When life gets very busy and we fall into habits of distraction and reaction, it’s important to approach flightiness and unfocused energy with deliberate and kind attention. Why? Because we become what we do. And we lose our perspective — that part of us that imagines and executes brilliant things — when we simply react […]
It’s a warm spring day here in Northern California, with wild poppies, purple lupine and cultivated daffodils blanketing hillsides and yards and roadside medians with pops of gorgeous color. After months underground, the flowers are everywhere – unapologetically vibrant. Unapologetically alive! Today, I invite you to consider your writing life in this fresh light […]
Why do you burn to write? Here’s what Swiss philosopher, Henri F. Amiel, has to say on the subject: “It is by teaching that we teach ourselves, by relating that we observe, by affirming that we examine, by showing that we look, by writing that we think, by pumping that we draw water into the […]
This image is one of the few I took when I flew back home to DC and Maryland recently. c. 2015 Marla Beck It’s haunted me a bit, since I took it. Every time I gaze at the bird and the hotel in the background, I feel more alive and awake. Here’s why. 1. Seeing […]
Ready to begin your next writing project? Congratulations! Let’s make sure you’re pursuing the best writing project for you, so you can avoid the malaise and burnout that can happen when you forget to honor all of who you are. Watch below to learn a new kind of decision-making for your writing career: Remember: when […]
It’s been a very exciting few weeks here. In the past three weeks, writers from across the U.S. have been telling me how coaching is helping them move their writing projects forward. I’m so excited for them! – One writer drafted her most recent book in record time. – Another writer is this close to […]
It was a cold D.C. morning, March 1993. “Look a’ her! “Takin’ a pitcher o’ that ol’ broom…” I’d framed the shot carefully, and as I clicked the shutter, two street guys slowly trudged by. “Uhn-huh,” said his friend, shaking his head. I looked up. Although I’d been delighted by the moment, happily documenting […]
Don’t let it fool you, dear writer. That unfinished novel may look like an innocent, overstuffed file in your desk drawer, but you and I know better: the manuscript you’ve been avoiding or putting off for months (or years) can be downright dangerous. Why? Unfinished novels sap your creative energy. Everything unfinished in a writer’s […]
[You might want to read “six long years” for some backstory…] When I looked up from my guitar last night, at one point I knew we were rocking the house. Why? Because wide-eyed pre-teen and a frail grandmother sat smiling at separate tables, bobbing their heads in time to the music. Felt great. But […]
