1) The cost of inaction is not much truth be told if I accept my life as it is. I have amazing friends, family, wife and work yet what is missing is my creative soul. I feel I traded that in somewhere in my first marriage and it has taken me decades to realize how much I miss it. As materially wealthy as I am, my soul is poor and starved for action and the more I have done this writing exercise, the more I see how it is to get out of inaction.
I have so much more to gain by trying that the only failure that will string is the lost chances to write. I see myself writing regularly and lately my visions for work and love have gotten clearer as if I was in a fog and until writing cleared away the cobwebs, I was merely content. Now I am full of energy, working out, writing, loving, planning things, it’s as if I am running out of time, and I want to get it all done and now.
Invent the Future by Cindy Gallop
A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
My favorite quote of all time is Alan Kay: ‘In order to predict the future, you have to invent it.’ I am all about inventing the future. Decide what you want the future to be and make it happen. Because you can. Write about your future now.
I sit here, mind blank, full of the past, not much of the present and none for the future. Those are my initial thoughts until I realize that I am present, I am here, and I change my present and future if I choose to. For the first time in my life, I ran 3 miles. To some, it may not mean much but for someone who like who was convinced that he could never run more than a mile, I saw a future of me running a marathon, getting new running shoes, perhaps a treadmill in the garage, full of future thoughts because I dared to do something in the present. It is now that I realize that my future is right here, right now, these words because they are the reason I keep wanting to write more, express more, get better than just whining. My future is my wife (who I am still getting to know) and what we will do together (perhaps travel, perhaps have children, or perhaps just spend more time loving each other, friends and family. What is the future but the possibility of the present? What I do today, right now will make my future, I see that now. Each day I work, work out, write, love her as well as family gets me closer to the life I have always wanted.
Wholly Strange and New by Bridget Pilloud
When good is near you, when you have life in yourself, it is not by any known or accustomed way; you shall not discern the foot-prints of any other; you shall not see the face of man; you shall not hear any name;—— the way, the thought, the good, shall be wholly strange and new. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Can you remember a moment in your life when you had life in yourself and it was wholly strange and new? Can you remember the moment when you stopped walking a path of someone else, and started cutting your own?
Write about that moment. And if you haven’t experienced it yet, let the miracle play out in your mind’s eye and write about that moment in your future.
(Author: Bridget Pilloud)
I remember the first time I started free style writing, it was under a timed essay for NCTE (National Council for Teachers of English), where we would write about anything. We had practiced many themes and topics in preparations but when the test started, I began to write about the time pressure, the room, describing my reasons for writing and it was then I truly knew I would win the contest. At that moment, my grammar was perfect, the words flowed, and although we had 5 page minimum with 2 hours, I ended up writing almost 12 pages about my life with my horrible handwriting, but it was bliss. It was clear. It made sense. I knew I would end up going to UCLA and win the only scholastic award in my life that meant anything. I don’t remember erasing much and at that time typing was not allowed yet my hand was sure and steady as I wrote about the room, setting my future in motion.
Take a moment, step back from your concerns, and focus on one thing: You have one life to achieve everything you’ve ever wanted. Sounds simple, but when you really focus on it, let it seep into your consciousness, you realize you only have about 100 years to get every single thing you’ve ever wanted to do. No second chances. This is your only shot. Suddenly, this means you should have started yesterday. No more waiting for permission or resources to start. Today is the day you make the rest of your life happen. Write down one thing you’ve always wanted to do and how you will achieve that goal. Don’t be afraid to be very specific in how you’ll achieve it: once you start achieving, your goals will get bigger and your capability to meet them will grow.
Write. Then Write Some More. At some point, the words have to matter, have to make sense, have to fill out the thoughts swirling around my head, have to come out onto this blank space or paper before they are lost forever. So Write. That’s the ultimate goal. That’s the end line. Think, ponder, wonder, question and then write. Write until it all bleeds out, and the hurt lessens, the past firmly finally deal with. write until there are no more issues left, write until all the indecision’s, regrets and what-ifs are put away and just focus on that one precious goal.
Fear by Lachlan Cotter
These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faint and inaudible as we enter into the world. Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Is fear holding you back from living your fullest life and being truly self expressed? Put yourself in the shoes of the you who’s already lived your dream and write out the answers to the following:
Is the insecurity you’re defending worth the dream you’ll never realize? or the love you’ll never venture? or the joy you’ll never feel?
Will the blunder matter in 10 years? Or 10 weeks? Or 10 days? Or 10 minutes?
Can you be happy being anything less than who you really are?
I knew it would be difficult to take on the 30 challenge more so than anything else because it would require me to face my fear of writing regularly and perhaps on some sort of schedule. The stories sit inside me cobwebbed, yet I feel great anxiety when I start to dust off the past to write about it mainly because I have not dealt with the emotional consequence as well as having a turbulent present. So where do I begin? That’s the question I am stuck or similarly whenever people ask what I want to write about, I say Ziba but to be quite honest, I do not if that’s the first story I want to tell.
As I witnessed a good friends wedding from UCLA, and being around other UCLA friends, I realized how much I miss that perfect time when all that mattered was scholarship and friendship. It was a perfect time when writing came to be easy and words just appeared when I sat in front of the campus desktop computer. Yet more than anything else, I was not alone. I remember spending nights on my friend’s couch when I had no money for dorm housing, and benefiting greatly from the generosity of true friends who I see now 15 years later, and it is as if nothing has changed. We all have spouses now, and we are older but just for that one night, we felt like we were 21 again, laughing and giggling about the dumb things we did at UCLA.
Yes the insecurity returns when the 39-year-old me sits here and wonder what to write about and it hits me that more than anything else, I am fighting about my own story. I do not who I am anymore. Years ago, I had a defined personality and name away from Ziba Beauty but now I am just a co-owner and while the opportunities are endless, there is a sense of betrayal to my sense of what I should be doing: which is writing. So more than anything else, as I sit in this hotel room in New York, I am determined now to keep writing regularly and hopefully have something published next year.
Divine Idea by Fabian Kruse
Imitation is Suicide. Insist on yourself; never imitate. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Write down in which areas of your life you have to overcome these suicidal tendencies of imitation, and how you can transform them into a newborn you – one that doesn’t hide its uniqueness, but thrives on it. There is a “divine idea which each of us represents” – which is yours?
Currently, I have a tendency of copying and pasting my own old writings and not really creating anything new so I need to stop “killing” myself and just sit down and write.
In the midst of a humid and hot as hell New York, I stayed away from the laptop just taking in the alone time with her and some old family. So far, it has to led to mixed results as we have become rusty at truly being alone together. The constant calls and texts from others do not help sometimes only because we have become new at being with each other. Sad truth is, we are struggling more so because there are some old habits we have that are hard to break, and are creating constant friction. Anyways, that is my long winded way of saying sorry, I didn’t get to the prompts for these reasons/
Trust30-Day 9-Afraid to Do
Afraid to Do by Mary Jaksch
The other terror that scares us from self-trust is our consistency; a reverence for our past act or word, because the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Emerson says: “Always do what you are afraid to do.” What is ‘too scary’ to write about? Try doing it now.
Writing for me has always been personal but recent comments by others in my family and others close to me have now made me scared to put down anything “real” or “off the cuff” for fear of offending them as well as coming off as harsh. I feel as if I can no longer vent bout the issues that are affect my due to friends and family. Unfortunately, I am in a position that I cannot blog about it but I did manage to find another outlet which is to write a blank document, rant and rave and then deleting so I don’t have the stress that I will offend someone.
Your Personal Message by Eric Handler To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, that is genius. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
What is burning deep inside of you? If you could spread your personal message RIGHT NOW to 1 million people, what would you say?
My message would be a copy and paste of Pema Chodron. To let things be, let emotion flow around you and don’t waste time on things that do not matter, spend time on the ones that make you matter.
