Filling the Well

by Janis Susan May/Janis Patterson

Writers are givers, and that's a problem. First of all we have the normal obligations everyone does - family, home, job, civic and religious responsibilities - all of which take time and energy. Then on top of all this we also write, which is a very draining occupation. Using nothing more than imagination (and for a lot of us, caffeine) we have to create worlds and populations and both actions and reactions in a coherent format - to say nothing of editing, spelling, selling, publicity.... etc. - and they all take from us. (I've always wondered how we can give so much of ourselves and still not lose an ounce - we should all be at least size zero...)

Let's face it, we can only give so much without getting to the point where we have nothing left. We need to re-fill our well. Nothing can be created in the vacuum of fatigue and stress. The question is how to do it, because it has to be done. Time is a problem for all of us, but this is important, both for us as writers and as individuals.

We have to find our 'safe and happy place' even if it exists only in our heads, a place where we can turn off our brains for a short time and allow the well to refill. I am arthritic, which is not much fun and most people would not consider fortunate, but through this I found my happy place. Exercise helps arthritis, but as I am large it was both painful and nearly impossible, so my rheumatologist prescribed a hot tub. As we have a large back yard it was an excellent solution, one which pleases both me and The Husband.

And it became my happy place where I turn off my brain and allow my thoughts free rein. While most writing work is done in the head, I don't allow it when I'm in the tub. I go out just about every morning when the weather is clement (and sometimes when it's not!) and just exist. Oh, I do my exercises - which I hate - but in a way they're kind of Zen. I don't have to think, I don't have to do anything but just be. And move my legs. It's almost as refreshing as a holiday. Maybe more. I sit and watch the trees, whether in bud, full leaf, or bare branch. There are birds and cheeky squirrels (though I could do without them!) and, in season, hummingbirds attracted by my myriad feeders.

Now I'm not so silly as to believe that a hot tub is right, or accessible, or possible, or even desirable to everyone. Another person's happy place might be a park bench, or a coffee shop, or an exercise session, or a short meditation, or a shopping mall, or maybe just a quiet quarter hour with a cup of coffee and a doughnut. Happy places are as individual as fingerprints, and are always limited by both availability and price, just like everything else in the world. But you have to have one. What I am calling a happy place is a sanity saver, and Heaven knows writers need all the sanity we can get!

Find your happy place and let your well refill. You and your writing will prosper from it.

Zen and the Art of Doodling

It’s First Fridays, and thus, time to get creative… with zen doodling. It’s the latest rage! Okay, it’s not such a rage. More of a low murmur. And Okay, it’s not so new. In fact, it’s as old as the hills. But I’m “down with the kids”, and this is what they’re murmuring about this week: Zen Doodles.

What, you ask, is a zen doodle? (Pretend you asked.) Basically, it’s a doodle. It’s one big, complex, massive doodle. What’s the point of a zen doodle?

1. Meditative
2. Stress release
3. A plotting tool
4. Cool art to fill the pages of your journal.

It’s meditative, because it helps you to exercise moving from constraint to freedom. The only constraint is the page on which you’re doodling. Then you slowly add constraints – an outline of my hand was my constraint in this doodle (below). Then you free up again by doodling in one portion of it, then add constraint – a curve, a flower petal, a line – big and bold within the constraint of the hand, then within that constraint, you add another layer of free-form detail. (This, by the way, is a LOT like plotting a novel.)

It’s a stress release, because it requires very little attention. I did the hand while having coffee with the LWDC (Ladies Who Drink Coffee). As we chatted, I doodled.

It’s a plotting tool. I suffer (suffer?) from Attention Deficit Disorder or A.D.D. – an ugly, pejorative term that doesn’t really describe what it is to have ADD. I prefer to think of it as Attention Diversity Dilemma. Sure, one of its less pleasant side bars is the inability to focus – on stuff that other people want you to focus! I’m perfectly chill with focusing on what I want to focus. Sometimes I need to employ strategies… like zen-doodling. I write. My mind wanders. I doodle. I strum my banjo, (always close at hand), and then I turn back to writing. I have a goal of 1,000 words per day. That’s just four pages, approximately. I can do that – in and around Attention Diversity Dilemma. Would I be more productive without A.D.D.? Maybe. Who knows, but I’m certain I would be far less creative.

Here’s a little video book trailer I put together for one of my off-road books, (another hazard of A.D.D. – going off-track genre-wise). The entire book trailer is just one big giant zen-doodle! While writing the book, I created pictures – still shots of scenes that were playing in my head – then I used my words – a free-form expression of what I hoped to incorporate into the characters, the plot, etc., into the creation of the pictures. The zen doodle is the plot! I hope you enjoy the trailer, even if the book might not be exactly your cuppa tea. (Warning: It's young adult, paranormal, not cozy.) The book I'm writing now is a sweet romantic comedy loosely based on the play, Cyrano DeBergerac, by Edmund Rostand. I'll try to post some of the zen doodles on my blog at www.sofiecouch.blogspot.com as I journal the plot... soon. 

So, the next time you sit down to coffee with friends, pick up a pen, grab a piece of paper… and zen doodle. You never know where it may lead you.