The first thing I took note of and that really stuck out with me in the book, came from the first two pages where she explains how excited everyone is to start and how we always have so much to say and then, we don’t know where to start. For me, this is incredibly accurate. I constantly have story ideas running through my head and things I want to write, but then I always seem to get stuck without fail. I can write a killer beginning and usually a killer end, but the middle and the details are always hard for me. It’s like I have so many ideas I can’t figure out how to blend it all. So, to hear that this is so natural makes me feel better.
Don’t be afraid to just write ideas, or just free write to help you! No one will ever see these things so it’s okay to just let your mind wander and let the words flow. This can really help inspire you and help you get your thoughts out, even if you don’t think that it will. These memories, or ideas may inspire new thoughts and plot lines or things like that. And even if it doesn’t work out, that’s okay too!
I feel like I always hear writers say you should sit down at the same time every day to write (have you ever said that, Jesse? I can’t remember) which I think is so interesting. To me, it seems like it could be helpful because like Anne Lamont says, it helps to train your brain. But at the same time, for me at least, I find that if I have no ideas in my mind, no blinking DVD symbol flashing back and forth trying to hit the corners of the screen, trying to sit and force myself to write does not work. I cannot think up enough ideas, and I’ll get frustrated. So, I think the thing is that you need to do whatever works best for you to get the most out of your writing. If you have to take breaks to explore and get more inspiration, do it! Or if writing at the same time every day works, do that!
The final thing I noticed/ that really spoke to me, was her reiteration of the fact that everyone goes through these struggles of having no ideas or being stuck. I feel like so many people forget that or want everything to be so perfect right away that they don’t remember that it’s natural not to have all the answers right away. You need to practice writing, and keep reading to grow.
In this reading, I noticed that there was piece of advice in there that I’ve seen so many times that I have yet to incorporate for some reason (perhaps because I struggle with routines). Write at about the same time every day. This is the part I struggle with, but what comes after, the figuring out an image and building, I think I could handle. Maybe even drown out all those other voices eventually, too. On that note, I resonated the kind of dread and uncertainty that comes with writing, and sharing writing, so I found the poem she included in the chapter quite humorous. Because even though I know how irrational it is to think that other people, especially those I’m close with, would judge so harshly, it’s something I think about often, and struggle with when sharing my work.
Something I was interested in and surprised by is how many of the speaker’s students seemed to want to be published so badly. It’s not something every writer wants, but most writers I’ve met who do want to be published don’t generally want it for its own sake (as seems to be the case here, as the students mention refunds), but instead see it as a) a form of validation, and b) a way to share their work with a much larger audience than they could on their own.
I really enjoyed reading Bird By Bird, as it made all of the struggles that I experience while writing seem much more normal than I thought. I really liked the author’s writing style in the sense that they write as though they are talking to their friend. It was easy to digest and understand exactly what they were talking about. What stuck with me was the fact that writing is a long and complicated process that is not meant to be good on the first try. In fact, it is expected to not be good on the first try. What resonates with me the most is that I am not the only one that loves writing, but has trouble doing so. It’s comforting to know that words don’t just need to come to me in order to be a good writer, but rather to be patient and let the ideas flow naturally.
A few concrete things that stuck with me from the reading are as follows: First, It is okay to not have a clear understanding of what you want to write about when you start off, it’s the process of finding out that matters (p. 3-5). The more you write and find out what your writing isn’t, the closer you find are to figuring out what you want it to be (9). Second, there is beauty in zooming in on the ordinary and capturing the details that readers may not have time to focus on in their day-to-day lives (15). Third, writing requires practice (14), and establishing a set time to write every day allows you brain to adjust to a time where it can be creative (6).
All of these details stuck out to me and resonated me for different reasons. When the author described the point about capturing the details since the audience might not have the chance to ordinarily, I recognized this as a strength I may have as a writer. I also was able to recognize that my set time to write will likely be at night when I feel most creative.
However, I also was able to recognize where I may need some improvement. This includes practicing my writing regularly and trusting the process. I tend to get frustrated and quit for the night when my ideas aren’t coming together correctly. I am a terrible drafter and more of a reviser. I need to work on allowing myself to write freely and allowing myself to focus in more specifically once I’ve drafted my ideas. This chapter allowed me to hone in on some strengths and weaknesses in my writing which I can be conscious of moving forward.
One thing I really loved about this reading was the light tone the author took. A lot of the time, authors create these self-serious instructional pieces to encourage students to write, but I find that it does the opposite for me. Lamott, takes humor and creates a guide to writing that doesn’t make you feel like your brain is melting from boredom. I also really appreciate how genuine she is about the process. Since this is only a hobby of mine, I have only had the pleasure of doing the painstaking forced sit down that Lamott references a few times in my life, but she perfectly encapsulates the feeling of just simply not knowing what to do.
Her advice about just getting everything down on the page really resonated with me. I have noticed that I tend to get overwhelmed with writing because I simply do not know where to start, and hearing that others suffer with the same is very reassuring. Now, instead of feeling down about being indecisive I can accept this as a part of my process while also homing in on my skills to narrow my ideas down. Lastly, I really appreciated how much she stressed that any story can be a story as long as you’re telling it. In a way she is telling people to take charge of their stories, “…we will deal with libel later on”. I enjoyed this reading, and I am excited to see more of what Lamott has to say.
One of the first things to stick out to me that Anne Lamott wrote was the technique of sitting down to work/write in the same place every day at the same time. This ritual is supposed to form a habit and train your brain to be creative at this certain time every time you begin to write. In this same sector of the book, she highlighted the idea of not letting those other “voices” in your head win out and lead to distraction. She emphasized persistence, faith, and hard work, which ultimately is what the quality of your writing will depend on.
What I really appreciate about this book so far is the ease with which it can be read. To me, it feels more like a genuine conversation someone is having with me rather than just reading some holier-than-thou nonsense that makes me feel patronized in the end and thus makes me want to listen to exactly none of the advice given. When I’m reading this book, however, I feel like perhaps I might actually want to listen to the advice given to me.
Something that really resonates with me is the inability to actually start writing. I have ideas in my head, but I have no clue how to articulate them properly and put them into words. It’s like I just want to jump right in and start from the most exciting point without having to give any background to the plot or the setting or the characters and just pray that by some divine miracle the reader will have perhaps a single iota of a clue of what’s going on in the story and why it’s happening. Of course, I know I cannot do that and so I must resign myself to sitting at my computer and waiting for the moment that the creative divines smile upon me, and I know exactly what I want to write and how I want to do it.
After reading the first chapter to Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, I immediately took notice of how excited her students were to start writing. I wouldn’t say that I never get excited about having to write a story, but I would say that I’m not always the most enthusiastic about having to write a story. I think that it’s because I’m not used to writing anything more than just a research and scientific paper. For me, I think what makes me struggle to write is that I don’t know what I want to say. Sometimes I actually have too much to say and it’s more about having to go through it and cut it down and delete some parts out. It makes more sense to say that I struggle with knowing where to start and how to end. I have all these thoughts on what I want to say, but I don’t know where to begin and where to end it. What I really liked about the reading was that the author was telling us that it’s okay to get stuck and to fail. It’s a natural occurrence to get stuck every once in a while and not everything is going to go according to plan and be nearly perfect if not perfect. I really appreciated the way the author mentioned simple steps on how to get started. Some examples that I liked were having the thought of writing like you are talking to a friend, just letting the thoughts flow from your mind to a piece of paper, and thinking of memories that you can remember, whether that it’s a good or a bad one. A good story can be both good and bad, as long as the words have a meaning and tell a story. I love the feeling of knowing a story can have a not-so-good feeling to it because not all memories are happy and not all stories have a happy ending.
One of the very first things that stuck out to me during the reading was actually found on page 3. “Writing is about telling the truth”, essentially, writing allows us to understand who we are. I appreciated this because, like most people do, I had a hard time figuring out who I was. Heck, I still feel like sometimes I don’t understand myself. Yet, something clicks when I write. I feel like the words that I write are true and honest, even if it takes a while to get to there. This brings me to the second thing that stuck with me. Throughout the chapter, there was one question that loomed over everything. If writing is something that is so personal and true and honest, then why is it so hard? While there might not be a real concrete answer, the one Lamott gives is that the world is against writers. Whether it’s time, circumstance, distractions, or the exploding political landscape, there is always something that should keep writers from writing. Sometimes, these things succeed, but other times, as Lamott states, we “clear a space for the writing voice”. One of the greatest things I’ve learned over this past year is that writing takes persistence and faith, two things that are embedded in this chapter. Specifically, on page 9, Lamott writes that “You are learning what you aren’t writing and this is helping you find out what you are writing”. Writing is trial and error and trial and error and a little bit of tears and some coffee and then ending with three words on a mostly blank page. But, three words is more than you had. Persistence. The poem by Philip Lopate is featured on page 11. The overall message, at least to me, is that your demons are your closest friends and the moments of frustration and jubilation when it comes to life can be used in your writing. The last thing, and probably the biggest thing that resonated with me, was the question of why. Why am I writing? I had to stop and really think about it. Being published and successful sound fun and amazing and I definitely strive for that, yet I know that that isn’t the reason. I think I write for myself and to create worlds, characters, and stories that connect people even in the darkest of times. In a way, I think I write to create a legacy for myself, something that I can be proud of. Though, the reasons may change, I think the most important reason that I write is because it makes me happy and it feels right.
Reading this first part of Bird by Bird really put me at ease in terms of writing and not knowing what to write about. I liked how the author made it very realistic by bringing up memories we can think about from our childhood to try and spark inspiration towards what we write about. I know I personally have been struggling with being able to sit and write anything that comes to mind because I am such a perfectionist with my work, but this first chapter made me realize that it is ok to be messy and not know where to start. What resonated well with me from this first chapter is learning about the beauty of writing and how it can teach us so much about the world and allow us to pay attention to important topics, something that getting published can’t really do. This is something I never realized until now and hope that by taking this class and reading more into this text I won’t just become a better writer but have a better understanding of the unique artform it provides to its audience.
Overall I really enjoy how the author, Lamott, writes. This chapter was really easy for me to read and comprehend, especially given all the different examples they give when talking to their students. I appreciated and resonated with a lot of different aspects from this chapter. The way Lamott talks about the process of writing and getting started was extremely helpful. Simply writing down your memories as you can remember them as well as accepting and using the emotions/mental illnesses we are trained to try and ignore or fix as a tool for your writing. I love the idea of using emotions/mental illnesses to your advantage when writing because I already do it! Whenever I have a depressive/self loathing/self pity episode late at night (I’m sure many of us have these) I go to my notes app to write it out. Being able to write down those thoughts and get the words out of my head in a somewhat poetic form is a good release, and can definitely be a great writing tool given the story you want to tell.
Another part of the reading I felt was helpful towards the writing process is just being able to set aside a little part of your day to just sit and write. Then to be able to go back to that writing the next day after it has marinated and you can see what you want to continue writing and what you want to destroy completely. I have never written anything this way before but I’m excited to try this process.
What really stuck out to me, quite early on in the reading, was the idea of starting with writing down everything you can remember from your childhood whether it was good or bad. I think this is a really cool concept because in the grand scheme of life those years of your childhood are really the formative years that will create your personality, your likes and dislikes, your tastes, your style and your future. Those first years and memories of life are so important when you reflect back on life. And when you think that a moment didn’t do anything to you, or didn’t affect you as much as you had anticipated, but it really did. All of the moments no matter how significant really does shape you and it is so cool to me to see the author highlight that for us in the first few pages of the reading. I also appreciated the idea that the author has no real recipe for her writers to create great writing or to get published. I like how she is just trying to give them the tools they need to excel and the rest of that will fall into place. This resonates with me because when I am tutoring for writing all of the students just want a perfect formula to create the best essay the can, to just then turn in and forget about. But I don’t have those answers, I don’t have the perfect formula to create the most perfect piece of writing anyone has ever seen. And hearing the author say that there is no perfect formula for this really helps me understand the what I am doing, by providing them tools and examples, is enough and will help them create the best work for themselves. Not the best ever, but their best work and that seems to be such an important idea to instill in this writers heads.
I appreciated the reality and honesty of it. I resonate especially with sitting down and writing, and how hard it feels. It’s a lot easier said than done and the way he explains the frustration and blanking on everything you’ve learned your entire life disappears the moment you sit down and tell yourself you’re going to write. Setting a time everyday to write really stuck with me. It seems like something so simple that I’m surprised I never thought of it, but it’s a hard thing to do. She seems to have a lot of experience and expertise in writing with the way she interacts with her students and describes the writing process. I appreciate his humor a lot because writing can be intimidating and scary to do. Nobody wants to write unless it’s good. It’s a hard mentality to let go of. I struggle myself especially with being a perfectionist in my writing. It’s a lot easier to overcome when you approach it with a lighter and more amusing note, maybe even poking fun at yourself. Even a writer like Anne Lamott acknowledges that every first draft is the most horrific thing you’ve ever read.
Reading the beginning of Bird By Bird I appreciate the advise Lamott gives to her students like focusing on the small steps rather than the whole project. Lamott breaks down and explains concepts in an easy understanding way. I also like the reference she made to “Mining a vein of memories” to encourage students to dig deep into their memories and write about a specific time in their lives. To connect writing to a personal experience in their lives makes the piece overall more special and powerful. I feel whiling reading this some of her concepts were teaching me more about writing and will stick with me. I feel this resonates to me because some of my best work in writing was stories connected to a personal experience I’ve had or a core memory. Lamott referencing the idea of having the voices in your head while you try to focus and giving techniques to push them away really helps me because I deal with that all the time. Trying to focus on one story and one piece while a bunch of second thoughts or different ideas pop in my head and take me off track of my goal. As we continue to read Bird By Bird I feel we will gain not only a better understanding of writing but being able to to tell a story in different perspectives and approaches that’ll attract and draw more audience.
Immediately, I appreciated the honesty that the author displayed. The author was very clear about the intensity of writing, the difficulty of the process and was able to be consistently clear about their point.
Out of this week’s reading, one piece of advice that stuck out to me was the idea that narrower moments allow detail to be explored further in depth and often lead to more fruitful imagery. The author did an excellent job of broadening the detail and zooming in on specific pieces in a way that kept the reader/myself interested and made the reading a visual experience that engaged the five senses.
This reading resonated with me in more ways than one. In particular, one of my favorite quotes that truly described how I often feel as a writer was on page 8. of “Bird By Bird” by Anne Lamott. The quote touched upon the difficulty of writing as follows, “It feels like you just have to keep getting out of your own way so that whatever wants to be written can use you to write it.” I found this example to be one of motivation; for it displayed the truth about the writing process in the sense that your mind can be your biggest obstacle as well as your greatest tool.
Lamott begins her instructions to us young and impressionable writers by telling us that “Good writing is about telling the truth.” (pg.3) Immediately I am at odds with this. Are we meant to tell “the” truth, or “a” truth? She tells us to “not worry about doing it well,” (pg.4) but what if our truth isn’t well? My truth may be ugly, and maybe I can tell it well, but it is ugly, and I want to hide it. She reassures me that “you own what happened to you,” (pg.6) and I do understand that my ugly truths are me. They are what happened to me. This brings me comfort, and this scares me too. It is like she speaks directly to me when she says “You are desperate to communicate,” and oh, how I am. I want this load off me, I want to be free of my ugliness, and my pain. She is right, I am desperate to communicate the agony that lives in me. I am ready to let it go. I ask myself how, and by the end of this chapter I discover that the answer is already within me, waiting to be written. Lamott didn’t have to tell me this, she already knows that I know.
I really liked how much Anne Lamott focuses on the process of writing in the first couple of pages. For me, the hardest part about writing is starting to write. In all my years of writing, ever since elementary school, before I start writing a piece I just stare at my paper or laptop thinking about how I should start. The advice Lamott gives of just throwing ideas onto your paper and having that be your first draft is a really good one. I feel like I think too much on my first draft when in reality the first draft is just the foundation for the essay or story. This aspect of writing has always been a problem for me but I feel like I’ve improved on this aspect in recent years.
The part about obsessing over writing also stuck out to me. I find myself doing this a lot, mostly to my own detriment. Whenever I have a writing assignment, I fall into the trap of thinking about it in bed before falling asleep, causing me to be up for hours later than I’m supposed to. The worst part is that in the morning when I’m actually writing, I always seem to forget my brilliant thoughts from the night before.
I found it really interesting how so many of the students want to be published. I guess it makes sense, the best way to become someone in the writing world is to get your work published. The eagerness to be published and have an agent, like Lamott mentions, can be a crutch to the writing process. Being patient and improving your writing and the process will lead to pieces getting the recognition they deserve.
The author is seemingly taking the expectations of writing, of being successful and making a career out of it, and telling the class that their expectations are not always true. Not everyone will be successful, not everyone will get published, and yet those things aren’t the purpose of writing. Everyone has their own goal, and while there is certainly the motive of monetary gain, a lot of times writing is less focused on the marketability and more on the story it’s trying to tell.
I certainly understand the difficulty with just sitting down to write. I struggled with it for this short story openers assignment. Getting everything else done or having to put it out of your mind for even an hour can be an arduous task. You look at the blank screen and the cursor blinking and wonder what to do. Yet, once I really started typing, I remembered why I love writing so much. The harmony of ideas and noises in your head flowing out of your fingers to the steady taps of the keyboard, making one word, then two, and soon you have a sentence, then a paragraph. Even just writing this seems so… right in a way. Then, I’ll look back on it and discover that it doesn’t make sense or goes on too long and there the process begins again. As the author tells us, writing can be a confusing, frustrating, and rewarding process.
After reading pages 3-15 of ‘Bird by Bird’, two things immediately stuck with me. The first, was the consistency of practice required. The self-acknowledgement of being a ‘writer’ and then committing to practice it, and setting a time for exercising this everyday. I think what I mean for this, the consistency in writing, making it a daily discipline, or like actually manifesting it, yourself as writer, as opposed to a somewhat vague but embedded notion I have of kind of writer in a blur of manic and intuitive frenzy.
The second thing that stuck with me, was that writing, or being a writer, is not about the end result, i.e. ‘getting published’, but rather writing in and of itself. Having the passion and practice, kind of comes from you and out of you, and not at you – or in some sort of external form of ‘making it’, i.e. getting published. This divergence of the two, or separation of, is hugely important and potent, and is something I already think of and grapple with quite often. It is also I think transmutable across many ares of life, especially and pertaining in this case, mostly to the act or forms of creative expression.
19 thoughts on “JOURNAL # 2”
The first thing I took note of and that really stuck out with me in the book, came from the first two pages where she explains how excited everyone is to start and how we always have so much to say and then, we don’t know where to start. For me, this is incredibly accurate. I constantly have story ideas running through my head and things I want to write, but then I always seem to get stuck without fail. I can write a killer beginning and usually a killer end, but the middle and the details are always hard for me. It’s like I have so many ideas I can’t figure out how to blend it all. So, to hear that this is so natural makes me feel better.
Don’t be afraid to just write ideas, or just free write to help you! No one will ever see these things so it’s okay to just let your mind wander and let the words flow. This can really help inspire you and help you get your thoughts out, even if you don’t think that it will. These memories, or ideas may inspire new thoughts and plot lines or things like that. And even if it doesn’t work out, that’s okay too!
I feel like I always hear writers say you should sit down at the same time every day to write (have you ever said that, Jesse? I can’t remember) which I think is so interesting. To me, it seems like it could be helpful because like Anne Lamont says, it helps to train your brain. But at the same time, for me at least, I find that if I have no ideas in my mind, no blinking DVD symbol flashing back and forth trying to hit the corners of the screen, trying to sit and force myself to write does not work. I cannot think up enough ideas, and I’ll get frustrated. So, I think the thing is that you need to do whatever works best for you to get the most out of your writing. If you have to take breaks to explore and get more inspiration, do it! Or if writing at the same time every day works, do that!
The final thing I noticed/ that really spoke to me, was her reiteration of the fact that everyone goes through these struggles of having no ideas or being stuck. I feel like so many people forget that or want everything to be so perfect right away that they don’t remember that it’s natural not to have all the answers right away. You need to practice writing, and keep reading to grow.
In this reading, I noticed that there was piece of advice in there that I’ve seen so many times that I have yet to incorporate for some reason (perhaps because I struggle with routines). Write at about the same time every day. This is the part I struggle with, but what comes after, the figuring out an image and building, I think I could handle. Maybe even drown out all those other voices eventually, too. On that note, I resonated the kind of dread and uncertainty that comes with writing, and sharing writing, so I found the poem she included in the chapter quite humorous. Because even though I know how irrational it is to think that other people, especially those I’m close with, would judge so harshly, it’s something I think about often, and struggle with when sharing my work.
Something I was interested in and surprised by is how many of the speaker’s students seemed to want to be published so badly. It’s not something every writer wants, but most writers I’ve met who do want to be published don’t generally want it for its own sake (as seems to be the case here, as the students mention refunds), but instead see it as a) a form of validation, and b) a way to share their work with a much larger audience than they could on their own.
I really enjoyed reading Bird By Bird, as it made all of the struggles that I experience while writing seem much more normal than I thought. I really liked the author’s writing style in the sense that they write as though they are talking to their friend. It was easy to digest and understand exactly what they were talking about. What stuck with me was the fact that writing is a long and complicated process that is not meant to be good on the first try. In fact, it is expected to not be good on the first try. What resonates with me the most is that I am not the only one that loves writing, but has trouble doing so. It’s comforting to know that words don’t just need to come to me in order to be a good writer, but rather to be patient and let the ideas flow naturally.
A few concrete things that stuck with me from the reading are as follows: First, It is okay to not have a clear understanding of what you want to write about when you start off, it’s the process of finding out that matters (p. 3-5). The more you write and find out what your writing isn’t, the closer you find are to figuring out what you want it to be (9). Second, there is beauty in zooming in on the ordinary and capturing the details that readers may not have time to focus on in their day-to-day lives (15). Third, writing requires practice (14), and establishing a set time to write every day allows you brain to adjust to a time where it can be creative (6).
All of these details stuck out to me and resonated me for different reasons. When the author described the point about capturing the details since the audience might not have the chance to ordinarily, I recognized this as a strength I may have as a writer. I also was able to recognize that my set time to write will likely be at night when I feel most creative.
However, I also was able to recognize where I may need some improvement. This includes practicing my writing regularly and trusting the process. I tend to get frustrated and quit for the night when my ideas aren’t coming together correctly. I am a terrible drafter and more of a reviser. I need to work on allowing myself to write freely and allowing myself to focus in more specifically once I’ve drafted my ideas. This chapter allowed me to hone in on some strengths and weaknesses in my writing which I can be conscious of moving forward.
One thing I really loved about this reading was the light tone the author took. A lot of the time, authors create these self-serious instructional pieces to encourage students to write, but I find that it does the opposite for me. Lamott, takes humor and creates a guide to writing that doesn’t make you feel like your brain is melting from boredom. I also really appreciate how genuine she is about the process. Since this is only a hobby of mine, I have only had the pleasure of doing the painstaking forced sit down that Lamott references a few times in my life, but she perfectly encapsulates the feeling of just simply not knowing what to do.
Her advice about just getting everything down on the page really resonated with me. I have noticed that I tend to get overwhelmed with writing because I simply do not know where to start, and hearing that others suffer with the same is very reassuring. Now, instead of feeling down about being indecisive I can accept this as a part of my process while also homing in on my skills to narrow my ideas down. Lastly, I really appreciated how much she stressed that any story can be a story as long as you’re telling it. In a way she is telling people to take charge of their stories, “…we will deal with libel later on”. I enjoyed this reading, and I am excited to see more of what Lamott has to say.
One of the first things to stick out to me that Anne Lamott wrote was the technique of sitting down to work/write in the same place every day at the same time. This ritual is supposed to form a habit and train your brain to be creative at this certain time every time you begin to write. In this same sector of the book, she highlighted the idea of not letting those other “voices” in your head win out and lead to distraction. She emphasized persistence, faith, and hard work, which ultimately is what the quality of your writing will depend on.
What I really appreciate about this book so far is the ease with which it can be read. To me, it feels more like a genuine conversation someone is having with me rather than just reading some holier-than-thou nonsense that makes me feel patronized in the end and thus makes me want to listen to exactly none of the advice given. When I’m reading this book, however, I feel like perhaps I might actually want to listen to the advice given to me.
Something that really resonates with me is the inability to actually start writing. I have ideas in my head, but I have no clue how to articulate them properly and put them into words. It’s like I just want to jump right in and start from the most exciting point without having to give any background to the plot or the setting or the characters and just pray that by some divine miracle the reader will have perhaps a single iota of a clue of what’s going on in the story and why it’s happening. Of course, I know I cannot do that and so I must resign myself to sitting at my computer and waiting for the moment that the creative divines smile upon me, and I know exactly what I want to write and how I want to do it.
After reading the first chapter to Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, I immediately took notice of how excited her students were to start writing. I wouldn’t say that I never get excited about having to write a story, but I would say that I’m not always the most enthusiastic about having to write a story. I think that it’s because I’m not used to writing anything more than just a research and scientific paper. For me, I think what makes me struggle to write is that I don’t know what I want to say. Sometimes I actually have too much to say and it’s more about having to go through it and cut it down and delete some parts out. It makes more sense to say that I struggle with knowing where to start and how to end. I have all these thoughts on what I want to say, but I don’t know where to begin and where to end it. What I really liked about the reading was that the author was telling us that it’s okay to get stuck and to fail. It’s a natural occurrence to get stuck every once in a while and not everything is going to go according to plan and be nearly perfect if not perfect. I really appreciated the way the author mentioned simple steps on how to get started. Some examples that I liked were having the thought of writing like you are talking to a friend, just letting the thoughts flow from your mind to a piece of paper, and thinking of memories that you can remember, whether that it’s a good or a bad one. A good story can be both good and bad, as long as the words have a meaning and tell a story. I love the feeling of knowing a story can have a not-so-good feeling to it because not all memories are happy and not all stories have a happy ending.
One of the very first things that stuck out to me during the reading was actually found on page 3. “Writing is about telling the truth”, essentially, writing allows us to understand who we are. I appreciated this because, like most people do, I had a hard time figuring out who I was. Heck, I still feel like sometimes I don’t understand myself. Yet, something clicks when I write. I feel like the words that I write are true and honest, even if it takes a while to get to there. This brings me to the second thing that stuck with me. Throughout the chapter, there was one question that loomed over everything. If writing is something that is so personal and true and honest, then why is it so hard? While there might not be a real concrete answer, the one Lamott gives is that the world is against writers. Whether it’s time, circumstance, distractions, or the exploding political landscape, there is always something that should keep writers from writing. Sometimes, these things succeed, but other times, as Lamott states, we “clear a space for the writing voice”. One of the greatest things I’ve learned over this past year is that writing takes persistence and faith, two things that are embedded in this chapter. Specifically, on page 9, Lamott writes that “You are learning what you aren’t writing and this is helping you find out what you are writing”. Writing is trial and error and trial and error and a little bit of tears and some coffee and then ending with three words on a mostly blank page. But, three words is more than you had. Persistence. The poem by Philip Lopate is featured on page 11. The overall message, at least to me, is that your demons are your closest friends and the moments of frustration and jubilation when it comes to life can be used in your writing. The last thing, and probably the biggest thing that resonated with me, was the question of why. Why am I writing? I had to stop and really think about it. Being published and successful sound fun and amazing and I definitely strive for that, yet I know that that isn’t the reason. I think I write for myself and to create worlds, characters, and stories that connect people even in the darkest of times. In a way, I think I write to create a legacy for myself, something that I can be proud of. Though, the reasons may change, I think the most important reason that I write is because it makes me happy and it feels right.
Reading this first part of Bird by Bird really put me at ease in terms of writing and not knowing what to write about. I liked how the author made it very realistic by bringing up memories we can think about from our childhood to try and spark inspiration towards what we write about. I know I personally have been struggling with being able to sit and write anything that comes to mind because I am such a perfectionist with my work, but this first chapter made me realize that it is ok to be messy and not know where to start. What resonated well with me from this first chapter is learning about the beauty of writing and how it can teach us so much about the world and allow us to pay attention to important topics, something that getting published can’t really do. This is something I never realized until now and hope that by taking this class and reading more into this text I won’t just become a better writer but have a better understanding of the unique artform it provides to its audience.
Overall I really enjoy how the author, Lamott, writes. This chapter was really easy for me to read and comprehend, especially given all the different examples they give when talking to their students. I appreciated and resonated with a lot of different aspects from this chapter. The way Lamott talks about the process of writing and getting started was extremely helpful. Simply writing down your memories as you can remember them as well as accepting and using the emotions/mental illnesses we are trained to try and ignore or fix as a tool for your writing. I love the idea of using emotions/mental illnesses to your advantage when writing because I already do it! Whenever I have a depressive/self loathing/self pity episode late at night (I’m sure many of us have these) I go to my notes app to write it out. Being able to write down those thoughts and get the words out of my head in a somewhat poetic form is a good release, and can definitely be a great writing tool given the story you want to tell.
Another part of the reading I felt was helpful towards the writing process is just being able to set aside a little part of your day to just sit and write. Then to be able to go back to that writing the next day after it has marinated and you can see what you want to continue writing and what you want to destroy completely. I have never written anything this way before but I’m excited to try this process.
What really stuck out to me, quite early on in the reading, was the idea of starting with writing down everything you can remember from your childhood whether it was good or bad. I think this is a really cool concept because in the grand scheme of life those years of your childhood are really the formative years that will create your personality, your likes and dislikes, your tastes, your style and your future. Those first years and memories of life are so important when you reflect back on life. And when you think that a moment didn’t do anything to you, or didn’t affect you as much as you had anticipated, but it really did. All of the moments no matter how significant really does shape you and it is so cool to me to see the author highlight that for us in the first few pages of the reading. I also appreciated the idea that the author has no real recipe for her writers to create great writing or to get published. I like how she is just trying to give them the tools they need to excel and the rest of that will fall into place. This resonates with me because when I am tutoring for writing all of the students just want a perfect formula to create the best essay the can, to just then turn in and forget about. But I don’t have those answers, I don’t have the perfect formula to create the most perfect piece of writing anyone has ever seen. And hearing the author say that there is no perfect formula for this really helps me understand the what I am doing, by providing them tools and examples, is enough and will help them create the best work for themselves. Not the best ever, but their best work and that seems to be such an important idea to instill in this writers heads.
I appreciated the reality and honesty of it. I resonate especially with sitting down and writing, and how hard it feels. It’s a lot easier said than done and the way he explains the frustration and blanking on everything you’ve learned your entire life disappears the moment you sit down and tell yourself you’re going to write. Setting a time everyday to write really stuck with me. It seems like something so simple that I’m surprised I never thought of it, but it’s a hard thing to do. She seems to have a lot of experience and expertise in writing with the way she interacts with her students and describes the writing process. I appreciate his humor a lot because writing can be intimidating and scary to do. Nobody wants to write unless it’s good. It’s a hard mentality to let go of. I struggle myself especially with being a perfectionist in my writing. It’s a lot easier to overcome when you approach it with a lighter and more amusing note, maybe even poking fun at yourself. Even a writer like Anne Lamott acknowledges that every first draft is the most horrific thing you’ve ever read.
Reading the beginning of Bird By Bird I appreciate the advise Lamott gives to her students like focusing on the small steps rather than the whole project. Lamott breaks down and explains concepts in an easy understanding way. I also like the reference she made to “Mining a vein of memories” to encourage students to dig deep into their memories and write about a specific time in their lives. To connect writing to a personal experience in their lives makes the piece overall more special and powerful. I feel whiling reading this some of her concepts were teaching me more about writing and will stick with me. I feel this resonates to me because some of my best work in writing was stories connected to a personal experience I’ve had or a core memory. Lamott referencing the idea of having the voices in your head while you try to focus and giving techniques to push them away really helps me because I deal with that all the time. Trying to focus on one story and one piece while a bunch of second thoughts or different ideas pop in my head and take me off track of my goal. As we continue to read Bird By Bird I feel we will gain not only a better understanding of writing but being able to to tell a story in different perspectives and approaches that’ll attract and draw more audience.
Immediately, I appreciated the honesty that the author displayed. The author was very clear about the intensity of writing, the difficulty of the process and was able to be consistently clear about their point.
Out of this week’s reading, one piece of advice that stuck out to me was the idea that narrower moments allow detail to be explored further in depth and often lead to more fruitful imagery. The author did an excellent job of broadening the detail and zooming in on specific pieces in a way that kept the reader/myself interested and made the reading a visual experience that engaged the five senses.
This reading resonated with me in more ways than one. In particular, one of my favorite quotes that truly described how I often feel as a writer was on page 8. of “Bird By Bird” by Anne Lamott. The quote touched upon the difficulty of writing as follows, “It feels like you just have to keep getting out of your own way so that whatever wants to be written can use you to write it.” I found this example to be one of motivation; for it displayed the truth about the writing process in the sense that your mind can be your biggest obstacle as well as your greatest tool.
Lamott begins her instructions to us young and impressionable writers by telling us that “Good writing is about telling the truth.” (pg.3) Immediately I am at odds with this. Are we meant to tell “the” truth, or “a” truth? She tells us to “not worry about doing it well,” (pg.4) but what if our truth isn’t well? My truth may be ugly, and maybe I can tell it well, but it is ugly, and I want to hide it. She reassures me that “you own what happened to you,” (pg.6) and I do understand that my ugly truths are me. They are what happened to me. This brings me comfort, and this scares me too. It is like she speaks directly to me when she says “You are desperate to communicate,” and oh, how I am. I want this load off me, I want to be free of my ugliness, and my pain. She is right, I am desperate to communicate the agony that lives in me. I am ready to let it go. I ask myself how, and by the end of this chapter I discover that the answer is already within me, waiting to be written. Lamott didn’t have to tell me this, she already knows that I know.
I really liked how much Anne Lamott focuses on the process of writing in the first couple of pages. For me, the hardest part about writing is starting to write. In all my years of writing, ever since elementary school, before I start writing a piece I just stare at my paper or laptop thinking about how I should start. The advice Lamott gives of just throwing ideas onto your paper and having that be your first draft is a really good one. I feel like I think too much on my first draft when in reality the first draft is just the foundation for the essay or story. This aspect of writing has always been a problem for me but I feel like I’ve improved on this aspect in recent years.
The part about obsessing over writing also stuck out to me. I find myself doing this a lot, mostly to my own detriment. Whenever I have a writing assignment, I fall into the trap of thinking about it in bed before falling asleep, causing me to be up for hours later than I’m supposed to. The worst part is that in the morning when I’m actually writing, I always seem to forget my brilliant thoughts from the night before.
I found it really interesting how so many of the students want to be published. I guess it makes sense, the best way to become someone in the writing world is to get your work published. The eagerness to be published and have an agent, like Lamott mentions, can be a crutch to the writing process. Being patient and improving your writing and the process will lead to pieces getting the recognition they deserve.
The author is seemingly taking the expectations of writing, of being successful and making a career out of it, and telling the class that their expectations are not always true. Not everyone will be successful, not everyone will get published, and yet those things aren’t the purpose of writing. Everyone has their own goal, and while there is certainly the motive of monetary gain, a lot of times writing is less focused on the marketability and more on the story it’s trying to tell.
I certainly understand the difficulty with just sitting down to write. I struggled with it for this short story openers assignment. Getting everything else done or having to put it out of your mind for even an hour can be an arduous task. You look at the blank screen and the cursor blinking and wonder what to do. Yet, once I really started typing, I remembered why I love writing so much. The harmony of ideas and noises in your head flowing out of your fingers to the steady taps of the keyboard, making one word, then two, and soon you have a sentence, then a paragraph. Even just writing this seems so… right in a way. Then, I’ll look back on it and discover that it doesn’t make sense or goes on too long and there the process begins again. As the author tells us, writing can be a confusing, frustrating, and rewarding process.
After reading pages 3-15 of ‘Bird by Bird’, two things immediately stuck with me. The first, was the consistency of practice required. The self-acknowledgement of being a ‘writer’ and then committing to practice it, and setting a time for exercising this everyday. I think what I mean for this, the consistency in writing, making it a daily discipline, or like actually manifesting it, yourself as writer, as opposed to a somewhat vague but embedded notion I have of kind of writer in a blur of manic and intuitive frenzy.
The second thing that stuck with me, was that writing, or being a writer, is not about the end result, i.e. ‘getting published’, but rather writing in and of itself. Having the passion and practice, kind of comes from you and out of you, and not at you – or in some sort of external form of ‘making it’, i.e. getting published. This divergence of the two, or separation of, is hugely important and potent, and is something I already think of and grapple with quite often. It is also I think transmutable across many ares of life, especially and pertaining in this case, mostly to the act or forms of creative expression.