Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott, On Being a Writer, and more
Coffee is ready
If something inside of you is real, we will probably find it interesting, and it will probably be universal. So, you must risk placing real emotion at the center of your work. Write straight into the emotional center of things. Write toward vulnerability. Risk being unliked. Tell the truth as you understand it. If you’re a writer, you have a moral obligation to do this. And it is a revolutionary act—truth is always subversive.” ― Anne Lamott
Friday
5/31/24
Dear Love,
What would you have me know today?
Celebrate it all, Java bean.
Marvel, there is liberation in realizing you don’t have anywhere to go. No goal to obtain. Sure, all those degrees are wonderful but not required.
Be your essence. Love. The world needs us.
If you are feeling alone, you are so not alone
Join us!
and the Letters From Love practiceTry looking at your mind as a wayward puppy that you are trying to paper train. You don't drop-kick a puppy into the neighbor's yard every time it piddles on the floor. You just keep bringing it back to the newspaper.
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
Some pre-dawn meandering thoughts. And some wandering and writerly research.
I discovered Anne Lamott over two decades ago. My first girlfriend was a brilliant historian and she told me to read LaMott’s Bird by Bird.
If you are a writer, maybe you are familiar. If not, check out a copy from the library or purchase a copy from your local bookstore indie. I highly recommend Elizabeth’s Bookstore of Akron.
Elizabethsofakronshop.com
Anne has a new book out called SOMEHOW.
Here’s a video of the writer extraordinaire herself on The Today Show:
On writing truths:
Anne Lamott: 12 truths I learned from life and writing | TED Talk
Buy her books here:
Elizabeth’s Bookshop & Writing Centre
https://www.elizabethsofakronshop.com/
For the love of books:
For some of us, books are as important as almost anything else on earth. What a miracle it is that out of these small, flat, rigid squares of paper unfolds world after world after world, worlds that sing to you, comfort and quiet or excite you. Books help us understand who we are and how we are to behave. They show us what community and friendship mean; they show us how to live and die.
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
Articles
* Bouris, Karen (January–February 2013). "Anne Lamott : life as a black-belt codependent". Interview. Spirituality & Health. 15 (6): 48–53. Archived from the original on April 20, 2016. Retrieved April 30, 2016.
Anne Lamott's Articles at Salon.com
On Perfectionism:
Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor, the enemy of the people. It will keep you cramped and insane your whole life, and it is the main obstacle between you and a shitty first draft. I think perfectionism is based on the obsessive belief that if you run carefully enough, hitting each stepping-stone just right, you won't have to die. The truth is that you will die anyway and that a lot of people who aren't even looking at their feet are going to do a whole lot better than you, and have a lot more fun while they're doing it.
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better.
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
On Writing Novels:
E.L. Doctorow said 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 on writing, or life, I have ever heard.
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
Thank you for the magical and magnificent fairies at Wikipedia:
Credit: Anne Lamott
NOVELS
* Hard Laughter. Viking Press. 1980. ISBN 0-670-36140-2.
* Rosie. Viking Press. 1983. ISBN 0-670-60828-9.
* Joe Jones. North Point Press. 1985. ISBN 0-86547-209-2.
* All New People. North Point Press. 1989. ISBN 0-86547-394-3.
* Crooked Little Heart. Pantheon Books. 1997. ISBN 0-679-43521-2.
* Blue Shoe. Riverhead Books. 2002. ISBN 1-57322-226-7.
* Imperfect Birds. Riverhead Books. 2010. ISBN 978-1-59448-751-4.
You are lucky to be one of those people who wishes to build sand castles with words, who is willing to create a place where your imagination can wander. We build this place with the sand of memories; these castles are our memories and inventiveness made tangible. So part of us believes that when the tide starts coming in, we won't really have lost anything, because actually only a symbol of it was there in the sand. Another part of us thinks we'll figure out a way to divert the ocean. This is what separates artists from ordinary people: the belief, deep in our hearts, that if we build our castles well enough, somehow the ocean won't wash them away. I think this is a wonderful kind of person to be.
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
Nonfiction
* Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year. Pantheon Books. 1993. ISBN 978-0-679-42091-0.
* Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life. Pantheon Books. 1994. ISBN 978-0-679-43520-4.
* Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith. Pantheon Books. 1999. ISBN 978-0-679-44240-0.
* Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith. Riverhead Books. 2005. ISBN 978-1-57322-299-0.
* Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith. Riverhead Books. 2007. ISBN 978-1-59448-942-6.
* Some Assembly Required: A Journal of My Son's First Son. Riverhead Books. 2012. ISBN 978-1-59448-841-2. (with Sam Lamott)
* Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers. Riverhead Books. 2012. ISBN 978-1-59463-129-0.
* Stitches: A Handbook on Meaning, Hope and Repair. Riverhead Books. 2013. ISBN 978-1-59463-258-7.
* Small Victories: Spotting Improbable Moments of Grace. Riverhead Books. 2014. ISBN 978-1-59448-629-6.
* Hallelujah Anyway: Rediscovering Mercy. Riverhead Books. 2017. ISBN 9780735213586.
* Almost Everything: Notes on Hope. Riverhead Books. 2018. ISBN 978-0525537441.
* Dusk, Night, Dawn. Riverhead Books. 2021. ISBN 978-0-593-18969-6.
* Somehow: Thoughts on Love. Riverhead Books. 2024. ISBN 978-0-593-71441-6.
And if you’ve never heard of The Marginalian,
(Created by Maria Popova!)
check this out! (A magical literary rabbit hole).
Marginalian.org
I’ll leave you with this:
“One of the gifts of being a writer is that it gives you an excuse to do things, to go places and explore. Another is that writing motivates you to look closely at life, at life as it lurches by and tramps around.”-Anne Lamott
Another book I highly recommend is:
THE ARTIST’S WAY by Julia Cameron! I discovered her over two decades ago on a bookshelf in Chicago.
Credit: YouTube
Let’s keep going, Marvels!
Love,
Oh, I almost forgot:
Credit/The New York Times
Credit: Constellations
Woof! 🐾
Let’s keep going!
Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere.
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
Because this business of becoming conscious, of being a writer, is ultimately about asking yourself, How alive am I willing to be?
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
THE SUMMER DAY
Who made the world? Who made the swan, and the black bear? Who made the grasshopper? This grasshopper, I mean— the one who has flung herself out of the grass, the one who is eating sugar out of my hand, who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down— who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes. Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face. Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away. I don't know exactly what a prayer is. I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, which is what I have been doing all day. Tell me, what else should I have done? Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon? Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?-Mary Oliver
Love Anne! ❤️