While I love working with people and opening them up to possibilities with their writing, I cannot make a person write. But I felt sad.

Writing is such a simple way to tap into our own soul, and yet we often wish to bypass it because it feels too hard, or because we fear what might come onto the page. Like when I was anxious about writing from my inner child: I didn’t want to know how mad at me she was for ignoring her, and how upset she was with some of her childhood experiences.

So, I understood a person ignoring their writing, being “too busy for it, ” puffing up with such importance that they have “no time for that.” After all, what might they write?

However, in not making time to write, whether it is that book you’re trying to lift off the ground, well, it’s just too bad. After all, you are the only one who can do it. If you don’t sit at your computer, or put pen to page, that book will never get done. You will talk about it as you sit in your rocking chair with your false teeth in the glass and your shawl around your shoulders, and you will bemoan it. You will have let yourself down.

Imagine how you’re going to feel when you’re 90. Will you be proud of yourself and for the body of work you’ve left here?

Will you be like my dear friend, Fred Cogswell, (former publisher of Fiddlehead Press) who on his last trip to the hospital, carried with him his 50th manuscript and asked his daughter, Kathleen, to first stop at the post office to mail it to his publisher? He passed away just a few weeks later, but he said that he was “finished” and had nothing more to write. He was 86.  I still read his poetry books and ‘hear’ his words. He took the TIME to write those poems.

Several years ago, I met  Diana Gabaldon at the Surrey Writer’s Conference. Outlander series is based on her books, and they are wonderful to watch. Way back then, she said that she wrote from midnight till 3 in the morning, because when she was starting out, she had three children to raise, a husband to tend to, and a job teaching at a university. But her books are now out in the world. She made the time to honor her ideas!

Will you do the same? Will you feel finished when your time is up? Will you know you’ve made the time to do your work? Will you leave this world the legacy of your poems, stories, and books?

Or… will you say, “I just don’t have the time.”

It is up to you — and only you.

I hope you make the time to write!

Sincerely,

Dr. Melba Burns

So, after a deep breath, I was able to view my sites through new eyes of appreciation. Eric reminded me that it was only my ego that was stressing me out. And he was right. In the past, I have not valued Christmastime, it’s only added more things I need to do. But when he reminded me that this is a season of Peace and Love I was finally able to put my hand on my heart, breathe deeply, and release the tension.

It was also a huge lesson in valuing what I have already written.

I ask you, dear reader, have you discounted what your writing offers to others? Have you taken time to see what you have already done, and to value it? Your writing comes from a deep place within you and has probably taken many hours of precious time to complete a book — so isn’t that worthy of your appreciation?  I think so. I hope this little piece today will remind you to be grateful for what you have written. And to keep on writing.

I just want to say how grateful I am for a good friend like Eric. Now, I can enjoy this season of Peace.

Yep, I was on my deck this morning doing just that. Why? Well, no more beautiful flowers will bloom if I don’t. It’s the way of nature.

Same with us, isn’t it?

Ask yourself, “What dead heads do I need to pull off in my life? What do I need to clean out of my home? What dead heads do I have in my writing?

In your life: Get clarity about your purpose, so that anything you do supports that. For example: If you are taking courses or seminars willy-nilly but they don’t actually further you along the path of your purpose, then clip them off. Let them go. If you find yourself running away from what you most value, then be aware of that. Choose to support your values and drop the aspects that lead you on detours. Let go of any dead heads. (This might refer to some acquaintances you’ve been hanging out with too!)

In your home: Get rid of stuff in your closets that you never use – so there is room for something new, a pair of new slacks, or a lovely top. If your closets are jammed, how could you even fit these new items in there? If magazines are stacked up in piles so high you nearly have to stumble over them, let them go. If you’re sneezing because of all the dust on your tables, take a cloth and clean it up those dust bunnies.

Let the dead heads go.

In your writing: This is often a challenge to yank off the dead heads.

So, how to deal with this issue?

1. Ask, What writing sits currently on my desk?
2. Am I working on it?
3. If not, file it, or cut off the dead heads. If you’ve already put some of those pages into books, then you don’t need to hang onto them. So, shred them.
4. Ah… breathe a sigh of relief at finding a clean space.
5. Ask, “What tugs at my heart? What jazzes me now?”
6. Then, give time to that project. You will think more clearly and your words will be able to flow onto the pages.
7. Acknowledge yourself for a job well done. Look in the mirror and say to yourself, “You are great. You are moving forward in your life now. The dead heads are gone and new blooms can flourish.”
8. Reward yourself. Give yourself a little present for that. Say, a latte at Starbucks, or a new notebook, or pen, or whatever.

When the detritus of these dead heads are plucked off, you will feel stronger, healthier and more joyful. As you move forward, smile and let your good feelings show! More blooms will happen now. Your stories will come to life!

© Melba Burns, Ph.D.

Are you hiding them because you fear you’ll upset one of your family or someone you love?

Have you just not gotten around to writing that story, you know, the one that haunts you, the one you dream about too often – the one that you deeply know you need to tell, because “I don’t have the time?”  Or have you simply tucked it away in the basement of your mind?

How does it feel to have it buried in that trunk under the rafters?

These are questions to ponder – to bother you actually – so you might actually put some of the story on paper.

Ask:  What if I don’t write this?  Won’t I have let myself down?

Ask: What am I waiting for?

 Ask the crucial question that the great French philosopher and poet, Gaston Bachelard (1884 – 1962), asked: “What was it for if I cannot speak it?”

Paraphrased, What was it for if you cannot write it?

I am trying to renew your belief in yourself as a creative being.

The above questions may be ways you can begin to foster that creativity:  to just put your pen on the page, or your fingers on the keys, and trust that what comes out is really okay.  It is you expressing yourself.

Sure, it’s scary to reveal some of your past, so you say, “Wouldn’t it just be better to keep it hidden? Ah, but what about the cost of that?

I spoke with a woman in her 90’s today who told me that her seventy-year-old daughter had a heart attack and nearly died. As this elderly woman shook her head sadly, she whispered to me, “She was always the one who kept everything inside.”

Many of us hold onto our old pain, and where does it go? Into cancer?  Into illness of some sort? Into anger? Into rage?  Where else is it supposed to go if the stuff doesn’t get expressed?

Writing your stories gives an outlet for the pain.

David Whyte, the poet, says to “Turn the pain into a poem.”

Or, simply turn your life experiences into stories – which may become novels.  Then, others could benefit from what you went through.  And you could finally let it go, see it from a new light on the pages, and eventually, rise above it and (if necessary) forgive yourself, or the persons involved. All in all, healing.

Wouldn’t it be better to write your story and let go of the “worst agony,” as Maya Angelou states?  Give it a try.  You might just surprise yourself with what flows onto your pages!

© Melba Burns, Ph.D.