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The Freedom of a Personal Writing Practice

In my classes and my personal life, I love writing by hand. While plenty of studies show the value of writing by hand, I also understand the appeal of the efficiency of writing digitally. It feels a little rebellious and very creative to step away from every act being geared toward the profitability drive that capitalism has imposed on all areas of our life. Doodling in margins of gorgeous journals, choosing between favorite pens and pencils, and lingering in the physical sensation of writing by hand grounds me. 

Whatever you call it, let’s go with simply “writing,” and however you do it, – pen and paper or digitally – a personal writing practice works wonders for everyone. It’s a transformative experience no matter what your approach – simply enjoying the process or strengthening your writing skills for projects you’d like to publish, or as a creative outlet to support other endeavors. The powerful effects of stream-of-consciousness, full-on rambling, blathering and unrelated tangents are always amazing. 

Unlike everyday life, where we edit and tweak for politeness, strategic efficiency, space limits and business rules, in a personal writing practice there is the freedom of having no concern for spelling, grammar or transitions to new topics. There’s room for messy ranting, swearing, whining and weeping. It’s also great for boasting, gloating, dreaming big and planning to make the dreams a reality. (Note: you can’t whine too long on paper or you naturally begin to bore yourself and write about possible solutions.)

With the nearly constant bombardment of demands in life and messages and information in our digital world, a few minutes on the page gives you quality time with your own mind and feelings. The conversation with yourself gives you the opportunity to be a patient, listening friend to yourself. It connects you, to you – the most important relationship you’ll ever have, and the one that makes you better at relating to others.

Sometimes writing is a prayer, a meditation, or a negotiation with yourself. Having a little existential crisis? The best place to find yourself is on the page. There’s no better place to work out ideas – safe from critics, doubters and haters.

Putting pen to paper is stepping up and saying yes to the big “I am. I exist.” It’s claiming yourself, your life, your thoughts, your feelings, your power and purpose. It’s more than the very adult sounding “taking responsibility for your life” – it’s an act of radical self-care to honor yourself with the time and effort to really get to know yourself. It’s bravely stepping around our culture’s limiting idea of only some people qualifying for the joy of being a writer or artist, and relegating the rest of humanity to only observing and admiring.

As the pen moves across the page, the topics may range from the mundane to the esoteric. The physical act of writing shifts energy from ruminating thoughts looping over and over to details, emotions, facts, possibilities – words on paper, now more tangible for contemplation and motivation.

I’ve found a positive side effect of a consistent writing practice is better conversations. When I’m not writing regularly, I chit chat more about trivial things, and sometimes feel I’ve wasted opportunities for more meaningful conversations simply because my head isn’t as clear and focused. For me, daily writing gets the negative and petty stuff on the page instead of spreading it around to the people in my life.

After 27 years, I’ve wondered at times if people still need a writing class like mine – especially now with so much of our life being shared on social media. But every time I reach a point where I start to believe that my classes are less relevant, something usually happens that reminds me of the amazing effect of writing in my own life and in my students’ lives. I’ve had former students send me songs that began as a writing exercise in class, email me later to tell me about very real and life-changing epiphanies they had during class or their writing practice that began there… these stories happen often enough that I am steered back to scheduling new classes.

The real beauty, value and purpose of writing, and any art form, is not the final product or the reader’s response. It’s not the branding or the number of readers or attendees or web hits or units sold. It’s the joy of the actual act, even when it feels messy, and the transformation of the writer from the experience. And art will transform you – writing regularly will change your life. That’s why we procrastinate or rush to it, often simultaneously – it’s scary and exciting and shines the light on what we already know: that we must keep evolving. Rapid evolution and radical self-care are really what we all need and what the world needs from us.

To learn more about my classes and coaching please visit PenPaperMagic.com.

The Melodramatic Tree

On a rural road in Southeastern Wisconsin, the Melodramatic Tree sits in front of an idyllic setting of farmland: freshly plowed and planted fields, houses, barns and silos nearby and on the horizon. But the Melodramatic Tree looks burnt black, as if it caught fire, but was put out before it was demolished. And, now, it is forever frozen in a sprawling, gasping reach to the sides and above. The contrast is stark against the reds, greens and blues of nature behind it.

The tree seems to be overreacting to something, and really, who isn’t? Or are we reacting appropriately? It certainly seems justified to splay and sprawl our limbs in outrage over the current state of our world, politics, the economy, the climate or many other issues.

It’s an appropriate response to a wacky, wacky world.

Sometimes the Melodramatic Tree is me. My mind hopping like a skipped stone making ripples, leaving them behind to move onto the next thing.

Sometimes I tease, “What happened to you, emo tree?” And on gorgeous days, I’ll think, “Oh, simmer down, Mel!”

The stories and details have spun in my head and on calls with friends. The nickname is Mel. It is not the giving tree which it calls it the passive aggressive codependent shaming tree. (Yep, I said it.)

I’ve incorporated “Don’t be a Melodramatic Tree about it!” into self-talk and jokes with friends. As in, “Am I being a melodramatic tree about this, and maybe it really isn’t a big deal?”

Maybe the tree is perfectly fine and happy. I’m reminded of Hanna Waddingham’s trick to get over performance anxiety. Before going on stage she makes herself really big – arms and legs spread wide with fingers reaching out, and her face in a big growl. And I notice how big, strong, powerful, and defiant the tree is, and remember it takes courage to take up space. And I say, “Thanks for the encouragement, I’ll stand strong today, too.”

It feels like the Melodramatic tree has more to say. And if not, that’s okay, too. But most days I don’t think the tree is being melodramatic. Most days I drive by and just appreciate the tree and mumble, “Same, tree. Same.”

My Ancestors

“Writing with the Ancestors” (SomaticWriting.com) was the perfect class for me in January. It is a tough month because my mother and sister have passed, and both of their birthdays are in January. My mother passed away in January, and my birthday is in January. 

Also, I’ve had family on my mind because my great-niece is having a baby this summer. Since this is the first child born since my mother has passed, I felt the pressure to do something matriarchal. In my family, that usually meant something crocheted as my mother was an avid crocheter. Thankfully the baby will inherit other baby blankets because my crochet skills are very slow. A blanket would not be done by the time the baby gets here, or, frankly, gets to college.

The idea though, that immediate matriarchal feeling, left me awash in thoughts of family and ancestors and what we give each other – materially and otherwise. And, how I’m someone else’s ancestor and what will I leave for them?  

Continue reading “My Ancestors” →

New Year’s Eve Memories

Raoul was my dentist, but also instantly become my friend at my first appointment when he said, “I love your writing.” As a local columnist known to be a feminist activist, it was not something I heard a lot from men in Charleston, South Carolina in the late 90s. What a surprise to find a dentist who took the role of arts patron to the next level and had fun doing it. Raoul supported the arts by attending art events, but also by constantly promoting the arts as part of his daily routine. He never spent money on advertising for his dental practice. Instead he invested in a killer sound system and an incredible collection of independent music and jazz. His office’s walls were a revolving art gallery for local artists. While playing fabulous music he relayed the details of the artists’ bios and ticket info for upcoming shows of musicians and actors while pulling teeth and filling cavities.

I always think of him on New Year’s Eve and rowdy nights he would have loved – the whole city partying and fun people joining and leaving our party. It’s been years since he died in a car wreck. And, even though I knew him in another city, I miss him in the odd way that, in other years, would lead me to forget for a buzzed moment he’s gone, and I would expect him to burst in to join the party.

“Raoul is cool,” was the recommendation from my intern at the film production company where I worked. But cool had no value to me when talking about dentists. I was looking for gentle and generous with N2O to get me through some dental challenges. Raoul was that, too. He’d crank up the gas, take my music request and close the door, leaving me alone to chill. The patient rooms were cozy and private in a gorgeous 1800s house in downtown Charleston. He’d come back a few minutes later and say in a goofy, announcer-like voice, “You know that Dean. The only kind of pain she likes is champagne.” If I laughed, I was “under” enough for him to work. He always gave me champagne for my birthday.

In spite of how cool Raoul was, I still wasn’t the best patient. Between my having no tolerance for pain, being really claustrophobic, and going through an angst-ridden-writer phase, I was amazed our friendship survived our patient/dentist experiences. At one particularly grumpy appointment he told me his plans for a fun afternoon. I rolled my eyes at his schedule – he didn’t work on Wednesday afternoons and took off Fridays. I said with obvious jealousy, “Nice life.” He said quietly and kindly, “Yep, I made it that way. That’s the cool thing about your life.  You get to do whatever you want to with it.”

His statement was a gentle nudge, just when I needed it. And I appreciated that he knew me well enough to tell me in a way I could truly hear it. Another kind act he did was to always leave me a voice mail rambling about what he loved about my new column every month. I admired his marvelous attention to the joyful details of life: beautiful art, great music, wonderful conversation, and always looking for a way to make a party just a little better.

On New Year’s Eve 1999 in Charleston, a group of friends gathered at his office for champagne before walking with flasks in our pockets and purses to the harbor to see the fireworks. The pineapple drop (the S.C. symbol of friendship) was beside a parking lot, almost a block from the water with police tape keeping the crowd a safe distance from the water’s edge. Our group stood against the tape, wanting to be closer to the water, the harbor – the beautiful, magical point where the locals like to say the East Cooper and West Ashley Rivers meet to form the Atlantic Ocean. I remember this moment so clearly years later: Raoul looking around at the cops who were distracted by the descending pineapple, then simply lifting the yellow tape and smiling. And with no need for words, just a simple gesture from our fearless leader, our party ran across the dark lot towards the water’s edge. The fireworks exploded in the sky and fell towards the water where the gorgeous bursts of color doubled in the reflection, and the crowd followed us.

Every New Year’s Eve I’m farther away from that magical night, and I raised my glass with my usual champagne toast, “May all your pain be champagne!” And I thankfully toasted this memory – the firework’s pink, white and yellow glow lighting Raoul’s smiling face after he’s just led another crowd to more fun. Not just a toast, but a loud crowd’s cheers rolling over the harbor as we welcomed a new year, a new century, a new millennium bound to be marvelous –  because we would make it that way.

Clues, Advice and Thanks

This year as I celebrate 20 years of teaching Write Your Life as a Woman, I’m sharing some older articles and columns inspired by the class. “Clues, Advice and Thanks” originally appeared in skirt magazine in 1997, the first year I led a memoir writing class, which led me to create Write Your Life as a Woman. 

Clues, Advice and Thanks
by T. Dean Adams

“So,” Betty looks around the cafeteria to confirm no one is listening, “How do you like working with the old people?” I nod and smile politely. It is my first day, and I am thankful my mouth is full of food and I cannot answer. “It’s a wonderful time of life,” she continues, “except for the overwhelming sense of finality.” She will not drop her direct gaze into my eyes and I am speechless. Finally, I say, “Tell me what it feels like.” And she did, and then she wrote about it, too.

Betty was one of my first students in a class I led called “Collecting Your Memories” for three weeks at an Elderhostel program in Charleston, South Carolina. Each week a different group of students came in from all over the country, and the ages ranged from the late 50’s to mid-80’s. The purpose of the class was to write about life stories and memories. The focus as not so much on “the price of bread in 1948” as it was on taking a reflective look at their lives. When I was asked to lead the class I hesitated because I had never taught in a formal setting. But I was stumbling into my 30’s praying for clues of what to do with my life, while I was doing the same things I’d been doing for years. When you pray for clues, you don’t second-guess them.

Though my students were from all over the country, their stories were often similar. In each class people wrote of how surprisingly different their children were. The fathers wrote of the births of their children and mentioned that “back then” they were not allowed in the delivery rooms and how they wished they had been. The men described homes in terms of numbers, measurements, and sizes of a room; the women described homes in terms of the children’s ages when they lived there. A woman wrote of her mother’s memory of Armistice Day in New York City when Caruso stepped out onto a balcony and sang the Star Spangled Banner and the crowds on the street blow stopped to listen.

Jack and Norma, from New York City, cannot understand why their friends are retiring to Florida. Jack told me relatively clean “dirty” jokes all week, all prefaced with, “if I stop suddenly it’s because Norma is walking in the room and she would kill me if she knew I talked like this.” And Norma wrote “The three great disappointments of my life are that, one, I was deprived of piano lessons as a child. Two, that I can no longer eat green peppers…” And three, I cannot remember. It haunts me. Makes me wish I’d written down every word they said. I try to remember the third thing, but instead I hear Norma’s strong New York accent as she read about getting her daughter out of jail for protesting the Vietnam War… how much she loves her daughter, how scared she was for her safety. Jack listens, nodding solemnly, as she reads.

In their stories and conversations, my students taught me about aging. How surprised they are to be old enough to retire. How shocking it is for the body to start to fail you, sometimes slowly, other times abruptly. They told me that everyone condescends to them, talking loudly and slowly, making jokes about their memory being bad. Everyone is sweet to them, but stereotypes them as slow, sickly and tired, and how insulting that feels.

They gave me lots of advice and doted on me. Somehow they knew I needed it. They gave me pats on the back and hugs. And advice like, “Pull your hair back you’re hiding your pretty face.” “Never date a boy who doesn’t love his mother.” “You’re saving, aren’t you?” “Did you have breakfast?”

I miss my students and wish I had the space to write about each of them. One of them, Bob, refused to write. During the first assignment he alternately stared at the floor and the ceiling. Before the next assignment I reminded the class they were writing for themselves first, and they could always pass when it was their turn to read.

Still Bob did not write. I spoke to him gently. “Just start with ‘I remember’ and see where it takes you.” He smiled politely and folded his arms. “This is writing practice, the only rule is to keep your pen moving for the entire ten minutes no matter what you write. You can write ‘I hate this,’ but you have to write. That’s all I’m asking of you.” He shifted in his chair and stared at the floor again.

When you are 30-years-old and have never taught before and an 84-year-old student refuses to write, you try everything – every writing mantra, every trick you know, even a little guilt – and when nothing works you ignore him and pray. Dear God/Goddess/whoever, please let this man write. I know he has stories to tell. I know he was a chemist and a father and a husband and apparently his wife is forcing him to come to this class.

On the third day, Bob started writing and on the fourth day, he even read out loud. On the last day, he shook my hand and then held it between both of his and said, “Thank you. I didn’t know I could write.” He held up his notebook as he said, “My kids have never heard some of these stories.”

And I felt the space around us, the light in the room, the sound of his words in my ears and the sparks in my brain making sense of the sounds. It was so big, such a big, big moment that words can’t hold it down, even now, months later as I write them. It felt like there was an exact reason to be alive in this body on this planet for this lifetime.

And I gave thanks.