There are endless questions when it comes to writing a memoir. How do I get started and keep going? How do I deal with family members? What if I can’t remember details or dialogue? What if I don’t know the real story, the best structure, or the overall theme? If you’ve got questions like these, you’re not alone...
If your inner critic has been especially harsh lately, please join me and your fellow memoirists at the next free meeting of the Memoir Collective...
Have you had an experience you are too afraid to write about? Is there some anecdote you’ve been harboring as too shameful to share? If you’re like most writers (or human beings, for that matter), there is not one story you’ve been hiding, there are many.
If […]
Fear, doubt, procrastination, starting over, changing subjects... resistance to writing takes many forms. In this free, 90-minute class we'll talk about resistance, what it is, why it exists, and--most importantly--how to manage it!
Fear is predominant emotion for memoirists. We fear what others might think, we fear failure, we fear success, we fear we’re not any good, we fear we may hurt others... and the list goes on and on. But fear is not out to stop us, it’s there to warn us and make sure we contemplate all facets of a situation before proceeding. This free Zoom class will introduce you to a tool to help you handle the heebie-jeebies when they arise.
When I was eleven years old, still flat-chested and shaggy-haired, I wrote my father a note explaining in painstaking detail the hurt I felt over some favoritism he’d shown my younger sister. The specific incident is lost to memory, but I remember writing and rewriting that note several times until […]
A few weeks ago, I was nearing the end of a daylong intensive with a client who’d come to me for help mapping out a nonfiction book. When the day began, she spoke of wanting to write a book about leadership—something that might gather together years of insight she’d gained […]
“What is needed, rather than running away or controlling or suppressing or any other resistance, is understanding fear; that means watch it, learn about it, come directly into contact with it. We are to learn about fear, not how to escape from it.”
~Krishnamurti
*(Copyright 2013, Brian Whetten, used with permission)
When we […]
I recently started a new writing project and for the last few days have been engaged in a full-on dogfight with fear and doubt. The project didn’t start with fear. Instead, it began—and progressed—like all my writing projects:
A vague idea that had been with me for several months started to […]
