Why Starting A “Blog” Is A Terrible Idea

Posted on April 6, 2015August 2, 2015 by Sarah K Peck

Getting out there on the internet is kind of like making friends as a five-year old.

The internet can be an intimidating place — it’s full of people who seem to write effortlessly and publish often. It’s like they have crowds of people gathering and listening, which makes other people wonder if they’ll ever be able to join in.

Pretty soon the voices of doubt crop up: Why bother? Will you ever get to it? Should you join in at all?

Starting a blog is a wonderful idea, and it’s also a terrible idea. To be clear: you should definitely write, but if you think you should “start a blog,” well, I have some ways to reframe that which are really important.

Everyone wants to write, but a lot of people are scared to.

In every writing seminar I’ve been to — both as a teacher and as a student — the most frequent thing I hear is doubt:

“I want to start a blog, but I’m not sure where to start.”
“I have an idea, but I’m not sure anyone wants to read it.”
“I have too many ideas, so I end up never writing them down!”
“I’ve always wanted to write, but I haven’t started yet.”
“Someone else has already written about what I’ve been meaning to say.”

Why you should write: the magic of the Internet.

Let yourself be found — carve out a second home on the internet.

What do people find when they put your name into the Google machine?

If and when you DO want to connect with others, it’s important to carve out your own “home” on the internet. In the world of Google-ability, we are quickly researching each other in order to learn about their skills and talents.

The good news is that you can own this answer pretty quickly. If you want to craft three articles on a particular topic that’s interesting or a hobby to you (ideally something you’d like to be known for), you can start a Tumblr,Weebly or a WordPress site for free or almost free (less than $50, max, if you want to own a domain name and buy a theme) and post three articles under a header with your name and contact information on it. This can be done in as little as four weeks.

All of a sudden, when someone types in your name, or better yet — the topics you’ve written about — you can now be found. Your ideas can be known.

Resumes are static, and we’re searching for ideas through our web-maze of online information. In today’s world, it’s your job to make yourself “findable.” Put your information onto the web so that search engines — and people, and serendipity — can stumble across it.

Without putting yourself out there, it’s a lot harder to be found.

I get so many emails from people that say, “I was looking for an article about how to improve my writing, or how to write a thank you note, and I started reading your blog and sat down with you for an hour last night. It was so fun to read your thinking.”

By putting my words and ideas into a space where other people can find them, I’ve let myself be found. I can become known for my ideas. If you have an idea and it’s stuck in your head, there isn’t an easy way for anyone to know that you have it. Serendipity comes through connection and collision, and when people can find you and your ideas, possibility sparks.

Now these interactions didn’t happen right away; I blogged for at least six months with only my mother commenting, gently correcting most of my typos and spelling or grammar errors. My sister discovered Grammar Girland gleefully pointed out my mistakes as well, which, as a younger sister, I’m sure delighted her. (I then hired her as my editor for my print projects, which probably made her happy as a clam — now she gets paid to point out all of my mistakes.) There was nothing perfect about my first few essays. Perfect is a pipe dream. There will be people who point out your mistakes, and people who see the bigger picture and connect with you over ideas. Both types of people exist, and you will meet both of them.

Don’t let being afraid of making a mistake stop you from making anything at all.

Start small: create a project, not a life.

The other thing to remember is that some of the best websites aren’t by people who show up every week. You might not have the stamina (or the resources) to enter into a writing relationship that’s indefinite in its time frame or scope. In fact, I think that’s a terrible way to start. For people starting a blog, I recommend thinking of it as a “Project” and not a “Indefinite Relationship.” When you commit to a blog and say to yourself that you’re going to write every week for the next two years, the minute you mess up or miss a week, you’ve essentially failed the project. Who wants to be disappointed that they tried something?

For people starting a blog, I recommend thinking of it as a “Project” and not a“Indefinite Relationship.” When you commit to a blog and say to yourself that you’re going to write every week for the next two years, the minute you mess up or miss a week, you’ve essentially failed the project. Who wants to be disappointed that they tried something?

The alternative, and what I recommend in all of my writing classes, is to create a project that you can do well at, by changing the parameters. Instead of promising an indefinite relationship, drastically reduce it in scope and start with a reasonable project that has a defined ending from the beginning.

When you can close a project successfully and complete it, you’re much more likely to continue on to a phase two or phase three of a project, rather than let it taper off into the land of incomplete projects. You also change the feeling relationship you have with yourself — instead of creating an inevitable failure-situation, with resulting disappointments and twangs, putting pressure to show up in a way that might not be reasonable for you because of all of your various commitments–you’re creating a success situation, where you can end the project within a concrete time frame and still be very happy that you did it at all.

I recommend creating a project that says, “I’d like to talk about _[topic]_ in 4 posts, within the next two months.” Give yourself a start time, and end time, and a quantity. Specify a topic. Perhaps you want to blog about four fabulous meals that you cooked and created. Maybe you want to chronicle your science journey behind the lens of a microscope. Maybe you want to document your notes on a new class you’re taking. You could start a Tumblr with your favorite photos of doorways in your quirky city. The possibilities are endless, but you must pick one small one (and only one).

Don’t believe me? Blake Master’s compilations of Peter Thiel’s lectures is one of my favorite sites to read and there’s a fixed (static) amount of content — 13 lectures — accessible indefinitely for those that want to self-teach and read the series. He’s not adding more content. He’s creating great content and sticking it up in a place for people to find it.

What I find with myself–and others — is that if we try to start too big, we actually fail to start at all.

When we dream the big dream of master projects and hundreds of photographs and best-selling books, many people fail to start because the dream is too big. I’m all for big dreams and goals–and relish in them, dance in them, and visualize them — but when it comes to the implementation, start with something small enough to do in a day or a week. Want to write a best-selling book or post? Start by researching your ideas, one at a time, in short posts. You can collect them later. In fact, the short pieces will serve as your building blocks for the bigger pieces.

Almost everyone I know that’s created something big started one, small, tiny step at time.

Bottom line recommendation? Create a fixed, small project that’s do-able within a time frame of less than 3 months.

Start writing — right now:

My takeaways for you? Build yourself an “internet home,” even if it’s only to enjoy making something by yourself.

I’m biased — I think we should all participate in this new form of community space, this digital world where we can place our creations. If you’re wavering about creating something, let me be clear: I think it’s time for you to join in.

To make it easy on yourself, start small. Pick one topic or project that you’re interested in, and make a small commitment to create a collection of pieces–drawings, ideas, words, notes, stories, essays, paintings, photos, or other–around this topic.

Give yourself a deadline of 3 months or less (ideally one month). And finish it.

What happens? It gives you something to point to. It’s a reference point for the future. It’s a means towards executing your projects. It’s a way to start a conversation. And it’s a way to do the things you’ve been talking (or thinking) about doing.

And best-case scenario? You get to meet a few people along the way who like talking about what you’re doing.

Is it time to join in?

If you’ve been thinking about joining the online conversation, or dreaming of starting a blog, website, or publishing more, it’s time to start.

The goal isn’t to have the loudest voice on the internet. It’s to have a voice: your voice. The point of writing is not to just to publish for someone else: Writing and storytelling are about developing a relationship with your voice and ideas. It’s about finding and practicing ways of expressing your ideas to yourself, and then to others.

It’s an incredible place. I hope you’ll join in.

Ten Ways to Use Storytelling to Improve Your Ability to Connect and Communicate

Posted on February 26, 2015August 2, 2015 by Sarah K Peck

Humans are born storytellers. The way we tell and share our stories about who we are, what we do, and what we want. This, in turn, affects who sees us, hears about us, and whether or not the right people connect with us.

When you want to learn how to describe yourself or your business, people look to storytelling as a way to improve their core message. But what is storytelling? And how do you actually get better at it? The word is vague and yet so appealing — but it can be difficult to know where to start, and how to use what you learn in your everyday practice.

This section will look at some of the core truths about stories and storytelling — and I’ll share a few tools that are practical and that you can implement quickly for many communication needs, ranging from a personal biography to the description of your company.

Storytelling is a fundamental human tool that we all do innately — but over time, we’ve been bombarded with terrible examples of storytelling that aren’t good models to look to. Our brains are wired for storytelling — because it helps us learn, explore, and retain information through second- and third-hand experiences.

What are stories and who tells them?

Stories are innately human: everyone is a born storyteller.

When you recount events that you’ve done — even the simple sentence as you walk through the door, “You won’t believe what just happened — first I went to the grocery store, then…” — your ears prick up. You’ve set up the most basic form of a story: do you know what it is?

Here’s another example — “The beach was dark and quiet. It was eerie — the moon was dark and someone had turned off all the lights on the boardwalk. Alison felt uneasy as she stepped nervously out into the dark. Who had turned out all the lights?”

Both of these examples use a very specific form of storytelling that we’re all hardwired to understand. Do you know what it is?

I’ll explain it today as we deconstruct storytelling. But first, I want to debunk a few myths about storytelling. Somehow we think that only an elite few can be storytellers, and it’s a skill that we don’t have.

Common storytelling principles:

#1: Everyone is a storyteller.

It’s sometimes thought that storytelling is limited to an elite few, or a professional clique. In reality, that’s not true—all humans are born storytellers, and we’re born to look for, hear, and describe our world in stories. Children are born telling stories — in fact, we play for exactly this reason. Play is our built-in mode of imagining the future and the past. In telling stories, and playing make-believe, we’re able to learn at a much faster pace than if we had to rely only on our own experience.

We are learning creatures. We learn by experience — and through our imagination. When something good happens to us, that’s a reward. When something bad happens, there’s a punishment. These incentives teach us over time. In stories, we get to pick up and enter into the landscape of someone else’s learning — and learn for ourselves, even though we may be sitting in one place, not moving. When someone comes back to us and says, “Avoid Atlantic avenue, it’s crazy full of traffic,” we select a different route because we got information — and a story – about someone else’s experience.

#2: We tell stories to connect, dream, and imagine.

We use storytelling to connect inwardly to ourselves, outwardly towards others, and to imagine futures. Humans spend up to four hours per day inside of imaginary landscapes — in daydreams, thoughts, visualizations, and places beyond the present. We live in a world of stories.

#3: Stories are how we are hardwired.

Prior to written language, we had to keep important information about the world around us, somehow. We’ve constructed melodies, songs, and other modes of storing information. Is it any coincidence that “storing” and “storytelling” are related? We are hardwired to remember cause and effect relationships — I saw a spider, that spider killed my friend, spiders are bad. “REMEMBER THIS!” Shouts your brain.

In research in The Storytelling Animal by Jonathan Gottfried, he talks about how we actually make up stories all the time, whenever we see two events happening. If we see a group of women and they’re all wearing tiny shorts, we might tell as story to ourselves about how they are all going to the beach. In research on people with their two brain hemispheres segmented or separated, they discover that our brains actually wire stories into our minds when presented two pieces of information. This brings us to idea #4.

#4: A story is what you take with you.

In any situation or setting, a story is what you take with you. When giving a presentation or sharing your brand or idea, what someone walks away with is the story. They’ve taken all the information they’ve been given and distilled it into the easiest parts to remember.

Bonus tip #1 — at conferences and in introductions. At a conference, if you babble and ramble when introducing yourself to people, they’ll forget most of what you said. If you string it into a story, and you keep it simple, people will be able to take that with you. You don’t need to get all the perfect information into one sentence; in fact, being imperfect can prompt likability and curiosity!

A quick and easy test for how good your story is is to listen in to what’s being said. Introduce yourself to someone, and then listen to when they introduce you. I’ll often keep it simple — I focus on writing and swimming, and I’ll say, “I work as a writer; I teach writing, and I’m also an open-water swimmer.”

When I’m being introduced, Clay leans over and grabs his friend and says, “You gotta meet Sarah, she’s a swimmer!” — I listen to what people hang on to.

A story is what you take with you. Listen to what people catch from your descriptions, and guide your story towards what people naturally keep bringing up!

#5: We are surrounded by far too many examples of bad storytelling — powerpoints, inadequacy marketing, and droll presentations have numbed our innate ability to tell stories.

Unfortunately, we’re surrounded by terrible examples of storytelling. In Story Wars, by Jonah Sachs, he talks about all the sins of modern storytelling — from Vanity to Authority and more. Basically, the last century of mass broadcasting let the leaders in charge of storytelling get lazy. There’s too much talking about yourself, not listening to the audience, and shouting lists. Technology (like powerpoint) even encourages bad storytelling by putting bullets and lists as the mode of operation.

#6: When you sell anything — yourself, a brand, a business — you tell a story.

When you sell things, you tell a story. It’s not about the thing at hand — lists are bad. Think about a toothbrush. You’re not selling a plastic stick with a bunch of flexible bristles on it. You’re selling the idea of a cleaner mouth. Why is that clean mouth important?

Think about Listerine: you’re not selling a bottle of alcohol, you’re selling … a date. The ability to be well-liked. Advertisements are stories about who you are and who you should be, and they want to capitalize on something deeper than the physical thing that they are selling. What do they believe about human nature? What story are they telling you, implied or otherwise?

How you can improve your storytelling today.

#7: Your English teacher was right — it is about “showing” versus “telling.”

Too often we jump straight to the point. “It was the hardest day of my life.” “The thing is, simplicity matters.” “Never underestimate the power of a good friend.”

Whatever your core philosophical statement, usually it’s often unsaid. Just like the toothbrush examples before, the point of your story isn’t to beat someone over the head with the idea, but rather to SHOW it through lots of vivid detail and an example that highlights your core philosophy. For example —

[It was the hardest day of my life.] vs: I’d just finished a fourteen hour shift in the cement factory. I had no idea what my dad did, so that summer I signed up to join him at work. Three days in, and I could barely lift my hands. My forearms burned, and my calves were shot from jumping in and out of the trucks. I’d probably lifted more than a hundred sacks of cement mix in and out of the truck.

[Never underestimate the power of a good friend.] vs: I’d just found out that my grandmother had passed, and I couldn’t make it home in time. My job had closed the week before, our office putting up the ‘for sale’ sign after more than 8 months in the red. On the bus ride home through the foggy drizzle of Portland’s grey fall days, I wondered how I could pay for groceries for the rest of the week. As I got off the bus, I saw someone sitting on my stoop. Probably another homeless person, I muttered, thinking I’d be one soon myself. As I got closer, I saw that it was Alex, holding two bags of Indian food takeout. He wrapped me in a big hug. “I thought that you could use this today,” he explained, pointing to the food. “Let’s eat.”

#8: Detail, detail, detail. The environment matters — because you’re telling someone about a world they’re imagining through your descriptions.

Great storytelling is about detail — but a specific kind of detail. How do you set the stage and the context for what’s happening? What does it feel like to be you? Stories immerse us in an event far away from where we are, catapulting us into a new time and space. Key descriptions anchor us into this new space through the use of all of the senses — smell, sight, touch, taste, sound, texture, even kinesthetics. Begin by describing the world around you, in vivid sensory detail. The English language has thousands of words to describe the subtle differences in texture and weight and material. Tell the story of what the world looks like. Great fiction books often begin with these details — take a look at 1984 or Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance for great opening scenes that write about detail.

With written narrative, all we have are words — versus in film, where we can show rich detail through visual imagery. In writing, all we have are words — and choosing words and describing the environment and scene, in detail, is what brings someone into your story.

#9: Introduce conflict — by using the “bait” method.

Here’s a secret about the human brain: we all like to be smart. We like to figure things out, and know the answers to things. Whenever we are presented with a puzzle, we like seeing if we can figure it out before someone else does.

In storytelling, a great way to engage your audience is to add a teaser at the beginning. By using a little bit of bait, you stoke the curiosity in your listener’s mind. Ira Glass talks about this often, and if you introduce a story with an underlying question (like “the house was eerily dark,” or “it was a different night than any other,”) the listener begins to wonder why it was so dark, or why the night was different.

This “curiosity gap” between a piece of information that asks a question, and the story that resolves the question, helps the reader stay engaged and curious about the story. A little bit of conflict introduces a puzzle to be fixed!

#10: Shorter is often better. Keep it simple!

At the end of the day, a story is what you take with you — and we don’t remember every detail of every story, but rather, the highlights real. When you’re presenting your idea, biography, or product, start with something short and sweet.

Conclusions and take-aways: journaling and practice.

What did you take away from this introduction to storytelling? How can you change your story to make it sweeter, simpler, and easier to understand?

Here are a few ways to take your work forward in your journal and practice:

Practice: how can you write a one-sentence description of who you are that’s super simple? What three keywords or nouns would you use to describe you? Think of it as a gift to your audience — the less you say, the more they can remember.
Writing exercise: describe your environment, in vivid detail. What is the shape of the space that you are in? What does it smell like, taste like, sound like?
Bookmark 10 great “About” pages that you love and highlight what stands out to you. What techniques and styles are used that you particularly admire?
Take a quick look at your email inbox (but don’t get lost in it!). Take a screen shot of your inbox and print it out. Highlight what’s already been read, and what you’ve skipped. Are there any themes? Look at what you click — which email titles are stories? Which ones are boring? What do you skip over? Your inbox is a great case-study for clues to how storytelling works in your everyday life. What can you learn?

PS: My new course on Content Marketing — how to grow your audience, understand your customers, and publish content that actually gets shared — goes live this Thursday, February 26th. We have 3,801 people signed up on the early-access list, and we’re opening up a limited number of spaces for 48 hours. If you want to join us, take a look and sign up for the early access list!

Have you changed your narrative lately?

Posted on October 21, 2014 by Sarah K Peck

As I wander through cities, one of the things I look for is evidence of fresh construction. Cities are living, breathing, pulsating organisms, and a great indicator of change is the number of cranes you can see dotting the skyline. In San Francisco, new construction emerges when the lack of residential units becomes absurd; in my new neighborhood in Brooklyn, new housing developments are popping up on vacant lots every few months.

Everything is always changing, even if we aren’t looking for it.

You have trillions of cells in your body, one of my yoga teachers reminds me. And your cells live, grow, and die and replace themselves every seven years. Every seven years we become an entirely new collection of cells. And in our personal and professional lives, metamorphoses happen even quicker. Your narrative changes every two, three, four years. You were a college student—then you weren’t. You were responsible for only yourself—and then you became a parent.

Every seven years our physical bodies completely regenerate. How often do we renew our stories of self?

Your narrative is always changing.

It’s easy to cling to a story, even if it doesn’t serve us anymore. It’s harder to shed the layers of past selves and emerge into a new narrative. The transition can be awkward, abrupt, or bumpy.

As things move and shift, you’re learning, iterating, growing, changing. You’re new to twitter and then, months later … you’re not. No one is listening to your blog, and then, some time later, people are listening. You’re embedded in the flush of a new job, thrilled to be working on your project, and then, a few years later, you’re tired. Ready for the next project, story, or idea.

Don’t cling too hard to your old narratives. Instead, build new ones. Grow into future ones.

When you’re a new employee, the biggest thing you don’t know yet is that you’re only in the entry level category for a short time before new faces come along and you’ve got to hand your bag of tricks over to the new staff. That management you’re secretly griping about? That’s you, really soon. Trying your best to do better, and learning the reasons why it’s so tough to implement your ideals. At the end of my twenties, just a brush away from my thirties, I realized with somewhat of a start that I graduated from college 9 years ago –

What? NINE years ago?

People were asking me questions that I had answers to — and many that I didn’t. I knew a lot, and yet there was so much more I wanted to learn.

You are, until you aren’t.

You aren’t, and then you are.

In my work with storytellers, educators, corporate leaders, and innovators, one of the things we do is unearth their current narratives — and watch people rebuild. Michael Margolis reminds me that “as you tell your story, your story moves.” When we take pen to paper, when we sit with friends, when we convene and collect and talk about what we’re doing — our story changes.

The act of expressing your story helps set your past narratives free. The act of imagining your future narrative helps you grow and transition into your next iteration of who you are.

We grow through story, and we grow into our story. Your narrative is changing.

What stories can you retire?

Who are you becoming next?

Writing exercise: get out a sheet of paper and write down as many stories and scripts that you carry around with you. Your age, what you believe in, how you explain who you are and what you do. Are there any that can be changed? Anything new emerging? Write down stories of your next, wiser, growing self. Who are you becoming?

PS: For everyone who’s interested in working on their writing and storytelling, I’ve got a surprise coming out in the next few weeks — if you’re on my mailing list, I’ll send you a note when my big surprise goes live!

Why is moving so hard? The struggle to lighten up, give up, and let go.

Posted on July 26, 2014July 28, 2014 by Sarah K Peck

Moving out — moving on

“Have nothing in your homes that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” — William Morris.

Everything changes.

I just emptied an apartment full of furniture, things, stories, and stuff. I carried couches, desks, and pieces of furniture up and down (and up and down) many flights of stairs across hilly San Francisco. I donated 600 books and gifted them to friends across the city.

Moving is so freeing and yet so hard.

And I wrapped up a life living in this beautiful home, this beautiful city, with so many good friends.

“We’re making space for new adventures,” my husband reminded me. “Don’t keep anything you don’t remember you had in the first place.”

But it’s so hard. The labor of moving everything. The memories.

Moving is exhausting. The energy of lifting, analyzing, purging, and letting go — it’s no small task. When I got overwhelmed recently in the pile of stuff that somehow accumulates around one’s home, I went online in a desperate plea to my minimalist friends — “Help!” I said, “How do I do this?”

Joshua wrote back a simple truth — and it made me laugh:

“You are not your dishtowel.” — Joshua Fields Millburn

Right. Right!

I am not my things.

I get to keep the stories, the memories, the transformation. My life is not a couch. My memories are not held inside of a sofa.

When I got back to New York this weekend, I decided to continue the cleansing: we piled up four more bags of books and clothes and cleaned out our home. More and more, I’m inspired by lightness, ease, minimalism, and letting go — letting go of past stories, details, habits, and junk.

Why do we each need to keep our own personal bookshelves? If I need a book in the future, I’ll borrow it or get a digital copy. I trust that the world will have this information, regardless of whether or not I house the words within my own tiny square-foot home. I do not need to own hundreds of books to continue to thirst for knowledge.

“There are two ways to be rich: One is by acquiring much, and the other is by desiring little.” — Jackie French Koller.

“Simplicity involves unburdening your life, and living more lightly with fewer distractions that interfere with a high quality life, as defined uniquely by each individual.” — Linda Breen Pierce

What is the weight of holding on to all these “things”?

Plus: what is the weight of carrying around a hundred books I haven’t read yet? The oppressive weight of “should” on my shelf must hold substantial weight in my mind, pinning me down to past wishes, thoughts, and dreams.

What if I free up that shelf space — mental, physical, karmic? Send those books to places they will be loved and cherished, rather than collecting dust in my own life? Root to rise, my yoga mantra. My roots come from my community, my connections, my spirit. My rise comes from weightlessness, expansiveness, ease. If I hold on to unread books, I hold on to unfinished committments. A bookcase full of shoulds and one-days and look at what you haven’t done staring down at me in my morning meditation.

“Any half-awake materialist well knows – that which you hold holds you.” — Tom Robbins.

The sadness of leaving + the freedom of space.

As I prepared to leave San Francisco, my home — my only permanent residence for most of my waking life — I kept tearing up about the friends and the people I would miss. Would giving up my home and apartment mean I could never come back? And then my friend Leah reminded me that I’ll always be back. The cool whispers of San Francisco’s foggy oceans will also be one of my homes.

“You’re family here. We’ll have space for you whenever you return. It’s not about the couch. Just come, whenever you want. It can be easy.”

And I remember that I get to keep all the stories, all the memories. I so grateful to this beautiful coastal city and to the rich community of people I have met over the years. I love it here.

And I love what’s next, even if I have no idea what it is.

Let go of what’s not serving you, even if it’s as innocuous as books. Make space for your future self.

To adventure, creative living, the sharing economy, and change.

And as Carol Pearson writes, to a new story, to a new narrative:

“Most of us are slaves of the stories we unconsciously tell ourselves about our lives. Freedom begins the moment we become conscious of the plot line we are living and, with this insight, recognize that we can step into another story altogether.” —Carol S. Pearson, The Hero Within

To an adventure. To freedom.

For more quotes on simplicity and minimalism, check out Joshua Becker’s list of inspiring quotes on minimalism — many of which I used as part of this essay.

The Writer’s Workshop is now open for our summer session! Join us for the next class—and kickstart your writing into high gear.

Posted on May 5, 2014May 5, 2014 by Sarah K Peck

It’s baaaaack! The Writer’s Workshop will open up again this summer for a brand-new six-week session beginning June 30th.

The Writer’s Workshop is a live course focused on improving your storytelling, writing, and narrative abilities through eight masterful lectures and exercises — together with a community of co-writers to share the journey. We interview experts across the industry in marketing, communications, blogging, and book creation — and send YOU on a journey to dig into your own inner creative.

This time around, there are a few changes and additions:

Now that almost 100 people have taken the course, we’ve gotten excellent feedback, tips to make the program even stronger, and rave reviews from students. Here’s what you get—and what’s changing:

In the upcoming summer session, I’m adjusting the course to become a six-week program.

Also, the Writer’s Workshop will be available at three access points—to make it both more affordable for more people. There is a self-paced budget option for people who want to do the course on their own; a live class where we get to meet each other and join forces with all the alumni in the program (my favorite part!), and a private, closed Writer’s Circle for just a small group of people to receive more personalized attention and coaching.

Both the Writer’s Workshop and Content Strategy will run again this summer, beginning June 30—check out the course pages for full details and how to register.

Who is this course for?

This course is perfect for people with aspiring creative writing dreams; professionals looking at improving their communication skills for a day job; bloggers who want to improve their craft; or people with an existing writing practice who want to meet other like-minded people.

“Improving your writing means you can improve your relationships, improve your work, and get more of what you want.”

We are all writers.

The idea that writing is a separate tool or skill from other skills is a myth that needs to be debunked. We should all be excellent communicators—because the more powerfully we can convey our ideas, the more we can achieve.

Improving your writing means you can improve your relationships (through better inter-personal communication), improve your work (by getting better at describing what you do), and get what you want (by better articulating what you want).

“Sarah combines her experience in athletics, writing, and design to teach in a relatable way that inspires growth. This course not only evolves the way you think and create, but helps you hone your sales and persuasion skills. So, you come away with a fresh set of tools and the know-how to apply them to your business, career, or creative projects. Two words: do it.” — Matt Hunckler

“Her content is always thought-provoking and will force you to confront the challenge of executing your best ideas. She studies where great ideas come from and helps individuals and businesses do great work.” — Cycle 1 participant.

What will you need?

You’ll need an inquisitive mind and a curiosity about how to improve your writing ability. The course works best if you bring an open-mind and a gentle countenance—behind the doors we like to create a warm, respectful atmosphere for collaboration and creation. You’ll need about three hours per week for coursework, an hour to watch videos, and anywhere from three to five hours to work on your writing projects. In the past, students have set up time in the evenings and on the weekends to do the course—it’s best to plan ahead and carve out a few hours for your work to get the most out of the class.

Limited pre-enrollment closes May 25th:

Class begins on June 30th — and early-bird enrollment closes May 25th. Early bird registrations get a $100 discount off of either the registration for the live class or the self-guided class.

Can’t wait to see the new class!

Want to be a better storyteller? Two new online workshops, April 24th and 29th.

Posted on April 18, 2014April 18, 2014 by Sarah K Peck

Humans are born storytellers. The way we tell and share our stories about who we are, what we do, and what we want affects who sees us, hears about us, and whether or not the right people connect with us.

If you want to learn how to describe yourself or your business (or both), join me at one of the following live storytelling workshops.

I’ve taught storytelling and narrative writing workshops live across the country—from the World Domination Summit to Bold Academy to General Assembly, and now I’m teaching two of these workshops as live online webinars that you can access from anywhere. Previously these workshops were only offered in person—if you’ve wanted to attend a class (or you’re curious about the upcoming writer’s workshops), join this one-day class.

Join me on Thursday, April 24 and Tuesday, April 29 for two 90-minute sessions on storytelling, narrative, and psychology.

“One of the best classes I’ve ever taken at General Assembly.” — Craig, General Assembly workshop participant

“Amazing class. I learned so much—left with pages packed full of notes.” — Joel, WDS workshop participant.

Storytelling 1.0: Crafting narratives for individuals and businesses. Thursday, April 24th, 1pm EST. $30.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN: This introductory class will cover narrative form and storytelling tools that are practical and quickly implementable for many communication needs ranging from a personal biography to the description of your company. Understand the role of your audience; the psychology of your readership, and why asking certain questions will make storytelling much easier.

You’ll learn how to dissect the various mediums where messages are told, how to modify your story based on the place you’re telling it; how to identify your values and your audience’s values, and the power of lyrical descriptions in your story. We’ll also cover basic psychological principles of understanding and why this is important for how you craft your message.

HOW IT WORKS: This private online webinar will be hosted LIVE at 1PM EST. The webinar includes 90-minutes of lecture, visual, and presentation materials followed by 30-minutes of open question-and-answer sessions—ask anything you’d like and get feedback on your story + listen in to the questions of others!

Can’t make it live? The webinars will be recorded with a private link of the recording sent out to all participants.

PREPARATION: Bring pens, paper, and notebooks to write on. Bring a draft of your current biography and/or business description (you’ll be asked to re-write it during the webinar based on the key principles we cover).

Register here: Storytelling 1.0: Live Webinar, Thursday, April 24th 1—3pm EST. $30.

“Sarah goes over five different frameworks for how to tell stories — this was the first time the Hero’s Journey really made sense to me in a modern context.” —Anne S.

“I never thought about how important value systems were to storytelling—once she described it, it was a huge “Ah-ha” moment for me. Now I know which stories to tell when.” — Jeremy H.

“The simple idea that we all have many stories to tell took a lot of the pressure off—we don’t need to pick just one story. We can switch them out based on our audience and the medium.” — Leslie.

Storytelling 2.0: Leadership, sticky messages and the psychology of persuasion. Tuesday, April 29th 1pm EST. $30.

ABOUT THIS CLASS: This second session of the two-part storytelling series can be taken independently or in conjunction with Storytelling 1.0. In this class, we look at the stories that great leaders use to inspire; why (and how) to use emotion in your stories, and the persuasive benefits of a great story. This class includes a deeper dive into case studies of great stories (and not-so-great stories) to better grasp the concepts. In our time together, I’ll even show how Finding Nemo can teach us how to engage audiences from the beginning of your story with clever hooks and curiosity gaps.

Can’t make it live? The webinars will be recorded with a private link of the recording sent out to all participants.

Register here: Storytelling 2.0: Live Webinar, Tuesday, April 29 1—3pm EST. $30.

“It makes so much sense—leadership stories are different than other stories, because the objectives are different. Now I can see how people tell future-based stories and I realize how powerful they are.” — Sam

“This class takes a deep dive into your own personal Hero’s Journey narratives based on the work of Carol Pearson—I finally understood how I was living out my own Orphan narrative. This class was better than therapy.” —(Anonymous).

“Sarah is one of the warmest and kindest people I know. Work with her, she will be a change-maker and an incredibly valuable asset to your team or life.” — Jana Schuberth, Owner, Love Work Now

Desire, Feelings, and Inner Softness: Why Is It So Hard To Feel Good? The Desire Map, by Danielle LaPorte

Posted on December 2, 2013January 6, 2016 by Sarah K Peck

1. A confession.

The first time I picked up my copy of Danielle LaPorte’s Desire Map I could hardly finish it. I watched as social posts flickered in my online vision, people talking about its brilliance and I wondered why I couldn’t handle it. Personally, I wanted to throw it against the wall. It took me a long time before I picked it up again.

Lost in the throes of a job I didn’t want and a life I didn’t love—coming out of a relationship that didn’t work, and a body that failed me, I couldn’t stand it. How did I want to feel?

How did I want to feel?

I wanted to feel anything but the way that I was feeling.

Desire lights the way home, but it asks you to do something important first: it asks you to look inside and examine your feelings.

And that, shit, that’s hard.

2. It can be easy.

Wait, what? But it’s hard.

Yes, it can be easy.

At first, this sentence will make you laugh. It might make you angry. It made me angry.

Because when you’re in the middle of it, when you’ve tried everything you can and you’re working 12-14 hour days and working a few more hours at the end and you still don’t have enough money, when your fat cells congeal in your ass from sitting too long, when you cry alone in a garage because it’s the only place you can afford to live, having someone tell you it can be easy can be maddening.

It’s not fucking easy! You sputter. You laugh. You reach, reach, reach for the thing that makes you feel better right now, because the truth of the matter is that she’s actually right, as are many of the philosophers that talk about the root of desire within our souls,– right about how what you want, what you desperately crave is to feel the feelings of desire, ambition, pleasure… you want to feel good again.

You want to feel what you want to feel. You crave it, want it, need it.

But then, I didn’t want what I had, and all I wanted was to feel less pain and less hurt and less dissatisfaction and so I did everything I could not to feel.

How did I want to feel?

3. A rant against feelings.

Hated it, I hated it, and I just
didn’t want what I had, so
I did everything in my power
To numb it, to stop it, to prevent it,
God-damn-it, I just don’t want to feel this way any more … I whispered,
tears falling on the outside of my
heart, drops dripping across my ribs, well,
I just don’t want to feel anything.

We’ll run from pain, run as fast as we can into the open arms of
Whatever’s waiting for us that
Tells us we’ll feel better,
Even if feeling better simply means
Not feeling anything at all.

The unbearable lightness of being
Or rather the weight,
the heaviness of wanting to disappear, and
What it felt like under the
Heavy oppressive fatigue
Of loans-bills-obligations-parental-expectations,
job application denials, denials, denials,
to-do lists layered all up in post-its,
tangible reminders of what I hadn’t done and
who I wasn’t and how
miserably I was failing;

Thoughts about what I could and should and would do
If I could only just escape
Escape this hell of daily
monotony, droll dissatisfaction, loss.

I called my coach, my listless voice tacking across the telephone into her ear,
goals rolling out at half speed,
Alarmed, she interrupted me and said,
Sarah, Sarah, Oh Sarah,
First, let’s get you to

Sleep;

You are chasing ambition that can’t serve you right now;
a list of things that won’t help,
Let’s pause, pause.
Sink into what your body needs.
We’ll get there, she murmured quietly,
You don’t have to prove anything today
First, let’s unwind. It’s okay
to let go. To be here, right now.

It’s okay to be here right now.

4. Pain is a teacher.

Pain is the corner of our soul, our own personal life coach,
Talking to us through the crannies of our bodies,
Squishing through our insides,
Reaching out, clawing at our skin from the inside,
ripping at our hearts and minds and
often shouting insistently,

HEY, HELLO, and HELP! And
I’M LOST INSIDE OF WHAT YOU’RE DOING,
and then, sitting back, depressed,
why won’t you listen?
This is not the way.

And these feelings are the only thing your soul’s got to
Tell you that something has to change.
Will you listen?

This feeling, this desire, this pain,
This cutting, terrible, thick block
wrapped up against your chest
It’s a voice, a chant, a prayer, a desire
From your soul.

Yes, here we are again,
Desire, it’s a funny thing.
Desire…

And this desire leads us home.

Yes, it really does.

5. The difference between mind-numbing and feeling.

It’s not easy, digging into this emotional work, but you have a choice: you can continue to build up defenses and safety nets, numbing yourself with security and short-term solutions,

OR,

You can FEEL. You can feel what’s going on, and sit into the turmoil and strangeness and discomfort that is, quite simply, your body telling you a story.

When we have pain, we often try to hide from it or run from it. The discomfort of a job that doesn’t fit, of a relationship that isn’t right–your body knows.

And when it starts to feel bad, that’s your soul, speaking up. It’s saying to you, “Hey, there’s more to me than this. I am so bright, and so full, and so capable, and I need to grow past this and bigger than this. We’ve got to leave what we’re currently in so I can be stronger and bigger and brighter.”

When the soul speaks up, it often looks like a scary story, so at first we try to avoid it, because it sounds like:

“Drop everything you know, and walk away.”

And so, when I first picked up the Desire Map, I hated it.

The hardest thing was the most simple: Danielle asked me to feel.

And in a world that’s so primed on not feeling and hiding our feelings and distractions and numbing and avoiding, I struggled. I was mad. I was really, really sad. Things hurt. Things weren’t working inside. Things weren’t working inside.

My crutches–alcohol, caffeine, mind-numbing television at night, running and running and running–were what I had to cope.

I didn’t know how I wanted to feel. I wanted not to feel. Asking me how I wanted to feel hurt. Burned. It felt terrible. When I picked up the book and had to confront an onslaught of feelings–to acknowledge feelings at all–I didn’t like it. (That’s the kind way of saying it.)

I cried under the covers and felt a raw ache in the center of my stomach. My eyes felt hollow and sunken in, my pants didn’t fit. I wore all black and barely made it to work on time, sometimes an hour late. I pulled sugar out of the cabinets and put as much of it as I could into my mouth while watching television late into the evening, impressive shows like The Biggest Loser and America’s Next Top Model. I drank entire bottles of wine and loved the feeling of being drunk. I put on glittery clothes and went to as many parties as I could go to. Sometimes I’d get home and sit on the bottom of the stairs and weep. Climbing them took too long.

What the fuck is this shit, I’m sure I said.

Feelings.

6. The process of getting to the good feelings.

For me and desire mapping, I’ve realized that there is a process to it all.

Sometimes the pre-requisite to getting to the great feelings is acknowledging all the shitty feelings that might currently be present. To get to the good ones, you gotta start where you are. You really can’t start anywhere else. And it can be a messy, painful, difficult unfolding process. It might not be easy right now.

I’m convinced, now, that this is part of the unfolding process.

To feel the root of desire, you first have to feel.

When you cut off the layers of plaque that hold you back, you can shine more brightly.

There’s plaque lining the outside of each of our souls. We build plaque and tartar through life’s wear and tear. We build resistance and protection.

But the current pain is temporary. It’s the space through. Lean into the fire, and walk into the fear, and embrace it. The shaking and stirring is part of the recipe for your greater truth.

There is love and kindness on the other side. Be brave. Love yourself. Be kind to yourself. Embrace this transformation.

Chip and chisel away at the armor that protected you in the past. You don’t need it anymore. You can be bigger and brighter. I know it. And somewhere inside, you know it, too.

7. Bringing desire to light: a roadmap for your soul.

I picked up the book again, the map, the program.

And begrudgingly wrote down what I wanted, what I wanted to feel.

There was a key distinction: not what I thought I wanted to feel. Words that I thought I should feel tumbled out, like intelligent and accomplished and satisfied.

Yet my soul whispered Sarah, I’m too tired, in reply.

I dug a little deeper. What did my mind and body and spirit and soul want, right now, in this exact moment? At this point last year, all I wanted to do was sink into a bed of restful bliss, sweet dreams, and a pile of cotton candy so high I’d be able to drift off into a beautiful rest. I dreamed of Mexico vacations and sandy beaches and warmth. My pulse jumped a little when I wandered by McDonald’s and I saw the kiddie grounds with piles of balls. Sinking in… I wanted to rest.

I wanted sleep. I wanted to feel peace.

I wanted freedom.

As I wrote, my ego started furiously correcting me,
Insisting that these little words weren’t
Torches enough to light the proper path,

I needed to be chasing things like Success and Prosperity and Wealth and Fame.

And I laughed,
As much as you can laugh from the belly of your bed buried under covers of tears,
Said, fuck it, you know, right now,
I gotta let go,

All I want right now is

Peace, freedom, quiet, and joy, rest,
And movement in my body.
Joy, I’d like a bit more joy.

These words became my torch for a terrible winter, a slow process to guide me through decisions, a wayfinding map out of the darkness of burnout and fatigue.

As the world swirled up around me, coaxing my cracked mind and ego with invitations, I used these words as sign-posts for decision making for the current period.

Rest, Joy, Movement, Freedom.

Those became the framework for my decisions for the six long, dark, cold winter months where I shielded myself from burnout and clung to the minimum scraps of what I could scrape together. Did it bring me rest? Then it was a no. Did it bring me joy? Then it was a no. Was it movement related? (Like the joy and freedom of dancing, and how a single dance class could bring me back to more rest?) Nope, not gonna. Did it help me on my path to freedom?

Then no, nope, and no.
No, no, no.

8. Fast forward to today (because it’s so much easier to move time in writing),

Desire, rooted desire, internal desire, internal fire—
The desire to change, to lean, to get closer to home,

The home inside of the self, inside of the soul,
That content, that peace, that
Conscious swell within,
That lets the voices go and the chatter fall
Softly to the wayside—

This desire tells a story. It tells a story of you, and tells you, through words and a language of its own, the shifts and places for change and growth.

My words today are slightly different—they are peace and freedom and light and movement and joy. Using the words of right now brings you closer to your desire, to yourself, to your light.

So that desire thing?

It’s a map to your soul. To your light. To your essence. Sometimes it’s a bit buried.

It’s okay to feel.

It’s okay to be you.

It’s okay to be where you are, right now.

XO.

Desire Map is a program and a book by Danielle LaPorte that’s been one of the many tools and processes instrumental in shifting my life over the past year. It’s one of many that I’ve come back to, time and time again, as I learn to listen to my soul. The new collection comes out tomorrow, December 3, along with a day planner, a workbook, and a journal. Also: I happen to know the designer who helped bring this collection to life, and I’m madly in love with him. Enjoy.

What’s in the trunk? A mysterious tunnel inside the house… and some of the things I’m so grateful for.

Posted on November 27, 2013November 27, 2013 by Sarah K Peck

What’s in the trunk?

My dad just moved to Colorado and I’m here for the week, visiting for the first time. The cold, snowy mountains outside of Denver are filled with deer, elk, and other creatures that wander up to the backyard and say hello. (There’s also a new dog in the family that’s a giant 1-year old puppy. I really mean giant. But I digress).

As they were showing me the house, we stopped and took a look at this trunk standing up against a wall in one of the bedrooms. My stepmom cracked up when she showed it to me–“Guess what’s in it!?”

When you open in up, the trunk is completely empty. So… what goes inside?

It turns out when you look at the bottom there’s just a hole in the floor. Or rather, it’s a verified secret chamber that they added to the house.

What the heck?

When they moved in, in addition to knocking walls and windows down and building new counters and cabinets (she’s an interior designer; she can’t help it)–she knocked a hole in the floor to create a laundry chute. When they lift the trunk lid, they drop laundry down to the room below. Rather than leave an unsightly hole, she put this trunk over the top of it.

But that’s not the best part: take a look at what’s stenciled across the entire outside of the trunk.

On the outside, she wrote all of the things she was thankful for. (You’ll see my name on there!) Every time she does laundry, she gets to use a small piece of furniture that reminds her just how much she has to be thankful for.

How cool is that?

It’s that time of year: what are you thankful for?

Gratitude is a practice and can take hundreds of different forms. You’re probably inundated with thoughts of kindness–and that’s one of the reasons this is one of my favorite times of the year. From the breath we take to closing our eyes and appreciating the simple gift of being alive–there is so much to be grateful for. We can practice gratitude in our appreciation of the small things, by adding little rituals into our lives, and by reaching out and telling someone that you’re thankful for them. (You can learn several of these inspiring tools in our upcoming Grace + Gratitude workshop, beginning December 1).

Through these little acts, we can literally reprogram our brains. Over time, they have a huge effect.

I am thankful.

I am thankful for courage, of which the latin root (cor–) doesn’t mean bravery, but rather it comes from the latin word for heart. As Brene Brown writes, courage originally meant “to speak one’s mind by telling all one’s heart.” Courage is the act of gratitude: of speaking your heart, and letting your voice be heard.

I am grateful for my imperfections, and the grace to be able to acknowledge them each time I goof up. I am grateful for mistakes, because they mean that we’re living and moving.

I am grateful for time, and for the present. For this delicious moment. For the wonder of being here at all. (It’s really crazy if you start to think about it.)

I am grateful for experience, because it is the best teacher, even if it’s mighty uncomfortable.

I am grateful for the internet, for connecting online, for meeting so many friends who can see me more fully through my writing than I’m sometimes able to explain in person.

I am grateful for my family, a rambunctious and boisterous bunch who likes to sit on top of each other, no matter how big the house. We’ll just pile on top of each other like a football stack, dogs and cats and kids and blankets and everything.

Every day, I’m thankful for the gift of life and for living. I am thankful for breathing, which is made particularly poignant when I’ve experienced losing my breath.

I am thankful for swimming, dancing, moving, and singing.

I’m thankful for my hands, because hands are so weird and wonderful and downright cool in their digits and bends and abilities to do what we command them to do so tirelessly.

I am grateful to teach and I am thankful for all of the studying I get to be a part of in order to become a better teacher.

I am grateful for you, reading this, building a community online, being a part of this space. I cherish you and I hear from so many of you. Through you, I’ve learned how important writing is, and how telling stories—my job in this world, in this time—is for showing various ways of thinking and being and becoming and doing. For that, I’m truly humbled and grateful.

There’s so much I’m thankful for this season.

What are you thankful for this season?

And if you have a gratitude post, link it up in the comments and I’ll read it this holiday–I love reading about what you’re doing!

sarah signature

Looking for a place of love and kindness? Join our upcoming Grace & Gratitude micro-workshop, a two-week journey to cultivate grace and gratitude in your life. Two weeks of daily stories and exercises designed to bring light, love, and joy into your life–one photograph, project, and quote at a time. Sign up here (or give as a gift this holiday). We begin December 1.

The masks we wear–how we hide who we are.

Posted on November 24, 2013November 25, 2013 by Sarah K Peck

We all wear masks from time to time: in our words, our habits, and our practices. We have an arsenal of crutches and shortcuts that slowly but surely hide who we are. They are things that prop us up and help us hide. We hide from our feelings and our desires. We hide from who we might become.

We drink coffee as a mask for how tired we are, or to replace what is really a lack of motivation for a certain project we’re involved in.

It masks how tired you are of caring for a newborn infant, or how miserable your boss’s cutting remarks make you.

The alcohol that you drink at night masks the fear and the stress feel from not having control during your day. Perhaps it helps to cover up the loneliness of your cubicle or help you get through another night.

We project false smiles of protection to hide our fears, to be desirable. We wear high heels and new clothes and carry certain bags and advertisements to show a sense of self, a projection, an idea. We use extroversion to be well liked. We chase busy to mask our fear of not leaving an impact.

We cover a lot of things up. Scars we carry, stories we hold, work we’re afraid of doing.

Our selves, deep inside.

It’s not always bad to have a mask…

It’s not terrible to have masks, but they can’t be our only way of dealing with the world. If we spend the entire time warding off the world and hiding from ourselves, we’ll miss the best parts. By hiding from the world, we hide ourselves, and we lose a piece of our souls.

Many of us have lost touch with ourselves, our souls, with the tender, tired, scared part of itself.

Here’s the catch…

Releasing a mask requires feeling. It requires having a real, honest, scary, less-than-desirable feeling. Letting go of your mask means you might need to say,

By golly, I’m tired.

And no, I don’t want to do this.

Or, I’m scared. I’m scared of messing up. I’m scared of doing a bad job. I’m worried that I won’t be liked. I’m worried that I might try and I won’t be good at it.

Letting the barrier down requires Guts. Honesty. Softness.

Looking at the impulse before we rush to snatch a cover, and breathing in recognition:

Your feelings are clues.

These feelings inside? They aren’t enemies. They are clues. Feelings are way points in an uncertain world, direction markers that guide us back into the brilliance of ourselves, if we’ll allow it. The trouble is it can be uncomfortable and downright painful. Feelings you haven’t had in years might surface to remind you of areas of internal work you still have to do.

And your masks were protection, once.

The masks aren’t all bad. Sometimes pulling down the mask and showing your face requires gentleness and slowness. Your mask might have served you at some point. A therapist in my yoga training reminded me that these coping mechanisms shouldn’t always be disarmed quickly. Children of abuse who learned how to harden and deaden their senses built masks in order to survive those times. These mechanisms and masks were useful–they helped you survive. They got you here. They protected. Unlocking them too quickly without new ways of being can also be damaging.

But at some point, perhaps you might notice you’re still wearing one.

What masks are you wearing?

What masks do you carry?

What do you hide?

Can you lower it for a bit?

With love,

sarah signature

Finding your creative flow: 17 writer’s tricks to get un-stuck and start creating

Posted on November 14, 2013October 28, 2013 by Sarah K Peck

I wrung my hands, trying to figure out what to write next. It was a typical afternoon at the computer: Somehow I had amassed more browser tabs than laundry quarters, each of which was threatening to pull me into an endless loop of reading more things on the internet — all conspiring to collect as a massive wave of procrastination in the way of writing the essay in front of me. I closed all the browser tabs. I sighed. Why was I stuck again? Why couldn’t I just WRITE this thing?

While procrastination and distraction are two of the biggest weapons against making your art, the third hurdle to jump is often the problem of getting stuck.

When you’re stuck, you can’t find the right words, time passes endlessly, and you wish fervently for that flow — that moment when words come quickly, your thoughts spill out, and you’re itching to write more. Yet sometimes even when I return to the white page of my blank screen, I get stuck. My thoughts grind to a halt, and I’m not sure where to turn next.

What do you do to get back in creative flow and get un-stuck? As a writer and creative, these are the tools I return to again and again to get myself back into the writing space and find my creative flow.

Start with predictable statements.

Blank pages, as a writer, can feel demonizing and cruel in their blankness. Sometimes I need to write anything down just to get started. Ray Bradbury found, after several years of writing, that word association was a powerful way for him to start. CARNIVAL, he would write in big capital letters. DANDELIONS. The project continued, each word unfolding into a paragraph and a study, his obsession with these strange, everyday elements turning into prize-winning stories. His word associations turned into explorations of the attic — finding the nooks and crannies in his mind, and chasing what he found both exciting and weird.

Write the banal. Start with where you are. Sometimes it’s garbage, and sometimes the simplest statements are powerful, raw, and beautiful.

Recount your day.

Often writers begin with “throwaway text” that they use to warm up. Summarize your day. Tell the story of where you are, what you’ve been doing, and what you’re trying to do. Even when crafting, I often write out a page of blank notes that describes the type of project and fill pages with sketches of the thing I want to make.

Get specific.

We often get stuck because we’re trying to tackle too much. An entire essay can take me days and weeks — or longer — so today, I focus on one paragraph. Just on one piece. In writing a story about two characters, I begin with the scene, coloring in the frames and spaces with more and more detail. I might spend an entire hour polishing the color and frame of the street lamp and the sidewalks, capturing the changing weather patterns as the seasons move into fall, describing the slippery stoop and broken stairs that the woman calls home. Get specific about one small piece of your project, and focus on that first.

React.

Peruse articles until you find one that stirs up your emotion in some way. Set a kitchen timer if you’re prone to getting lost in browsing, or set up a system that lets you read for a limited time. Browse and jot down notes about what you click on, and what pulls you. Observe that emotion. Find an article that makes you mad or enthusiastic enough to want to write a response. Begin by writing that response.

Mine your conversations for clues.

Often, my essays evolve from comment threads, email chains, and conversations that lead to longer and longer pieces. A comment turns into a paragraph. A paragraph turns into a page. A page turns into an essay. When people ask me questions and I know the answer to them — and I jump in, with lots of ideas and things to say — I’ve learned to become aware of these as golden nugget opportunities for future essays.

Go analog. Slow down.

By pulling out a pen and paper, clearing the table, and simplifying, we can slow down to capture our thoughts and ideas. Slowing down helps us pay attention. As Gwendolyn Bounds writes in the Wall Street Journal, handwriting trains the brain, and slowing down to write by hand helps us learn, convert to memory, and explore new ideas. “It turns out there is something really important about manually manipulating out two-dimensional things we see all the time,” explains Karin Harman James. Using our hands — and crafting physical works, even written works — unlocks new spaces and ideas.

“I write not just to record what I already know, but to discover what’s in my mind.”

Clean.

A cluttered mind can often be the result of a messy situation. Set a kitchen timer for 20 minutes or fewer and give yourself permission to clean and sort. The process of using my hands to clean, sort, and organize often unlocks powerful thoughts in my brain. Doing the dishes is meditative at times. Forcing myself to fold laundry can slow my brain down long enough to catch the thoughts that drift in after I release the pressure to perform.

Set deadlines and use timers.

I’m a big fan of the Pomodoro Technique and kitchen timers. Sometimes less time and more urgency can push us over the edge into massive creation, stimulating our brains with a sense of urgency. I’ll sit and write for one hour, making a bit of a game out of my essays. “Alright, it’s 10AM. Can I get the first complete draft of this done by 11AM? Let’s see if I can get 700 words and a structure all put together by then. Ready? Go!”

Release the negative harnesses.

Ever feel like you’ve got someone watching over your shoulder, breathing down your neck to make sure everything is perfectly done and correct? As best as you can, remind yourself that you are allowed to stumble and stutter, that your writing does not have to be (and likely will not be) perfect the first time around, and that messiness is part of the process.

When the critic comes, which she does predictably for me, observe her. Watch the thoughts pile up, and write them all down. Say to your critic, “Thanks for all of this, I know you’re trying to have my back. I’ll keep these criticisms over here in my notebook, but for now I need to work.” Let your critic take a break.

Add detail and narrow the focus.

For this moment in time, on what you’re creating, focus on one particular element. Find a soothing or repetitive rhythm to it. Perhaps, as a writer, you’re writing about the scene and setting the stage for the actors’ patterns. Describe the street lights in detail, from the luminescent glow in the aftermath of a rainfall, to the painted-black iron stands. Do micro-histories on the pieces. If you’re a craftsman or a technician, begin with one small piece and polish and craft that section until it’s gleaming.

Forget about the entirety of the project. At this moment, be within this moment.

Talk it out. Use your voice.

Explain your idea to someone. Use a voice recorder to explain it. Sometimes I’ll get on the phone with my parents or friends and ask them to chat about an idea for a quick minute. I’ll set a quick record on the voice memo and capture myself explaining it to people. Sometimes I set my voice memo down on the counter and start explaining to the blank walls how things work. I play back the voice memo and write down the notes. The notes on the page start to make sense, and I edit them with my writer’s eye.

Get moving.

Despite how many times we’re told to get moving, many of us never get up and stand up from our desk to take a break and move our bodies. Sitting is terrible for us, and we sit for an average of 9.3 hours a day (nearly two more hours than we spend sleeping!), causing our bodies to lapse into sedentary norms.

The best way to get myself back into flow is to shake out my body for a bit. Do a few jumping jacks. Go for a walk. Take a short jog around the block. Go for a 10-minute bike ride to pick something up. Plan afternoon or evening swims for when the day is winding down and your brain is chattering. Jump in the shower for a 10-minute dunk. Turn upside down and do a handstand against a wall in your office or living room. Stand up and do a few squats. Do a seven-minute workout.

By increasing the blood flow and circulation in our bodies, we can change our thoughts. (For more on this, read SPARK: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain, which looks at the mind-body connection).

Get still.

Breathe. Lay flat across the floor. Sink into child’s pose or downward dog for a few minutes. Take a darkness nap — one of my favorite tricks. Do a darkness nap by going to a very quiet place, eliminating light, and reducing all of the stimulation (close your curtains, put an eye mask on, put earplugs in) and lie flat on the floor or a bed for 7 or 8 minutes. Use a timer to let yourself sink into rest. Like a power boost on a battery, getting your body and mind very still can re-set your mental and creative engines for hours.

Notice and adjust the stimulation.

Adding movement or stillness, as above, are about adjusting and equalizing the stimulation levels in my mind and body. Many times the creative flow is stalled when I am out of sync between my mind and body. My mind is racing forwards or backwards and my body is tired of being still. When the stimulation in my mind — and all of its dissonant bits and starts and bursts of energy — are out of sync with the stimulation in my body, I check in with a quick evaluation: Which one is racing more? Am I twitching and itching in my seat and in my body? Does my mind feel overwhelmed?

Sometimes our brain needs a rest, and our body and senses need to take center stage.
– Stephanie Guimond

Like a washer’s spin that’s gone off cycle, I need to put the two links together again, apace with each other. Adding movement, adding stillness, or adding a counter stimulation (music, water flow, massage) can help ease the frustration and pull me back into balance.

Disrupt your “stuck” with movement or stillness and find a way to balance the simulation in your mind and body.

Drink water.

There’s something magical about water. Drinking a large glass of water cleanses the thoughts in my mind and refreshes my energy levels. In addition to theenormous benefits of hydration, adding water reminds me to get up more often by forcing me to use the toilet more consistently as well.

Develop patterns.

Creativity is largely about creating systems and patterns that reveal (and allow) your best self to emerge. Read any great writer’s habits — Hemingway, Stephen Pressfield’s The War of Art, Stephen King’s On Writing, Ray Bradbury’s Zen in the Art of Writing — and you’ll hear them describe their habits and routines. Some of them race to their desk for hours of uninterrupted morning writing, and others write late at night, but they all have habits and systems that help them get unstuck. The less you have to think about when or how you’re going to do what you’re going to do, and the more you do it automatically, the easier it is to do well. (For more on this, check out The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg).

Be honest.

Have an opinion. Sometimes “stuck” is part of getting angry, upset, or frustrated. You’re pissed off that the piece you wrote hasn’t been picked up yet, you’re upset that a friend treated you poorly; you’re mad at the universe for delivering blow after blow to your health. It happens. Sometimes when I try to write a chipper post and my feelings are anything but, I walk smack into a massive brick wall that says, “Nope, no way. You can’t fool me here.” The way out, fortunately or unfortunately, is often through: I need to work through each of these thoughts and feelings. That’s the heart matter of the day.

More often than not, however, these posts — these raw, vulnerable, frustrated essays that pile up — become the meat and story of future essays, pieces I surprise even myself with.

Remember that getting stuck is part of the creative process — and is often a precursor to great breakthroughs.

If you’re having trouble solving a problem or finding your way back into the flow, try any of these tips or let me know if you have your own peculiar habit that works to get back on track.

This post was originally published with Tara Gentile and Carrie Keplinger on Scoutie Girl in September 2013.