Write about your first job, or a job you had as a teenager.
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Write A New Story . . . Prompt #356
Ready to explore? Today’s writing prompt invites you to look at your old stories in new ways. Perhaps you can rewrite your story.Excerpt from October 2016 Reader’s Digest, “Down Off The Cross,” by Debra Jarvis, a chaplain and cancer survivor.
“Let’s say I meet you on a bus. We really hit it off, but I’ve got to exit soon, so you’re going to tell me three things about yourself that help me understand who you are, that get at your essence.”
Note from Marlene: Prompt: List three things that define you.
Back to the article:
“Of those three things, is one of them surviving some kind of trauma, like being a cancer survivor, a war survivor, or an abuse survivor?”
Note from Marlene: Or perhaps you are currently experiencing a difficulty or a trauma.Back to the article: “Many of us tend to identify ourselves by our wounds.
Claim your experience; don’t let it claim you.
The way to cope with trauma, loss, or any other life-changing experience is to find meaning. But here’s the thing: No one can tell us what that meaning is. We have to decide what it means. And that meaning can be quiet and private—we don’t need to start a foundation, write a book, or work on a documentary. Instead, perhaps we make one small decision about our lives that can bring about big change.
If you find yourself repeating your survivor story: Get down off your cross.
When you repeat your survivor story, you aren’t processing your feelings—you are feeding them.
Let your old story go so that a newer, truer story can be told about who you are.
Claim your trauma as an experience instead of taking it on as your identity.
It could mean the end of being trapped by your wounds and the start of defining yourself by who you are becoming.
We’re all on this bus together. What story are you going to tell?”
Note from Marlene: Prompt: Write a new story about what defines you.
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A time you felt free to be you . . . Prompt #355
Write about a time you had no worries . . .
a play-filled time . . .
a time you felt free to be you.
Does this scene look familiar? You know where it’s from if you’ve been to Maria’s Out West Garage in Petaluma, California.
Hi, Maria. 🙂
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Wrong Number . . . Prompt #354
Today’s writing prompt:
Wrong Number.
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If you could invent something . . . Prompt #353
If you could invent something to make your life easier, what would it be?
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Favorite time of year. Prompt #351
Spring. Summer. Autumn. Winter.
In-between seasons.
Write about your favorite time of year.
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You think you know them . . . Prompt #350
“You think you know them,
these creatures robed
in your parent’s skins.”
Writing Prompt: Read the excerpt. Copy it in your notebook, if you want. Then see what comes up for you and Just Write!
Excerpt from the poem, At the Lake House by Jon Loomis
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“At the Ice Rink” by Alison Luterman . . . Prompt #349
Today’s writing prompt is a poem by Alison Luterman. When the prompt is a poem, you can write on the theme or the mood of the poem. Or use a stanza, a line, or a word to inspire your writing. Just Write!
At the Ice Rink
I came here to fail
and to fall
but not so well
as that man careening over the ice
sliding into the wall
as if into second base
shambling up, grinning, like a great bear,
and taking off again,saying, over his shoulder,
“You’ve got it backwards.
Learn to fall first,
then skate.”I end up clinging
barnacle-like to the sides,
inching around the perimeter like a caterpillar.
Wall-hugger. Nothing has changed since I was eight
and my parents paid for skating lessons
in hopes I would become more balanced.Now as then I am wobbling, terrified,
feet frozen like blocks of wood at the ankles.
Not loose-limbed and easy like Hilary
who rides the ice like a North wind scouring the plains,
nor deft and graceful like Ruth
picking up her feet and kick-gliding
in time to the ’70’s pop muzak.But what can we do
when fear throws its rustiest pickaxe
dead ahead in our path?Mince. Inch. Stumble. Pray
for the grace to fall
and not be rescued, pray for the scramble-upfor the liberating laughter that knowsit is not in our control.
There is the center, gleaming like a fish-eye.
Little girls spin on it, twirling their bright skirts.
It shines under its white scars like a destiny.—Alison Luterman As a child, I used to creep onto the stairs when my parents had guests over and eavesdrop on the grown-ups. A creak of the stairs would invariably give away my position and I’d be chased back to bed, only to reappear at the next opportunity, hiding and listening. I wanted to be where the interesting conversations were happening. I still want that. Only now the conversations happen all over the country, all over the world, with friends, friends of friends, and complete strangers. Our stories rub up against each other and expand and change in ways I could never have imagined when I was young, and they now include rocks, weeds, fruit trees, cats, stars, and myths from all over the world, as well as all kinds of people.
Your favorite time of day.
