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Failure Is Part of the Creative Process

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Trying out new things is part of the creative process. Things can change at any stage in a painting’s or manuscript’s development. 

The writing process is an exciting and adventurous process. It sometimes feels electrifying and at other times, downright discouraging.  A writer needs to go in knowing that it might not work.   It means that results don’t matter as much as the process, the joy and the journey.

I try to keep this in mind every time I sit down at a blank page. An athlete has to work out to get to a point where she wins the competition. A writer sometimes has to fail many times before succeeding.

You may think that what you wrote is terrible, but it may work out later in a future draft, or help you get, through experimentation, to a wonderful manuscript. t’s part of the journey to that wonderful piece that finally works.

I’ll be blogging on Thursdays about the writing process. Follow me on WordPress at http://www.eileenpkennedy.com

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Literature As Salvation

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Why does literature endure? Why do we read it? What makes the words so compelling, we can’t put the book down?

Literature, and the reading of it, has saved many people in difficult situations. Literature can show people at their best. If you’re living through a difficult situation, say prison, this can be an important hope and message. Words can teach, illuminate and inspire us. Nelson Mandella cites the books he read in jail that gave him solace during his long incarceration. He devoured anything he could read on armed combat because he was trying to form a Liberation Army. As a young strategist, he read about boxing when he tried to defeat his opponents in the ring or books on chess when he was competing in chess tournaments. “I had no time to brood. I enjoyed reading and writing letters and that occupied my mind completely…” says Mandela.

Most prisons have a library and prisoners are encouraged to read books. According to most state statutes, prisoners are entitled to legal texts to research their own appeals. In addition to lawl books, almost all libraries have literature. Sometimes there are limits on content, like rape or gun construction, but overall there is much literature available to inmates. Some of the most popular in prisons are Stephen King and Harry Potter novels. Orange is the New Black and Gone Girl are some of the most popular novels in prisons. Longer novels are also popular, like Ayn Rands The Fountainhead. Biographies of different famous Americans are also sought-after in prison.

We should donate books, and keep books circulating, to The Prison Project. In this way, prisoners will continue to read. It can only help us as writers. I will continue to blog on Thursdays. http://www.eileenpkennedy.com.

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Blogging v. Writing

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How does blogging differ from writing? I guess when I sit down to write a poem or prose piece, I have a more formal block in my head. I think the main thing is that blogging is more spontaneous. You could argue that blogging has changed formal writing. But if you can write, you can blog.

The conventions of writing and blogging are very different. Run-0n sentences and asides don’t work in a blog. Short declarative sentences do.

Print stories are often written in the third person, especially nonfiction. Blogs are mostly in the I, first person.

In books, footnotes are frequently used to tell the backstory on your topic. They take up space. Hyperlinks serve a similar purpose in blogging. No one has to read them unless they click on them and they take very little space.

I enjoy blogging as a variation to my poetry. I will blog on Thursdays about the writing process. Follow me here at WordPress.

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End of Summer Musings

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I’m writing to you from my summer home in New England. As a retired college professor, summer is my favorite time. It always represented freedom to me.

I love fresh vegetables, beautiful flowers, farmer’s markets and stands, swimming in cool lakes.

But my favorite thing to do is to go to a local bookstore that’s located in an old mill with a stream running by it. I feel like my creativity flows more easily with the flowing stream. I knew a playwright who would stand in the stream and write with a pen and paper to get the creativity flowing?

Now that summer is coming to an end, I will look for new inspirations for my writing. What do you do for inspiration?

I will be blogging regularly one Thursdays again, with announcements, as they happen, on Tuesdays. Follow me here on WordPress.

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Listening to Your Inner Voice

Writers write in isolation mostly. Sometimes it’s in small groups or workshops, but mostly alone. Sometimes I wait until the last minute to write what I want? Why?

In the end, I try to listen to my inner voice that speaks my true thoughts that ultimately helps me cut through the nonsense that sometimes enters into my writing. Good writing comes from the true self.

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I use different methods to get in touch with my inner self. I meditate, move to a coffee shop or library, read a book of an author who is writing something similar to my project. Sometimes just sit quietly.

Join me in imagining and getting in touch with your inner self. Try writing from that one true voice.

I’ll continue to blog on Thursdays. If you’d like me to make an announcement for an upcoming reading, publication or award, get in touch with me here.

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“You Can Learn A lot of Things from the Flowers” said Alice (Alice in Wonderland)

June is flower month. I love fresh flowers. The one pictured is from a recent trip to Costa Rica. I get a sense of renewal when the green buds first appear in the Northeast in March or early April. This time of year, I often feel depleted in body and mind and the flowers renew me.

I plant flowers to have on my porch and in my yard. My partner often brings me flowers from his farm. I have irises now. I love to take walks in the woods and look at the wildflowers

Now that it’s the beginning of June, I feel grateful for the at the abundance of life growing around me. I recommit myself to simplicity, renewal, and writing. I remind myself to “smell the roses.”

As an artist, I celebrate the creativity I have as an antidote for the destruction and chaos in the world.

I will be blogging on Thursdays, with announcements, as they come, on Tuesdays. Follow me here on WordPress: http://www.eileenpkennedy.com.

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I’m So Grateful To Be Named A Finalist in the 2022 International Book Awards in Poetry for Touch My Head Softly -Thank you.

Poetry: General

Finalist
A Ligature For Black Bodies by Denise Miller
Eyewear Publishing

Finalist
Death, With Occasional Smiling by Tony Medina
Indolent Books

Finalist
Stars in the Junkyard by Sharon Berg
Cyberwit

Finalist
Touch My Head Softly by Eileen P. Kennedy
Finishing Line Press

Finalist
Warren by Karina van Berkum
MadHat Press

Finalist
Watermelon Linguistics: New and Selected Poems by Alexis Krasilovsky
Cyberwit

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Sometimes Failure Is Part of the Process

Photo by Steve Johnson on Pexels.com

Experimenting is part of the creative process. Things can change at any stage in a painting’s or manuscript’s development. 

The writing process is an exciting and adventurous process. It sometimes feels electrifying and at other times, downright discouraging.  A writer needs to go in knowing that it might not work.   It means that results don’t matter as much as the process, the joy and the journey.

I try to keep this in mind every time I sit down at a blank page. An athlete has to work out to get to a point where she wins the competition. A writer sometimes has to fail many times before succeeding. It’s part of the journey to that wonderful piece that finally works.

I’ll be blogging on Thursdays, and posting announcements, as they come, on Thursdays. Follow me on WordPress at http://www.eileenpkennedy.com

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Derek Walcott on Life

The time will come 
when, with elation 
you will greet yourself arriving 
at your own door, in your own mirror 
and each will smile at the other’s welcome. 

–Derek Walcott

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Derek Walcott writes about being comfortable in your own skin. In a world of war and international pandemic, sometimes we have to be our own friend.

As writers, we need to nurture ourselves. There is plenty of rejection and criticism out there for the writer, so being our own cheerleader is sometimes necessary.

We crave praise, awards, good reviews, and the affirmation of the publisher, but if we remember the joy of the creative process, we don’t need the positive feedback of others.

As a poet, I work often alone and in solitude. Books tend to be published quietly also. There may be a book launch, but aside from that, people buy and read our books on their own. This doesn’t mean that our books don’t touch people or have a lasting effect. A writers, we know the books that have made that special impact on us and we have to trust that our writing will have an effect on our readers.

Or as Derek Walcott so aptly put it “…peel your own image from the mirror. Sit. Feast on your life. “

I will be posting on Thursdays about the writing life, with announcements, as they come, on Tuesdays. Follow me at WordPress.