Today's Creativity Reflection:
Autumn Writing Prompts
Fall Leave Behinds: Write Your Own Autumn Greeting Cards
By Chris Dunmire
It is easy to pluck a greeting card off the rack and post a meme graphic on social media, but personalized hand-written messages remain highly prized treasures! Let me open the space for you to engage your writing and creativity. While greeting cards celebrating birthdays, weddings, baby showers, and Christmas are Hallmarks of traditional celebratory giving, here's a unique opportunity for you to break the mold and dig into the reason for the season. Celebrate the beauty of autumn and the gifts it ushers in, including special holidays for family fun and togetherness — Halloween and Thanksgiving — with some creative writing, right here, right now.
Creative Careers Interviews
Naomi Rose: Book Developer and Writing Coach
By Naomi Rose
Naomi Rose is a writer and Book Developer with over 30 years in the publications field. She works with writers, frequently first-time book writers, to nurture their book into being. She is the creator of a unique approach to writing called "Writing from the Deeper Self." This approach is an antidote to the product orientation of conventional book writing, in which what is on the page is seen as more important than, and essentially disconnected from, the human being who gave it life. Writing from the Deeper Self is based on the conviction that honoring the human being who is doing the writing will bring forth the best in the person, the final manuscript, and the eventual readers of such books, and in this way bring healing and amazing beauty into the world.
Transform Through Creative Engagement
Inspiring Creativity
How to Give Yourself Permission to Create
By Dave Storer
What are some specific, practical things you can do to get to a place where you feel you absolutely have the right to create and can begin to connect deeply with your own creative process and start to actively pursue your creative dreams?
Love of the Craft
Navigating Print on Demand (POD) and Self-Publishing Services
By David Duggins
Q: I am wondering if there are any publishers or agents who become involved in republishing books? I wrote a children's book 12 years ago, and I want to republish it, making changes to the cover and title, so that it is more marketable.
A: Several major Print-On-Demand (POD) publishers — iUniverse, Lulu.com and Author House are three — have programs that allow authors of previously published books to launch reprints of their titles. If you're not familiar with POD and how it works, check out sfwa.org for the single most exhaustive article on this subject I've ever come across. Sfwa.org is the website of the Science Fiction Writers of America, but even if you're not a genre writer, you'll find plenty to sink your teeth into there.
Living in the Light
Transforming Our World
By Shakti Gawain
Transformation begins on an individual level and moves out into the world. The more I'm learning to trust my intuition and act on it, and the more I'm willing to experience and accept all my feelings, the more the energy of the universe can move through me. As it comes through, it heals and transforms me and everyone and everything around me. This is true for each one of us. The more you are willing to trust and be yourself, the more life energy will move through you. Everyone around you will benefit from your energy and begin to trust and be more themselves. In turn, they become powerful channels for everyone in their sphere of influence. And so, transformation spreads rapidly throughout the world. You may have heard of the "hundredth-monkey phenomenon." Although certain facts of this story are debated, I believe it is a powerful example of evolution and what is possible as we continue to focus on expanding our consciousness.
Books & Printables
Origami Money Plant Project
By Chris Dunmire
With fake fun printable 'Cashius monetarius' seed packet! As featured in Money: Everything You Never Knew About Your Favorite Thing to Find, Save, Spend, and Covet by Sandra and Harry Chonron, this unique origami money plant makes a delightful gift to create, but hard to give away! Learn how to make this truly memorable craft with my with easy-to-follow instructions in a fully-illustrated, step-by-step 23-page project book.
Write What You See
Connect Seeing with Writing
By Hank Kellner
Valerie Reimers is a Professor of English in the Department of Language and Literature at Southern Oklahoma State University. Reimers has developed an assignment that asks her students to discover convergences between visual images and verbal texts as they create both. First, she directs them to create photographs and, without looking at them, immediately write journal entries describing what they saw and hoped to capture in the photos. "In this way," she writes, "the students connect seeing with writing." A few days later, Reimers directs the students to view printed versions of their photos, describe in writing what they see in their images, and compare/contrast their descriptions with the journal entries they had written earlier.
365 Pictures: See Today's Prompt
Write Right Now! Prompt
Imagine that you are one of the French Resistance Fighters from days gone by. What do you feel as you re-enter this town and see the passage ways that were a refuge from danger and which provided a means to outsmart the enemy, now harboring tourists? Are you visiting as an older version of your self or are you a ghost? Go even further back and imagine that you are a silk weaver. Finish this story starter: It is a cold and rainy day. You are safe and dry within the traboules, carrying your precious silk to … —Kristi Tencarre
Artist Spotlight
Joy Sikorski's Whimsical 'How to Draw' Lessons & Life Wisdom
By Chris Dunmire
Joy Sikorski was the best-selling author of How to Draw a Radish: And Other Fun Things to Do at Work along with a series of 'how to draw books' featured in art museum bookshops across the nation including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, and Guggenheim Museum.
Enjoy a sampling of Joy's whimsical style in this fun collection of art lessons from her books Squeaky Chalk and How to Draw a Clam that includes a rolling vacation car, flapping Pterodactyl, long-tailed flying kite, dogs galore, cute piglet, and original twitter bird, along with insights from her interview about creativity, being an artist, publishing a book, and the legacy she desired to leave behind through her work.