Getting Ready for the New Year

The last few years, I haven't taken the time to 'prepare' for the new year by writing down important goals and setting intentions. I've been wandering through a forest wondering where the path is hidden.

If you've never done a Wheel of Life, it's a fun project, can be as detailed as you'd like, and redirects the path to success. As a former life management coach, I used this with clients at the end of each year.

Here is a quick overview:

Draw a circle

Next, draw 'wedges' in the circle for each area of your life: (ex. health, personal growth, family/friends, career, creative endeavors, art/writing, spirituality, recreation, home, relationship -- add or delete what suits your life)

Begin anyplace on the circle: Ask yourself three questions:

1) On a scale of 1 to 10 where am I now? ('10' being perfect '0' not so much) Write down your answer
2) Where would I like to be?

3) What will it take to get from where I am to where I want to be? List out your ideas.

Go back to the circle and mark two lines in the wedge you're working on for the answers to question 1 and 2 (the center of the circle is '0' and '10 is the outer rim)


Here is an example:

WEDGE: Health  

Where am I now?: 5  

Where would I like to be? 10  

What will it take for me to get to 10?

a) 30 minute walk daily
b) yoga class twice a week
 c) stock the fridge with fresh fruit and veggies so I'm not tempted to eat junk food
d) no snacks after 7 p.m.

 The more detailed you are, the more likely you will be successful.

  It took me about an hour to complete my wedge. I tightened things up a bit and put them in a special notebook so that I can review my actions.

  Good luck!!!

Scars...

I've gotten comments from friends that they can't leave comments on my other blog, cindyluck.blogspot.com, so I'm hoping you can leave some here. The other blog is dedicated to my writing life and there are prompts there, so if you'd like to use them feel freee :-)


This morning when I wrote my morning pages, I wrote about 'scars' -- something I plucked from my inspiration box which brims full of possibility for spur-of-the-moment surprise ideas to write about.

Here's what I came up with. It's not the scars that leave visible marks on our knees or chests, breasts, or hands that haunt us as much as the ones we can't see -- the lies we've been told, the deception or humiliation we've experienced, words that cut deep into our hearts, lost loves we won't see or speak with again, words left unsaid and more.

Whether or not you are a writer, we all have something to say about our own scars...

writing writing writing --I've moved

I've not been very good at posting on this blog -- because I've been posting prompts and goodies about my writing life on cindyluck.blogspot.com

Come check it out. Frankly it gets pretty lonely there ... won't you drop in for a visit?

Thanks!

Book in a Week

I finished my class, Book in a Week last week. The class was amazing.

I set an unrealistic goal of reaching 50,000 words, but life happens and there were a couple of things that I didn't want to give up like spending time with my grand children, taking them to yoga class, going to my own yoga class--those sorts of important things. Speaking of yoga, by the end of the writing week, my left arm felt the pinch of too much computer work and too few breaks. My yoga teacher, Mary Smith, at the Danville Yoga Center worked with me during class, and when I left, and for the first time in a week, I was pain free. Pain free! Yoga is amazing.

Okay, back to the class. I wrote a total of 26,000+ words--a little more than half my goal. I felt I let myself down, but 26,000 words was more than I most probably would have done if I hadn't taken the class.

Here's what I learned about myself as a writer:

~I love to procrastinate. However, if I completed my day's work knowing where I planned on beginning the next day, I found my way to the page much quicker. Otherwise it was to Starbucks for coffee, a load of laundry, a telephone call, answering emails, you know what I mean?

~Once I start writing, I don't like to stop, hence the sore arm. So, I needed to have a stern talk with my stubborn self.

~The best laid plans as they say--I had my plot figured out and by golly my characters wanted little, if anything to do with it.

~When I get out of my own way, my work is much more successful.

~A collage of pictures for the characters in my book was incredibly helpful. When I could see faces, I slipped into their heads easily.

~I am my own worst enemy! I suppose most of us are.

~Pay attention to synchronicity events--it led me where I needed to go!

The class and support from the group, not to mention April, was just as good as having your own personal coach giving a gentle nudge when needed!

April will be holding another class in early June. Here's how to contact her:
aprilkihlstrom@yahoo.com

Write a Book in a Week, are you kidding???

Two weeks ago I began an online writing class called Book in a Week. I heard the instructor, April Kihlstrom (www.aprilkihlstrom.com) speak four years ago at the East of Eden Writing Conference in Salinas.

A book in a week? Come on now! I've been working on Nineteen Darby Way for four, yes as much as I don't want to admit it, it's been four years. (My husband says it's taken me longer to write my book than it did to write the bible, but that's another story--not the bible--the comment).

We're just finishing up week two and then we have one more week of preparation before beginning to our week of writing. And, I'm procrastinating by writing on my blog instead of figuring out the flaws my characters have. I figure, if I gave each character one or two of my own flaws, they'll be all set and maybe, just maybe they'll teach me something, like how to rid myself of them.

We'll see, first I have to get to writing.

If you've thought of writing a book, I can't recommend April's class enough. She's written seventeen books, is so informative, answers all emails with suggestions and new ideas, and has the whole class developing characters, plotting, using post cards, and making collages. We're all making progress.

Check her out, again her web site is www.aprilkihlstrom.com

Poor me

I've been so busy posting on my new blog, cindyluck.blogspot.com, that I almost forgot about my old buddy, scribblescrabble! The place where I got my experience, sort of like the entry-level position at a factory, Macy's stockroom, or K-Mart, when you were sixteen and owned the world.

Speaking of entry level positions, reinventing myself as a novelist is proving to be quite a challenge. Trying to hold my heavy head high after receiving what I consider more than my fair share of rejections for my novel, Nineteen Darby Way, has not easy, nor fun, and it's humbling. At first I said, "well, now I'm that much closer to a 'yes'" but I don't think I even fooled myself with that one.

So I gave my baby to a woman who is very 'literary' and am waiting for her opinion, a decision made after rewriting the first four chapters in another tense and person. I hoped maybe that would work, but after chapter four it didn't and it was time consuming and frustrating. It was a dreadful experience.

This book, my baby, may be the book that finds its' way under the bed until I reach the best seller list (tee hee) with the next book--then I can dust it off and everyone will be clamoring for it, right? right? well, maybe?

Anyway, I've heard that every writer has at least one, two, or possibly three unpublished babies...maybe Nineteen Darby Way will be mine. But the fight is not over yet!

Lounging...

Oh dear, this could be dangerous, this downloading pictures trick I now know how to do--sort of (I can't figure out how to see the pictures before I download them, so this one was snapped before our backyard remodel).

Anyway, here's Jake lounging in the backyard...which is where he'd probably like to be right now -- but it's cold and rainy today. I don't want him outside laying on the cold ground or on the flagstone because at his age (ten and counting) I worry about his hips.

As with most larger breeds (Jake is part Golden Retriever and part Grand Pyrenees) hip 'challenges' are always a concern and we want and try to keep those challenges to a minimum. So enjoy the picture of our peaceful baby taken a few years ago! It's easy to see why he's so special isn't it?

I know I know--beauty is in the eye of the beholder and although his head is too big for his body (and actually his tail looks a foot too long is this picture) and he doesn't have "golden retriever" ears, he's still the best, most handsome dog I've ever seen. What I need to do is take a close-up of his soulful brown eyes, then you'll understand!