Make visible what, without you, might never have been seen.
~ Robert Bresson, French film director (1901-1999)
I’m on a theme this month, aren’t I? Open the blog post and scroll back for other quotes that have touched me recently.
“Only when the brain is confronted with stimuli that it has not encountered before does it start to reorganize perception. The surest way to provoke the imagination, then, is to seek out environments you have no experience with. They may have nothing to do with your area of expertise. It doesn’t matter. Because the same systems in the brain carry out both perception and imagination, there will be cross talk.”
— neuroscientist Gregory Berns, MD, PhD, in a 2008 article, Neuroscience Sheds New Light on Creativity
“If you don’t do your work, it might not ever get done.”
— Madeleine L’Engle, in Walking on Water, her book about being true to your art
Last weekend, I attended the Pikes Peak Writers Conference in Colorado Springs, giving presentations on building character, setting, and common mistakes writers make about the law. Barbara O’Neal, the keynote speaker at lunch on Sunday, gave a powerful talk focused on a topic for all creators: What is yours to do? What is the work only you can do? She’s reprised those themes in this essay, drawn from the talk, on Writer Unboxed.
daffodils blooming between the cracks in a rock
Lean into that, I say. Into the stories, the paintings, the songs, only you can tell, paint, or sing. The gardens only you can plant. The joys only you can give, the sorrows only you can ease.
What is yours to do?
“Only when the brain is confronted with stimuli that it has not encountered before does it start to reorganize perception. The surest way to provoke the imagination, then, is to seek out environments you have no experience with. They may have nothing to do with your area of expertise. It doesn’t matter. Because the same systems in the brain carry out both perception and imagination, there will be cross talk.”
–neuroscientist Gregory Berns, MD, PhD, in a 2008 article titled Neuroscience Sheds New Light on Creativity
So when you’re stuck, do something new, something different. Big or small, change creates new paths for thinking.
“I do fundamentally believe that you can change somebody’s mind, you can influence their opinion, you can alter their thought if you do it through art and culture. I think that this is how we develop tolerance, we develop understanding. … Artists are extremely smart. We find ways.”
—Myrna Ayad, Lebanese cultural strategist and art consultant, based in Dubai, discussing an increasing willingness of the Saudi government to allow a greater variety of stories and perspectives in the arts, particularly exhibitions (NPR 3/3/23)
(Tranquility, by Tabby Ivy, oil on canvas; collection of the author)
“Becoming a writer is about becoming conscious. When you’re conscious and writing from a place of insight and simplicity and real caring about the truth, you have the ability to throw the lights on for your reader. He or she will recognize his or her life and truth in what you say, in the pictures you have painted, and this decreases the terrible sense of isolation that we have all had too much of.”
– Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
Her comments on writing apply equally to any creative endeavor — writing a song, making a painting or a quilt or a gorgeous birthday cake. Art matters. Remember that.
“Thinking you have to read all the unread books on your shelves before buying new ones is like thinking a wine connoisseur should drink everything in their cellar before buying any new bottles. Some books just need a bit of shelf-time before they (you) are ready.”
– Bookish wisdom from Shakespeare & Company, Paris, France, quoted by Robert Gray in Shelf Awareness, 11/2/22
I’ll drink to that!
“Art in general reminds me that there are things we call meaningful. Time is an impersonal force, and life itself can feel airy and insubstantial, but when I hear a song that I love, something catches and holds me the way gravity holds us to the ground. There is resonance; there is traction.”
– singer/songwriter Dar Williams in How to Write a Song that Matters (2022), quoted by Kathryn Craft on Writer Unboxed, 11/10/22
Going to Left Coast Crime in Tucson next week? Let’s talk! I’ll be at Author Speed Dating Thursday morning, on the food and drink panel Friday at 4:00 (wrapping up just in time for happy hour!), and moderating a discussion of political and social issues in crime fiction at 10:15 Saturday morning. Cozy author Emmeline Duncan and I are co-hosting a banquet table that evening, and we’d love to have you join us!
(Photo: Moonrise over Wengen, in the Swiss Alps; author photo)
“She reminded herself that, this early in an investigation, she should feel that she was drifting aimlessly. Drifting was an essential, if frustrating, part of the process, allowing her to map the actual contours and characteristics of the landscape instead of setting off in a pre-chosen direction. Yes, this left her torn, between a tight commitment to Michael Johnston and a broad sweep of what the Gardener Estate had to tell her, but facts would become clear and a route would take shape.”
— Laurie R. King. Back to the Garden The character, Raquel, is speaking of police work, but it applies equally to writing and almost any kind of creative work