To write from a place of brokenness is no easy thing. It’s to come to the edge of what I know, the edge of comfort, and to peer over that edge and wonder if I can risk brokenness. Can I risk the vulnerability? Do I dare? Can I be what some might consider “weak”? In many cases, I can’t. I turn away. I retreat to safety because I have written from that place previously, and the things I’ve written have sometimes hurt people close to me.
Archives for October 2013
Write Right: Bullet Points and Punctuation Marks
I know of no rigid rules regarding bullet points and how to punctuate them. Because of that, I defer to two principles. One is consistency. The other is the effect on the page, that is, the visual element.
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You Will Never Be Ready
You will never be ready. You’ll never know enough. You’ll never think you know enough. You’ll never believe you’re adequate. You’ll never think you have the necessary skills or talents. You’ll never think you have what it – whatever “it” is – takes. You will never be ready.
Sit Down. Rest a While.
You. You down in front. The one tapping your pen against your knee. The one rushing to and fro making sure everyone has a seat and has everything they need for the duration of this speech or film or whatever it is that you’re attending. You. Sit down. Rest a while. Put the pen in your purse or your pocket. Let the other people be. You sit down. You rest.
How to Find Good Ideas
Good ideas aren’t necessarily hard to find. It’s the process, as Dean Young says of writing, involved with finding them that’s difficult. It might be work one might not want to do. It’s a process that’s both creative and analytical; at least, it is once one becomes accustomed to the process of coming up with good ideas. What, though, is that process? It probably varies from person to person but, perhaps, some generalizations can be made.