Excerpt from I Could Do Anything . . .  If I only knew what it was, by Barbara Sher

Rescuing Your Past

Something inside you is too loyal to permit you to turn your back on everything you loved and simply walk away. No matter how many times people tell you to let the past go, it’s never possible. You’ll never  move wholeheartedly into the future unless you take your beloved past with you.  And that’s exactly as it should be.

There’s no reason to turn your back on a happy past. Sometimes we try to turn away from the past because we feel it somehow betrayed us. It’s as though we loved our past, but our past didn’t love us. So we go on strike and pretend we don’t care, as if to punish fate for being unkind. Fate never cares, of course, so we only hurt ourselves.

Prompt:  What do you pretend to not care about?

I’m thinking about our connections with one another. This excerpt seems timely.

Excerpt from Your Mythic Journey by Sam Keen and Anne Valley-Fox

“Pre-modern people didn’t think of themselves as individuals — they were members of a tribe as well as of a family. Ancient philosophers knew that human dignity begins with ‘We are a people, therefore I am.’ Modern people are tribal too but we call our tribes by different names —  churches, corporations, states, nations. Each of us was nurtured within and shaped by several corporate bodies, voluntary organizations and professional corporations that molded our values and behavior — schools, athletic teams businesses, clubs, temples, and local, national, and international governments.”

Prompt:  I am from . . .

Or: What uniforms or emblems have you worn?

Or: What groups have you been a member of?  Brownies, Blue Birds, Daisies, Girl Scouts, athletic groups, sorority, secret clubs.

I’m thinking about ancestors this week and how we inherit some of their traits, like threads weaving from one generation to the next, connecting us.

For this prompt, remember your grandfather, your father or an uncle doing something he likes, or liked to do, whatever it is or was.  If they built something or maintained something . . . picture what that looks like.

Take a deep breathe in. Let it out.

Now, think about your grandmother, your mother, or an aunt, doing something she likes, or liked, to do,  whatever it is or was.

If she built something, or made something, picture what that looks like.

Go back a generation or two or three, before electricity, before modern conveniences, pioneer days.

Picture your grandfather or grandmother or great-grandparents. If you know how they spent their time, picture that.

If you don’t know how they spent their time, use your imagination.

Perhaps someone chopping wood for the fireplace.

Maybe great-grandmother is sitting by the fire, with her needlework on her lap. Perhaps she wears a contented smile as she darns, or knits, or crochets.

Deep breathe in. Let it out.

Maybe she reflects on her ancestors, those who told stories either orally or through their needlework.

Maybe you remember a special quilt, or a tablecloth or a doily—something your grandmother, or her mother, or her mother made—maybe an embroidered pillowcase or a sampler.

This is where we come from—these ancestors. We are hand-me-downs of these people. We have their characteristics, their traits, their mannerisms.

Writing Prompt: When you’re ready, write about something an ancestor made.

Wall hanging quilt made by Marlene’s sister, Janet.

Today’s writing prompts are about “showing” through dialogue.

Show what characters are thinking, show their personalities, their quirks, move the story forward through dialogue.

Remember, with freewrites, the writing is spontaneous. There is no crossing out.  This could be called “practice writing,” as Natalie Goldberg says.

With dialogue we can show character, scene and drama.

Use these prompts for practice writing. Respond as your fictional characters would respond.

Or, respond in the first person, “I,” with yourself as the primary character . . . You playing the character of you.

Prompt: Write a scene, where two characters talk about what they are afraid of.

Prompt: Same or different characters. One confesses “I’ve lied about . .  .”

Prompt: Same or different characters: “I wish I would not have . . . ”

You can have a turning point – where the drama takes an unexpected turn, excitement mounting.

Throw is some twists, turns, surprises. After all, people are surprising, aren’t they? You expect one thing and something else pops up.

Use this writing for fun . . . “What would happen if. . . ”

Use this writing to understand what happened in your life.

Just write!

Elizabeth Taylor and Paul Newman in Cat On A Hot Tin Roof.

Does your heart hurt?

I’ve been hearing “My heart hurts” from  several friends these past few days. And when I hear their stories, my heart hurts, also.

What to do?

I believe in healing through writing. So, let’s write.

Write about: Does your heart hurt?   Write all the details you can about this.

What happened?  Write all the details that you know. If you were directly involved: Be as detailed and as explicit as you can.

When did it happen?  Day of week? Time of day? Where did it happen? Who was involved?

What were you wearing? Were you standing or sitting?

If you weren’t directly involved: Write as many details as you know. Then, focus on why you are affected. What connects you to what happened? Why are you affected so strongly?

Read the next part after you have written about why your heart hurts and how and why you are affected.

Okay, I know, if you are like me, you will read the whole thing now and write later. That’s fine. Go ahead and read the next part.

Louise De Salvo, Writing As A Way of Healing, says by writing our stories fully, we can begin to understand what was formerly unclear.   By writing, we can understand what we didn’t previously understand. What we’re writing is called a narrative.

In order to come away with this as a learning experience and with a good feeling, we need to make this writing a healing narrative.

A healing narrative is a balanced narrative.

This type of narrative uses negative words to describe emotions and feelings …. Probably what we just did in our writing about a hurting heart. A healing narrative also uses positive words.

Take a minute now to rethink your experience that you just wrote about and see if you can find something positive and hopeful about your encounter.

Even if your event was traumatic and extremely unpleasant, is there anything positive you can add to your narrative?

Write: Take a few minutes to write about something good — anything — that came from that experience.

For example, after writing about my difficult situation, I realized I was right to pay attention to my intuition.

How are you feeling now? Take a few minutes to jot down what you are feeling now.

Go ahead. Write down your feelings. Even if you didn’t write on the prompt. . . take a few minutes to jot down your feelings. Later, when you write on the prompt, compare your feelings then with now.

You can use writing to shift your perspective. Sometimes you can’t change the situation that’s causing you pain. You can change how you look at it.

The key is to write about events and the emotions surrounding those events.

James Pennebaker describes this in his book, Opening Up.  Healing starts when you write about what happened and how you felt about it then, and how you feel about it now.

And in order for our writing to be a healing experience, we need to honor our pain, loss and grief.

As we write, we can become observers. It is not what you write, or what you produce that is important. It is what happens to you while you are writing that is important.

So, that’s why we write . . . to understand ourselves, our emotions and our world.

Please, if you are feeling completely overwhelmed, seek professional help.

For more details on how to write about difficult topics: please click on How to write without adding trauma.

The pink ladies are about to bloom in Northern California where I live. Their proper name is Amaryllis belladonna.

“A plant gone wild and therefore become
rugged, indestructible, indomitable, in short: tough, resilient,
like anyone or thing has to be in order to survive.”   —  The Ubiquitous Day Lily of July by David Budbill

This last sentence in The Ubiquitous Day Lily of July reminds me of our pink ladies and is the inspiration for today’s writing prompt.

Write about something you have survived.