blocked creatively until life flowed freely again.
During that time, I began Zoom Write-Ins at the Writers’ Mastermind. Zoom Write-Ins are live meetings where writers from all over the world get together online for an hour of undistracted writing time. Afterward, we all stay for a quick chat and to trade resources and advice.
This write-in ritual gave me the routine my brain needed. When working alongside fellow writers in this virtual space, I felt motivated and inspired. These meetings have become my new “writing place.”
I know many writers struggle to carve out time to write, and the new normal is still restrictive. We wonder when or if life will get back to the way it used to be.
Claiming a writing space is an effective way to get our heads in the game, no matter how crazy the world is.
We may have to squeeze it in on the train, or in the middle of the night, or on lunch break or in a noisy household. We have to be adaptable and write wherever we can and make the most of what we got.
If we wait until conditions are perfect, we may wait forever.
It’s up to us to actively design a safe place for the muses to land and for creativity to flourish.
10 Tips to Create Your Writing Space
How can you make the most of your current situation?
What can you do to remove distractions and feel safe from interruptions?
How can you change the atmosphere or shape your environment to cue you creatively? Plants, paint colors, incense or essential oils
How can you ritualize your routine and transform whatever spot you’re in into your writing place?
Can you team up with other writers to hold yourself accountable?
Change the lighting–close the shades, brighten the lights, light a candle
Attach writing to another habit—start with the first cup of tea, after a workout, before bedtime
Cover your walls with inspiration—your favorite quotes, pictures of your writing heroes, artwork that stirs you
Cue your brain with sound—classical music, a writing playlist, or white/brown/pink noise
Wear a writing “uniform”—a favorite robe, a special pair of reading glasses, a lucky T-shirt
Where is the most unusual place you’ve written?
What is the best time and place for you to write?
What tip do you have for creating a writing space?
Have you ever asked yourself this question and truly answered it?
This is important to define for yourself, the quality of your work. The past few years have been filled with chaos, fear, and upheaval. As things normalize, it’s the perfect time to let the dust settle and get laser-like focus on why you write and how you’re going to get your words into the world.
It’s not easy to be an aspiring writer. Just tell someone you want to become a successful fiction author and their reaction will be something like:
Laughs awkwardly until they realize you’re serious.Shows concern about your mental healthSays, “Really? Uhhh… Good luck with that.”
It’s the same look adults gave you when you were six years old and you told them you wanted to grow up to be a pegasus.
That’s because writing fiction is a time and energy-intensive pursuit that never guarantees a big material reward.
As a marketing strategist for authors, I see many writers approaching their writing career with a “lottery mindset.” They scribble out a book, feverishly upload it to Amazon, and wait for overnight success.
When they don’t wake up on the bestsellers list, they give up.
This the paradox:
Only by NOT writing for money or fame will you possibly become a successful author because once you begin writing for sales, your words will lose their magic.
You must have a deeper reason than to become wealthy and famous. You need to think about who you’re writing for and how you want them to think and feel after reading your work. Either that, or writing must be so satisfying for you that it is its own reward.
Maybe you write because it’s therapeutic, allowing you to express yourself and make meaning of your experiences. Maybe you want to make people laugh and forget their worries. Maybe you just want to scare the hell out of them.
Whatever the reason, I suggest you create your own writing manifesto that states your big-picture reason for writing. Rewrite it till it’s powerful and succinct. Read it each day before you begin working on your stories. Click here for an example of how powerful a writing manifesto can be.
Not only will a writing manifesto help you on the hard days when nothing is working, keeping your mission in mind will inspire you to produce stories that will impact your readers and the world.
Being a writer today is a battle. In a world where material wealth is the marker for success, you fight against the system, you fight against the world, you fight against time, and you fight against yourself.
Your creativity is a tender sprout erupting from the cracked earth, and you must water it, feed it, and shield it from the elements. Guard it with bared teeth and a snarl, because deep inside you know that if you lose this gift of writing, you will have lived your life in a desperate, choking silence.
But you can take up arms against all the things you think you should be doing this weekend and surround yourself with knowledge and inspiration.
Here are 5 TED Talks for writers that will fill you on a mental, emotional, intuitive, and spiritual level so that you will be ready to claim your right as an artist and do your best writing yet.
Slow–mo Multi-tasking?
Do you have many writing projects going on at the same time?
Multi-tasking has a bad reputation, but Tim Harford talks about “slow- motion multi-tasking” and all the great minds who worked by this kind of system (like Einstein and Darwin).
This technique makes the most of the ebbs and flows in your thinking while cross-training your brain in other disciplines to prime it for creative breakthroughs.
Social media is as much a curse as it is a blessing.
This is one of writers’ most pressing concerns during our virtual meetings in the Writers’ Mastermind. In almost every conversation, someone has said that they would like to throw their phone or computer out the window.
Joseph Gordon Levitt has been acting since he was a child. I first became a fan of his after catching him in Mysterious Skin and Brick. He is not a writer, but he is an artist, and even though he has “made it,” he confesses that he is still susceptible to the toxic charms of social media.
Ask yourself, honestly. Are you writing for attention?
We may not even realize it when we are writing or promoting our writing that we are being quietly steered by the fickle mob or by the desire to keep up with or outdo others.
In this video, Levitt talks about how creating for attention takes us out of the flow state and makes for sub-standard art. Don’t fall into the trap!
Julie Burstein compares our creative output to the Japanese art of raku pottery in which the imperfections are treasured.
Julie talks about embracing the whole breadth of the life experience and growing from the broken places.
She also tells us not to try to control the outcome of our stories so much. At a certain point we have to let go and be open to what is coming to us beyond the confines of our usual thoughts.
Creating a nursery for wildly, creative writing spurts
How does your environment affect your writing?
What kind of people do you surround yourself with?
The mission of the Writers’ Mastermind is to create a place where a writer can surround themselves with great minds while having all the knowledge they need to make their dreams come true.
Actually, this is not a TED talk, but I had to include because it outlined so thoroughly how the Writers’ Mastermind works.
Tina Seelig talks about optimizing our creative environment using the “Innovation Engine.”
We can create the conditions to write at a level we never dreamed of by focusing on the following elements:
If you watch only one video in this post, make it this one.
I saved this for last because it will set your creative kindling on fire.
Elizabeth Gilbert talks about how historically creative people have reputations for being mentally unstable. Writers are in danger of becoming undone by their gifts. As much as we crave success, we are equally terrified by it. What if the muses don’t return?
Elizabeth explains how linking our creativity to suffering will lead to anguish. We should not accept misery as part of the deal. There is only so much we can do to invoke the mysterious and fleeting spirit of genius, but there is also an upside to this. We are not wholly responsible for things not turning out the way we’d hoped.
She tells us how to manage the emotional risk of baring our souls in our work by detaching from the ego and distancing ourselves from our writing. We must empty ourselves to be the conduit for inspiration. We must allow ourselves to slip into the flow, that hypnotic state of creativity that approaches the divine, where we get to be gods for one exquisite moment.
Bottom line, you have to be there. Keep showing up.
Here are 7 ways to have fun with your writing. Explore the reaches of your creativity and never suffer from writer’s block again.
7 habits that cultivate creativity
1. Plan artist dates
The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron is like a 12 Step program for creatively traumatized and repressed artists. Part of her plan is to book an artist date once a week with yourself. It doesn’t have to be anything to do with writing. In fact, it’s better if it isn’t related.
Go out and do something you’ve never done before. And outdoor adventure, a cooking class, a window-shopping trip, or a performance. Let your subconscious absorb and play with new sensations, experiences, and ideas.
2. Explore different genres
Writing outside of your genre can help you get out of a writing rut. Since it’s not what you’re supposed to be good at, you can detach from your expectations and feel free to experiment. Take it as far as you want to go. Get as silly, raunchy, gutsy, or gross as you can. You may be surprised to discover tools and techniques you can apply to your usual genre that you never knew existed within you.
3. Read and watch funny stuff
When was the last time you laughed out loud? I’m talking about unbridled laughter with your belly burning and tears streaming down your cheeks. Laughter is not only good for the soul, but it’s also great for creativity and productivity too. A sense of play is the key to high performance. When we turn writing into a game, it becomes fun instead of tedious. It’s soil for new ideas. We tend to be less critical and balky and more receptive and innovative. Get stupid, really stupid. Let loose and then go back to your work. See if you shook something loose.
4. Process, not outcome
If we’re perpetually focused on the end result, all the steps between us and our goals will seem overwhelming, if not impossible. Don’t obsess over the four novels you want to write or the twenty short stories you want to publish or the agent you need to win over, or the readership you need to build to get to the bestsellers list. What’s the next small step you can take today? How can you enjoy that step?
5. Invest in others
Self-centeredness makes our struggles seem bigger. Once good way to flip your switch from worry-mode is to shift your attention to others. Who is doing some great writing? What have your friends been working on? How can you support another struggling writer? Share someone’s book with your following. Post encouraging comments on other writers’ social media. Leave a thoughtful review for a book you really admired.
6. Give yourself permission
How often do you allow yourself to have fun creatively? Is it all word counts and structure? Performing personality analyses of your characters? Is it striving for perfection and not accepting anything less from yourself than the next Pulitzer Prize winner?
Remember, again, when you were a kid hanging out with your imaginary friends. Get back to creating for the sake of creating. Relax and let your intuition take over. Genius is birthed serendipitously. Let go of what you think you should do and just be a curious child open to the possibilities.
7. Chat with other writers and creatives
I used to think I was anti-social, but it turns out, I just wasn’t inspired by the people I was around—a default combination acquaintances, spouse’s friends, and people from work. They were wonderful people, but not creative people. That is why I founded the Writers’ Mastermind. I formed my own coven of writers where we have amazing discussions that light us up. Our meetings create a synergy that inspires, comforts, and informs our lives and our writing.
Do you have a circle of writing friends? Is there a local writing group you could join? If not, create one, or join on online community like The Writers’ Mastermind. There is nothing more fun and restorative to your creativity than having conversations that matter with people who care about writing as much as you do.
