Commentary on Writing and Life

Onward and Upward

The last 12 months disappeared. One day I was working on a book and the next day my volunteer efforts at a local public access television station turned into a full-time gig without compensation. Call me crazy, but it took me 9 months to come to my senses, i.e. realize that my good deeds were futile and it was time to walk away from what started as a desire to make a contribution, and became a thankless series of tasks. I thought I could save the day with my 25-years of experience as a writer/producer but the hole was deep and money was scarce.

As a good friend of mine always says when times are tough, “Onward and upward, then.” My first thought was to get back to my blog. Imagine my surprise when my site was gone. Apparently, I’d miss the deadline (by several months) to renew my domain. In spite of wanting to scream, I convinced myself to not panic. In a flashback, I recalled the system bomb that made a book disappear back in 1984. I was working on my first computer and didn’t know about backing up. Boy, did I learn that lesson in a hurry. That time I did panic, but I also learned that rewriting is faster and often better than a previous draft. At least that’s what I told myself to keep from slashing my wrists. Then, just in case all was lost, I convinced myself that maybe it was time for me to do something else like become a professional chef or a dog walker–something that had nothing to do with technology.

This time, because I’m older (ugh) and wiser (at least about some things), I called my friend Evelyn who built my previous site. As luck would have it, she had a backup from last March so I didn’t have to reinvent the wheel. I purchased a new domain (my old one would cost me $300 dollars — highway robbery but that’s another story) and I’m now .net rather than .com. Evelyn installed a new theme, which is still being tweaked (is a website ever done?) Most importantly, I have visions of completing a book I was writing “before my venture down the public access rabbit hole” and of showing other writers and content experts how to get their ideas on to the page.

Today’s Writing Tip: (Don’t volunteer — Write your book)

When Life Gets In the Way of Work: Getting Back on the Horse

By Jan Fishler Leave a Comment

When Life Gets In the Way of Work: Getting Back on the Horse

I had a lot of momentum going in the beginning of 2015. I was close to finishing the book I’d been working on for the past two years; I was building my platform as a writer through regular blogs, tweets, and Facebook posts; and I was actually doing a better-than-average job promoting (and selling) Flex Your Writing Muscle. In addition, I was getting a lot of positive feedback from the bi-monthly “Healthy Options” column in our local paper. It seemed like I was on track and on a role professionally, and I was happily settling into the rhythm of success.

On January 31, I had an experience that ultimately led me down an unexpected path—a path that I am still processing. In preparation for a “Healthy Options” article, I interviewed an equine therapist. I wouldn’t describe myself as a horse person, but I did take horseback riding in college and I never turned down an opportunity to ride. I was also looking forward to learning more about this “horse whisperer”—something I wasn’t convinced existed. Sitting bareback on a medicine horse was an intriguing opportunity, but I didn’t have the slightest notion how that day would turn my world upside-down. [Read more…]

New Book to Launch — Tomorrow?

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Last year I posted a writing prompt for each day. Last month I decided to collect and improve upon the prompts and turn them into a book–Flex Your Writing Muscle. My son, Nick, took the cover photo and my friend Ellen Baxter designed the cover, which I posted on Facebook. Lesley Schneider proofed the interior copy and I should have had her proof the cover, because an old friend–someone I haven’t seen in YEARS– found a typo. So, I’m uploading to Create Space again and I should have a book before the week is out.

What’s Up for 2015

By Janfishler Leave a Comment

Last year I posted a writing prompt for each day. I hope you enjoyed receiving them and that they helped you write. In fact, if the prompts helped you, please let me know. For many people prompts are a great way to jump-start the brain and get the creative juices flowing.

This year, I have some new things in store and I’m really excited to share them with you. In fact, my goal for 2015 is to help YOU write anything quickly and painlessly or, I can always do it for you.

In January and February I’m teaching a Yes! You Can Write a Screenplay workshop at NCTV. Learn about format, story, characters, beats, scenes, locations, dialogue and more! The 6-week class is offered every Tuesday evening from 6:00-8:00p.m. beginning Tuesday January 20, ending February 24. I’ll also be teaching a weekend intensive on February 21 and 22. Call NCTV at 272-8862 to reserve your seat.

In March I’ll be teaching a Write Your Story Workshop. Check the home page.

If you’re a writer who is looking for accountability, inspiration, feedback and more, be sure to check out the Just Write It! Meetup. We meet at Summer Thyme’s in Grass Valley from 5:00-6:30 p.m. once a month (We’ve moved to the 3rd Thursday beginning in February, 2015).

I’m also going to have a bi-monthly column in The Union newspaper on alternative health options. The column will be published the first and third Tuesdays of each month on page A3 beginning January 6, 2015. Be sure to check it out. If you know any good, local alternative practitioners, please send them my way!

Here’s to the best writing year ever!!

Be happy. Be well. And write!

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Writing to Heal

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The following article was published in VietNow National Magazine Fall 2013
Volume 23 Number 3. Writing: A Pathway for Healing Trauma.

Why I Write

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Why I Write

Writing is the one thing I do simply because I love it. I can’t help myself. Writing grounds me and helps me find my center, especially when I’m tired, emotionally drained, or preoccupied with the “should and musts” that constantly seem to present themselves. Without writing I would be as wilted as the tomatoes I forgot to water on more than one occasion this summer.

Unlike some writers, who stick with one project until it’s completed, it’s not uncommon for me to tackle several writing projects at once. Take the past few months for example. Since I haven’t been blogging, some people assumed that I haven’t been writing, but nothing could be further from the truth. In the past three months, I’ve revised 100 Tips & Prompts, started writing fiction, have been collaborating on a non-fiction book, developed a new workshop, and have been writing two 500 word blog posts a week for a client. No wonder I forget to water the tomatoes from time to time!

The non-fiction collaboration—Just Plan It!—is a small book designed to help writers plan their fiction. We were hoping to have a release in late September for this year’s National Novel Writing Month—when thousands of people actually commit to writing 60,000 words during November, but the editing is taking longer than expected so publication might have to wait until 2014.

The fiction is on its way to becoming a novel. Set in the 1940s, it’s about three generations of women, some more successful than others, in getting what they want. The main characters are loosely based on my birth mother, her mother, and her grandmother. I say loosely because I know so very little about them, and am having a great time making things up. Because I’m fairly new to fiction writing, I’ve joined a fiction writing group. We meet every other Monday evening and the feedback I’ve been getting has been incredibly helpful.

The workshop, Free Yourself to Write, a collaboration with another writer, is designed to help writers tap into their right brain and make writing—regardless of the content—quick, easy and fun. We’ll offer it locally a few times and then take it on the road. During the half day workshop, writers will learn 10 tools that we have used to avoid writers block and keep the words flowing.

Because I’ve gotten such good feedback on my memoir-writing workshops, when I’m not writing I’ve been marketing them, and soon I’ll be having workshops in various surrounding areas.

Anyway, it’s been a very busy summer and I’m looking forward to a busy fall, one with a lot of rain, so I don’t have to remember to water the tomatoes.

Falling off the Blogging Wagon – Writing Fiction

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Falling off the Blogging Wagon – Writing Fiction

Since the beginning of the New Year, I’ve fallen off the blogging wagon. It’s not like I haven’t been writing though, I just haven’t been keeping up with my blog. This morning I woke up at 5:30, and decided it was time to get back into my morning blogging routine, so now, here I sit with my cup of Chai Masala Organic Tulsi tea from India waiting for my muse. How, when I had so much blogging momentum going, did I manage to lose my way?

The trip to Arizona did it. In early February my daughter, who had been struggling with Lyme Disease for the past eight years, called to tell me she was going downhill fast, and I needed to help her find something that would work. By the end of the month, we were in Scottsdale where she started treatment. (Check out www.SundridgeMedical.com). We were there for a month, returning at the end of March, and today her health continues to improve. In fact, she’s going back to school in a couple of weeks and is looking forward to getting her cosmetology license and working in her field. After so many years of being sick, it is such a relief to see her firmly planted on the road to health.

While the outcome of the trip was successful, the change in my routine derailed me. Instead of writing each morning, my daughter and I would put on bathing suits and trot across the road for a hot tub and swim—what a wonderful way to start the day! Because I’m someone who is also in the habit of blogging in the morning, within days, I was adrift. And I’ve been drifting ever since—catching up on bills, organizing taxes, weeding out my closets, planting a spring garden, seeing friends, and writing fiction.

Since completing my memoir, I’ve wanted to write a fictionalized account of my birth mother, Jane, who I never met. I even followed 74 days of writing prompts and blogged about the book I was going to write (see the posts at www.searchingforjane.com). While the prompts didn’t get me to write the book, they did get me to think about it. I picked my characters, outlined a plot, wrote some dialogue and even cranked out a couple of scenes, but I wasn’t serious. About a month ago, I joined a fiction writing group. We meet every other Monday evening and I’m taking the commitment seriously. The members of the group are published authors and I couldn’t ask for better company. Because I feel privileged to be part of this group and have tremendous respect for their feedback, I am motivated to show up with my five pages. It turns out that accountability motivates me.

Having a writing routine does the same thing. It keeps me on track, and forces me to be accountable—even if it’s only to myself. Starting today, I’ve made a commitment to write every morning. I’ll blog at least two mornings a week and spend the other mornings writing scenes for my novel. I know this is only day one, but It feels really good to be back on the wagon.

Unexpected Twists and Turns

By Janfishler 2 Comments

Lyme Disease Treatment

Life. That’s what happens when you’re making other plans. I was just about to start marketing Write Your Story Workshops when my twenty-four year old daughter called telling me she was feeling bad– again. For the past 8 years she has been dealing with Lyme disease. Aware that she was bitten by a tick while on a camping trip, she didn’t think much of it and neither did I.

Shortly before her trip she had been in bed with mono so when she never really recovered from the fatigue, the doctor at UC Medical Center in San Francisco, where we went for a consult, said it was simply the Epstein Barr virus. After a well-intended lecture on the bell shaped curve, the doctor bid us farewell.

My daughter never started feeling better. Obviously, it wasn’t just the bell shaped curve! Thus began the quest to diagnose an overwhelming number of ailments from stomach pain and depression to joint pain, excessive weight gain and crippling fatigue. Something was dreadfully wrong, but none of the doctors we saw had an answer—and we saw a number of doctors. One even suggested she take ADD medicine for energy!

Somehow, my daughter persevered. She finished her general education requirements at a community college and went on to enroll as a pre-med student at a 4-year college. Midway through the semester she called and told me she felt like she was dying and I needed to find a doctor who could help her. In 2009, five years after the tick bite, she received a diagnosis: Lyme Disease. And thus began a quest for wellness that on two occasions nearly killed her.

Most recently, our journey has taken us to Arizona, where we have finally found a clinic that knows what they’re doing. After IV antibiotics, hosts of supplements, homeopathics, Rife Machines, and Infrared saunas, mediation, diet plans and everything else under the sun, It looks like my daughter will finally get her life back.

We’re staying with friends and internet is sketchy at best, which is why I haven’t been able to post on a more regular basis. Things should be back to normal by April 1—no foolin’.

The Next Big Thing

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The Next Big Thing

My thanks to Ron Cherry for inviting me to be a part of this week’s The Next Big Thing blog posting group.

The Next Big Thing is a meme that is creating an ever growing wave through the blogs of authors who write in a variety of genres, with each participant answering the same questions about either a work in progress or a work currently being marketed. Each author then chooses five other authors to keep the chain going. The following is my contribution:

1. What is the title of your book?
The title of my book is Searching for Jane, Finding Myself. It’s an adoption memoir.

2. How did you come by the idea?
I always knew I was adopted, but I had no information about my birth mother other than the lie that she had died during childbirth. When I was forty, I decided it was time to search. Whenever I told someone my story, the response was either, “Oh my God, you should write a book about it!”, or “Oh my God, you should be on Oprah.” Finally, I did.

3. What genre does your book fall under?
Memoir. It’s a look inside the heart and soul of my adoption—how being adopted affected me growing up and my perspective as an adult—one who is not only older, but also wiser.

4. Which actors would you choose to play your characters if it were a movie?
I always saw Jamie Lee Curtis playing the lead. When my hair was short I was often told I looked like her. Because of the resemblance, I thought mistakenly that Janet Lee was my birth mother. Also, Jamie Lee Curtis has adopted children of her own, so I imagined she would have an interest in the movie.

5. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
Searching for Jane, Finding Myself inspires us to find the truth, however difficult and fearsome the search may be.

6. Will your book be self-published or traditional?
Tin Cat Media, is my small, independent publishing company.

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
I wrote the manuscript in my head for about 7 years. When I finally sat down to write, it took about three months.

8. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
There are several memoirs on the topic of adoption. Most are about adopting children from other countries. Identical Strangers: A Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited is a compelling read. I also thought Found A Memoir and Mamalita, An Adoption Memoir were captivating adoption stories

9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?
Friends and family inspired me to write this book. Anyone who ever talked to me about adoption know how important it was for me to discover the truth—whatever it might have been. I wasn’t looking for a relationship with my birth mother, I just wanted to know who she was, more important, who I was. My ethnic background, my religion, where my ancestors came from—the things everyone else takes for granted.

10. What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
Readers who enjoy good human interest stories will enjoy my book. It’s an easy read and an honest expose about what it feels like to be an adopted child. If you’re not adopted it’s a peek into mind and heart of an adoptee. If you’re part of the adoption triad, it’s confirmation about your own feelings.

The four authors I’ve chosen to continue the chain on or about December 24rd are…
Tony Richards: http://raineslanding.blogspot.co.uk
Delinda McCann: http://delindalmccann.weebly.com/blog.html
J. A. Vasquez: http://www.BooksThatSow.com
Ron Cherry: http://www.rlcherry.com
…but don’t wait that long to visit these interesting blogs of 4 very different writers.

Celebrating Winter Solstice: Inviting Change

By Janfishler Leave a Comment

In my community several end of world and Winter Solstice celebrations are planned. While the physical world is still here, many people believe that December 21, 2012 is a time to put an end to things that no longer serve us. At the top of my list are people who drain my energy, unhealthy foods and the drinks that go along with them, and worrying about things I can’t change. Winter Solstice — the darkest day of the year — is a good time to meditate on small changes you can make to improve the quality of your life. Just yesterday my daughter suggested we rethink various holiday celebrations and celebrate the seasons instead. I think she’s on to something. Instead of focusing on consumer spending, what Christmas has become for most of us, let’s give ourselves the gift of becoming better people and sharing that gift with others. Imagine how the next year would be if you stopped one destructive habit or eliminated one negative or limiting belief. What if the New Year’s resolutions you never keep, actually stuck? What if you took the time to really contemplate the change and visualize in bold detail how life would be for yourself and those around you if you succeeded. The reason most of us can’t keep our New Year’s resolutions is that we just give them lip service and don’t spend time imagining, feeling, experiencing the benefits we will ultimately receive — before they occur. It’s so easy to want to lose 10 pounds, make more money, vow to improve our relationships, be happier, but actual change requires planning and follow through. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have a holiday that supports self growth and the god-like qualities within us? Imagine what the world would be like if we all worked toward Mahatma Gandi’s suggestion to:

“Be the change that you wish to see in the world.”