Write Starts by Hal Zina Bennett
Must-read 'Write Starts' Excerpts
By Chris Dunmire
"The creative process requires that you leave the external world and go to your private inner one," Hal Zina Bennett writes in his new book Write Starts: Prompts, Quotes, and Exercises to Jumpstart Your Creativity (New World Library, 2010).
I requested this particular excerpt on Solitude and Creativity for Creativity Portal because it's good, perhaps even necessary, to occasionally reflect on the time we spend alone, by choice, in pursuit of our creative explorations and expressions.
What is the sum of the total parts (synergy) that make up your 'private inner world'? I was thinking about this last night before drifting off to sleep when it occurred to me that within the private chambers and vaulted corridors of my own inner world there is endless space and unlimited potential to think, ponder, imagine, sift through, process, invent, re-invent, collaborate & co-create (yes!), explore, and pre-express* whatever comes up for me in thoughts, emotions, feelings, colors, textures, concepts, memories, projections, and more.
Yes, how awesome it is to know there exists a private space within myself that I can access from anyplace at anytime (inaccessible to others to roam and rummage through without my presence, consent, and will to share), and I can easily access this space deeply through the gate of solitude.
Bennett continues:
"Think of solitude not as just a mood or sentiment but as your entrance to the imaginative theater where you project the illusions of sailing on the open sea, or taking a leisurely walk through a mountain village, or driving along city streets teeming with life, or sitting contentedly at home in your favorite chair."
Isn't that cool? Read more where that came from, plus enjoy a second helping of Write Starts: Get Unreal: A Writing Exercise. Both these pieces will whet your appetite for a total of 50 gems, reminiscent of Natalie Goldberg's format in Writing Down the Bones, including five that grabbed me:
- "You Do It So Well" (A little experiment on embracing personal gifts)
- "Embers of Past Wounds" (Creative transformations of life's most challenging moments)
- "The Question Is..." (What is the question your best writing asks?)
- "Checklist for Creating Characters" (Twelve steps for making your characters leap off the page)
- "Talk to Your Readers" (Making your reader your collaborator)
Not just another writing prompts and exercises book, Bennett's Write Starts has garnered praise from C-P author Barbara Abercrombie, plus luminaries Julia Cameron (The Artist's Way), Wayne Dyer (The Power of Intention), Shakti Gawain (Creative Visualization), and Gabrielle Roth (Maps to Ecstasy). Learn more about the author at his Web site www.halzinabennett.com. •
* Pre-express is that 'tip-of-the-tongue' stage right before manifestation. (You know you're in it when you're feverishly searching for pen-and-paper on your nightstand before you forget that important passing thought from lucid dreaming, heaven forbid should it float on by and disintegrate before it's jotted down in chicken scratch with your sleepy eyes in the dark.)
© 2010 Chris Dunmire www.chrisdunmire.com. All rights reserved. |
