The magic of writing

"... I still encourage anyone who feels at all compelled to write to do so. I just try to warn people who hope to get published that publication is not all that it is cracked up to be. But writing is. Writing has so much to give, so much to teach, so many surprises. That thing you had to force yourself to do-- the actual act of writing-- turns out to be the best part. Its like discovering that while you thought you needed the tea ceremony for the caffeine, what you really needed was the tea ceremony. The act of writing turns out to be its own reward...

Ever since I was a little kid, I've thought that there was something noble and mysterious about writing, about the people who could do it well, who could create a world as if they were little gods or sorcerers. All my life I've felt that there was something magical about people who could get into other people's minds and skin, who could take people like me out of ourselves and then take us back to ourselves. And you know what? I still do." -Anne Lamott in her book Bird by Bird.

I did not feel the same way when I was a kid, only because the books I read that I loved so much made it all seem so easy. The authors of the books were so good at what they did, that they made the writing of it seem effortless. Now that I'm "all grown up", and have attempted creating various pieces of writing myself- whether it be articles, poems, song lyrics or fiction, - I have a HUGE appreciation for writers, for good writers. I admire what they do, how easy they make it seem, and yes, I agree, the ARE magical

You don't have to write about EVERYTHING or have it all figured out before you write...

"...one-inch picture frame that I put on my desk to remind me of short assignments.... It reminds me that all I have to do is write down as much as I can see through a one-inch picture frame."

"E. L. Doctorow once said that 'writing a novel is like driving a car at night. You can see only as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.' You don't have to see where you're going, you don't have to see your destination or everything you will pass along the way. You just have to see two or three feet ahead of you. This is right up there with the best advice about writing, or life, I have ever heard.... "

"...thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he'd had three months to write, which was due the next day. ...he was at the kitchen table close to tears,... Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother's shoulder, and said, 'Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.' "- Anne Lamott

Why writing?

"Writing can be a pretty desperate endeavor, because it is about some of our deepest needs: our need to be visible, to be heard, our need to make sense of our lives, to wake up and grow and belong. ..." - Anne Lamott in Bird by Bird

"I have become better at writing than living...

On the page, I'm perfectly charming, but that's just a trick I learned.

It has nothing to do with me. At least, that's what I was thinking as

the mail boat came toward the pier. I had a cowardly impulse

to throw my red cape overboard and pretend I was someone else."

- character Juliet

in The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society