3 Reasons Why It's Okay To Sleep at a Writing Retreat (When You Should Be Writing)

I just spent a week at a writing retreat called The Porches, a lovely spot in rural Virginia on the James River. Many times I've taken myself there to work without distractions, in a private room with a solid desk, and lots of peace and quiet. I got some good writing done that I look forward to continuing. I also edited a piece and submitted it. And I drank some good wine.

Also, I slept.

Trudy Hale, the owner and operator of The Porches, once told me that many writers arrive, set themselves up for good, focused work, then spend two days mostly sleeping. They are always surprised by this, and wonder why they're sleeping in or napping every day when they were so geared up to work. It's simple, Trudy says. They're tired.

Writing Habits: 3 Ways to Engage Your Subconscious Mind

Yesterday I read this article in Observer by Benjamin Hardy. This paragraph got me thinking about the power of the subconscious mind:

The first thing to do when you wake up is output. This may be in the form of writing in a journal to capture all the work your subconscious has been doing while you were sleeping. Or immediately getting to the project you’re working on. When you get out of a meeting or finish any form of activity, rather than going directly to your email or other input, maximize your subconscious by going directly to output—your work. 

I've never thought in terms of "input" and "output" before, but now I'll probably use the words all the time because they fit so well into my beliefs about how the subconscious powers our writing.

Now This is Cool: Non-Profit Dedicated to Studying the Brain Through Writing

Oliver Sacks died just a couple of days ago: August 30, 2015. I miss him already. His writing--elegant, precise, and compassionate--inspires me not just to be a better writer, but to be a better human. He believed in the power of story to heal and to better understand the human mind.

While doing some research on his life, I found this: The Oliver Sacks Foundation. Then I got all excited when I read this:


The Oliver Sacks Foundation is a nonprofit organization devoted to increasing understanding of the human brain and mind through the power of narrative nonfiction and case histories.

The foundation’s goals include making Dr. Sacks’s published and yet-unpublished writings available to the broadest possible audience, preserving and digitizing materials related to his life and work and making them available for scholarly use, working to reduce the stigma of mental and neurological illness, and supporting a humane approach to neurology and psychiatry. (emphasis mine)

Those of us who love to read already know the power of storytelling to make meaning from our lives and better understand our internal worlds. I've never bought into the dividing line between art and science, between what we think is quantifiable and what we think is not. Sacks clearly felt the same, using his tremendous writing talent to share the experiences of and humanize his patients and himself.

Narrative nonfiction, you guys! Let's get into it!

I remember you, Oliver Sacks, M.D. RIP.

How to Write a Synopsis of Your Book

I came across these resources almost by accident today. I'm always surprised by how difficult it feels to write a synopsis; so much happens in a book that it isn't easy to sum it up in a few short pages. But, like the rest of my writing, if I feel I have a strategy in place, it becomes much simpler and less daunting.

Literary Agent Maria Vicente recently posted a few guidelines about writing a synopsis:

Memoir Craft: Grappling With Memory in Warm Springs (Part 3)

In Part 1, I wrote about Susan Richards Shreve's craft technique of writing about her memory within the creative narrative of her memoir, Warm Springs. She begins immediately with the word "traces" and its double meaning: the small responses still evident in muscles atrophied by polio, and the flashes of memory she mines from her time living at the polio hospital.

In Part 2, we looked at the beautiful scene describing Shreve's first memory, one that could not have happened, but she insists she remembers.

A few more six-word memoirs I like from Smith Magazine:


chocolate chip cookie endowment coming soon

I came. I saw. I sat.

Searching for profound moments of pleasure.

These years writing about those ones.

                                          What the hell is going on?

Four Crucial Differences Between Memoir and Autobiography

Two cats who symbolize the difference
between ... oh whatever. Kitties!

The differences between memoir and autobiography are crucial to the experience of both the writer and reader. Many people, however--including writers--don't understand how they differ in in terms of craft and storytelling technique.

I keep these four ideas in mind as I write my own memoir so I can keep the focus and clean story arc I need. They also help guide me in creating myself as a character on the page.

1. Time Span

An autobiography tells the story of a whole life, whether the writer has lived a long time (Oliver Sacks, Roger Ebert) or not so long (Drew Barrymore). If you want to write an overview of your entire life, including all of the significant events and lessons learned, then you want to write an autobiography.

Six-Word Memoirs and a T-Shirt Maybe

Just discovered this book titled Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure. (Should six-word be hyphenated? Does it matter? It's distracting me.) The title grabbed me the way flash fiction does: it's short! I can read it easy! I know that's illogical, considering how dense good short writing has to be, how much it makes you think. Maybe I just want to think sometimes instead of read.

Exercises that have helped me a lot over the years involve strictly enforced word counts. Recently I answered the question "Why did you attend your first writing workshop?" I had to write it in 100 words or less. Doesn't sound like a big deal until you actually try to do it, and the discipline it requires makes the writing sharper, clearer, and more succinct. It also works your brain in a different way, which feels refreshing after long sessions thinking about craft, content, or character.

Here are a few examples. They sound a little like haiku when you read them out loud.

Workshop Weariness

Just finished a memoir workshop at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown with the writer Patrizia Chen. I hadn't counted on the burnout factor--that doing an MFA would take so much workshopping bandwidth out of me. I did fine while I was there, being myself, as another student said, "intense." I suppose I am. I'm passionate about writing, passionate about text itself, about reading it, analyzing it, making it work, finding meaning. I love it all. Words. Language. The art of making books.

But I did struggle a bit during the off-hours with fatigue. I needed a nap almost every day. My brain felt drained. I didn't sleep very well. I never once went to the water, a first for me in all of the times I've been to Provincetown.

It was worth it, though. If you ever have a chance to work with Patrizia, take it. She's a generous, intelligent instructor and just a great person.