I learn the most amazing things from my writing exercise book (which I deliberately do not name, lest I poison some other writer's therapy). It's chock-full of new-age pop psychology wisdom, and an astonishing discovery awaits me every week. To date, I have learned:
- The muse exists ? literally. Humans do not create; they act as a conduit for the muse.
- Treating yourself to ice cream will cause you to get a job offer.
- Every person on earth wants to be an artist.
- Though I have been encouraged to write anything I want in my morning pages (a stream-of-consciousness exercise), the book's author can determine and discuss, week by week, the revelations I have writing them. Someday, she'll get one right.
- Enthusiasm, distaste, and indifference toward writing exercises may all be taken as proof that the exercises work.
- When I have difficulty writing, it's because my parents didn't love me enough.
- Meaningful discussion of god can precede a definition of god.
Eternal skeptic that I am, I pooh-pooh such penetrating insights almost by reflex. Sometimes, I have to catch myself in the act and give myself a mental wrist-slapping, because negative attitudes aren't always the best to adopt. (The muse may be imaginary, but that doesn't mean talking with your invisible friend can't shake out some good ideas to write about.) And, though I snicker my way through the book even as I honestly do the exercises, most of them are phrased vaguely or abstractly enough to defy firm contradiction. Isn't that always the way with new-age pop psychology?
Well, not always. The book puts me through numerous drills designed to get me to be more generous towards myself. If I am, I am absolutely, positively, 100% guaranteed to have a streak of good luck almost immediately, not that this makes generosity, with money or praise, any easier. I have to grit my teeth and force myself at times, and managed to do it the night before last.
Eileene came up as I was reading myself to sleep, plunked on the bed, and said, ?Let's go to Maine.? She wanted to take a weekend trip just for the heck of it. Since she's recently become a victim of the dot-com shakedown, and I'm writing for peanuts, our finances are a little shaky, and I didn't want to. But that very day, I'd promised myself and my writing book to spend some money without looking back, so, after a brief expression of concern, I agreed. When Eileene pointed out that we didn't have to go to Maine, that we could go to Canada or DC or anywhere, I replied that I didn't care ? why not check the long-term weather forecasts for various regions? We could go wherever there would be sun, far more conducive to enjoying myself as we crawl out of February weather than the actual location. Eileene went down to find out, and I dropped off to sleep.
The next morning, I learned Eileene hadn't made any reservations. The entire eastern seaboard, it seems, was to be cloaked in a grim drizzle by the weekend. My nurturing universe had let me down, even when I was generous with myself. So much for streaks of good luck, unless you count this journal entry as the fruits of saying ?okay, let's go.? I do have to admit I got a good laugh out of it, vindicated in my pessimism.