Ten Minutes: Activism if you have depression or other limitations.

The reality of injustice has been uncovered in the most horrific ways possible. We have work to do to make the country a place where people can live in peace.

If you suffer from depression, chronic pain, or other conditions that keep you from the front lines, you can still help people. The trick is to start small. If you make your goal too big, you will inevitably fail and slide into despair. So begin with ten minutes, just like if you were starting an exercise program.

You can get a lot done in ten minutes. Write a tiny email to someone you admire, telling them thank you for their hard work. Or write a tiny email to the city council, saying you want the police to learn new ways of interacting with their people of color.

No need to worry about making it perfect. Just start. For example, here's a tiny note I just made up on the fly:

Dear Police Department,

Seriously, guys, I think you need some help. The way you work now kills people, both officers and populace. Please expand to include social workers and mental health professionals. I want everyone to feel safe on the streets.

Or, you could be more assertive, depending on your personality:

Dear Police Department,

What the fucking fuck, dudes??

In ten minutes, you can create a draft about a situation or system that needs to change. If the email triggers your anxiety or your condition, you can wait for tomorrow's (or next week's) ten minutes to edit and send.

Perhaps you are awesome on the phone. Or you design excellent protest signs. Maybe you are in the absolute pits and can barely get out of bed. At that point, play some protest music, for yourself or your neighbors (my favorite protest musician is Mavis Staples).

Start small.

Small actions do add up and do make a difference.

Women Entrepreneurs: Natasha Lakos

Natasha Lakos

I don't spend much time talking about being an entrepreneur. It's time to turn that around!

Last year, I was honored to meet Natasha Lakos of Natasha Lakos Creative. 

She graciously allowed me to interview her! Thank you, Natasha!

1.Name of Business: Natasha Lakos Creative

What I do: I'm a Creative Director and Graphic Designer. I craft couture identities for exceptional clients - working 1:1 with heart-based entrepreneurs who are changing the world.

2. Aspects of my job that people don't see:

The very left-brained wrangling of ideas, details and deadlines that brings creativity and good design into reality. At times it can feel like herding cats! It's a good thing love is in the details.

3. Who inspires me on rough days:

If I'm having a rough day I honestly don't look to anyone else. I take it as a sign that I need a

pattern interrupt...I need to focus my attention elsewhere - on getting inspired creatively, on moving my body, on being in nature, on my friends / family. I usually take it as a cue to rest or focus elsewhere for a while. And when things have gotten really rough in the past I've learned that it's a sign I'm on the wrong track. Which means it's time to re-evaluate what I'm doing and implement a plan to get me through the rough patch and back in alignment. A talk with my coach, the lovely Sherold Barr, always does the trick.

4. Current projects:
I just had 3 clients launch new websites (yay!), I'm tying up a couple of other VIP design projects, and coming off of a major online launch with a retainer client of mine.
New in the works is a redo of my own site natashalakos.com, and content development for IDENTITY, a playbook I'm creating that will help passionate business owners identify what makes them unique, and help them express that online (you can learn more here).

You can also get my 5 Secrets to Uncovering Your Visual Identity, for free, here!

Here is some praise for Natasha's work:

“Working with Natasha has been dreamy. She’s creative, elegant, timely, professional, and perceptive. Not only do I adore the final visual product, the process has been wonderful, as well. Natasha is deeply nurturing of her clients while remaining sophisticated and on task. This is quite a rare combination and I’m grateful for it.”

Kate Northrup
ENTREPRENEUR, SPEAKER, AUTHOR, KATENORTHRUP.COM

 

Learning who you are.

I have had the honor and the pleasure of modeling with Michael Baxter, the genius of belly dance photography.

I never knew I had mystery inside.

Michael was gracious enough to experiment with me. The images he coaxed from me and his equipment showed me aspects of myself that I never knew existed.

If you asked me to describe myself, I would always say I was a little funny looking. I'm far from petite or graceful and - let's not mince words - overweight.

But Michael showed me a part of myself that was strong, passionate, and, yes, beautiful.  I learned a valuable lesson that day:

I no longer could justify my self-loathing.  

I wish everyone could have the experience of working with a gifted and empathic photographer. I wish you could discover the parts of yourself that you do not see.

Romantic Times are the best of times.

At the beginning of May, I attended the Romantic Times Reader Convention in Kansas City, MO. 

While I was there, I was so busy, I couldn't keep good notes, but I was able to take many photos!

Lori Sjoberg

Me, Lori Sjoberg, and Kim Foster

Fellow e-Kensington auther, Marina Miles.

More fun with eKensington authors!

Kensington had cookies with our covers!

Me at the E-book Expo.

The "before" picture of my table at the E-book Expo.

My "after" picture at the E-book Expo.

OMG I got Laura Kinsale's autograph!

Jade Lee, after I was eating a candy penis from Delilah Marvelle.

Kim Foster and her stash of goodies!

John Scalzi for The Charming Man!

Blast from the Past.

Once more into the past - this post is from June 14, 2010.

Jennifer Crusie rocks my socks. 

 

For those who aren't familiar with the romance genre, a little back story.

Here's part of what Wikipedia says about Ms. Crusie:

Crusie was graduated from Wapakoneta High School, and then earned a bachelor's degree in Art Education from Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio.^[1] She has two Master's degrees. For her first, from Wright State University in Professional Writing and Women's Literature,^[1] Crusie wrote a thesis on the role of women in mystery fiction.^[2] Her second master's degree is an MFA in Fiction from Ohio State University.^[1] She has also completed work towards a Ph.D. in feminist criticism and nineteenth century British and American literature at Ohio State University.

So we know we're dealing with a driven, intelligent woman who loves romance and who can discourse intelligently on the themes and motifs of romance fiction. On her website, Ms. Crusie discusses her writing process and analysis of genre fiction.


I have to recommend the below essay, if only cheer about someone mentioning V. Propp's and Claud Levi-Strauss' theories on literature and myth.

This Is Not Your Mother's Cinderella: The Romance Novel as Feminist Fairy Tale.

More Best of....

Captain America - one of my favorite fictional heroes.

To continue celebrating the 4th anniversary of my blog, here is another post from 2009.

Surrounding yourself with heroes.

Books on writing are full of advice - some of it life-changing. Some are, how do I say this nicely?

Utter rubbish.

And sometimes, advice starts as one and turns into the other.

For example, when women try to lose weight, they are told to paste a picture of a slim person on the inside of their cupboard or on their refrigerator. I have always found this to be nasty, belittling, and condescending - yet another way of telling women that they are not beautiful and they will never measure up.

But we all need heroes. That's why we write, that's why we watch movies/TV, that's why we read. Everyone needs someone to show us that what we want is possible and how to get there.

So this week, I found pictures of my creative heroes and I've seeded them around my writing stations.

Obviously, I have a love for mythology and for the band Queen. Freddie, Brian, Roger, and John now live in glorious color on my laptop's wallpaper. Their music, politics, and courage never fail to lift me up when I'm feeling sluggish or stuck.

The magical Jayne Ann Krentz

Emma Holly

Jayne Ann Krentz, a wonderful best-selling author (and former librarian with a background in history!) is another of my heroes. I've met her in person a few times and she is down to earth, intelligent, and has great insights on our craft. If you do not own Dangerous Men and Adventurous Women, you are shorting yourself some great discussion on Romance!

Emma Holly writes beautifully sexy and emotional fiction.

I've got lots. Who inspires you?

Working for a Living: Women in the Arts IV

Ladies and gentlemen, meet the multi-talented Jessa Slade, author of the Marked Souls series.

1.      What is the name of your business and what do you tell other people you do? (such as author, teacher, designer)

Hello, I’m Jessa Slade, and I’m an author. (This sounds like a 12-step program intro, except I use my last name because I’m dying for people to know how word-addicted I am.) When people ask what I do, I say I am a writer. I say writer instead of author because I like to emphasize the verb part. I’m a writer when I write. That’s the part I control. Technically, I suppose you could say I control the author part too, now that I am self published, but personally, I consider the author part of myself subject to the whims of being read. And that part I can’t control. Sadly!

2.      When did you know it was time to stop treating your art as a hobby and start it as a career?

When I got paid! That sounds a little mercenary, doesn’t it? I guess I’m going by the IRS’s definition :) I’ve always written with the intent of being read, and until that happened, I wasn’t ready to call myself an author, which is the career part. But to be honest, I didn’t make that many changes moving from writer to author. The deadlines are more deadly :) but the work is pretty much the same: words on the page, one after the other.

3.      What are some of the aspects of your job that people don’t see? For example, most people don’t understand how much marketing is done by the authors themselves instead of a publisher, and most audience members don’t see how costumes and props are designed/chosen.

I did a booksigning at the Powell’s Books at the Portland International Airport with a couple other authors, and I was surprised how many people were surprised we were authors! I mean, we were sitting at tables surrounded by our books next to a sign that said Meet The Authors, and yet when we said we were the authors, people invariably said, “You’re the authors?” in simultaneous tones of surprise, pleasure and suspicion. Apparently we did not look like authors! I wonder what would have convinced people.

Most people don’t see the hours that go into writing a book. Nathaniel Hawthorne said “Easy reading is damn hard writing.” I suspect most people think writing is easy because all of us learn our alphabet from our very earliest years, so how hard could it be, stringing those same 26 letters together over a blank page? (Insert maniacal laughter here.)

4.      Who inspired/inspires you on those inevitable rough days?

I belong to a great romance writers’ organization, Romance Writers of America. The women and men in my local chapter are a fabulous source of inspiration and energy. There is always someone querying or getting published, just starting or just finishing a book, touring blogs or going off-line to concentrate. Seeing that constantly ebb and flow of mindful effort, excitement, determination, and passion helps keep me going when the works aren’t going.

5.      Name a few of your current projects. For example, conferences, publicity, design process, what you have for sale.

 

For the holiday season, I published a Christmas novella in my Marked Souls demonic possession series. (What? Christmas and demons go together like children and lots of sugar.) THE DARKEST NIGHT is about two lost souls finding each other at the darkest time of the year. Also, the second book in my Steel Born dark fairy series, A LITTLE NIGHT MUSE, is out in January. I’m currently working on the second book in my science fiction romance anthology series and the third book of the Steel Born. I gotta write faster!

6. (OPTIONAL)   This question is a chance to meander or talk in greater depth if you’d like. Here you can talk about what hobbies you pursue, how you refresh your well of ideas, what you would recommend to other women interested in a career in the arts, or just anything you'd like other people to know.

I truly believe in the power of a creative outlet to change for the better the way we live, think and love. I don’t doubt that entropy is out to get us, and our only way to battle the inevitable chaos is to create. Whether that’s writing, music, painting, sewing, cooking, gardening, or compiling supercuts of cute baby animal videos, find the thing you love and share it with the universe. The universe is waiting for your art!

You can find me online at:

My website, My newsletter, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Goodreads 

FANGIRL SQUEE!

http://susiebright.blogs.com/I have a workshop with Susie Bright tonight!

*turning handsprings*

The meat of the matter.

In romance and erotica writing, the men have large penises. I've not read a story about a man's thin or short cock, even though every single heterosexual woman out there knows that they come in all shapes and sizes.  And every single one is capable of bringing great pleasure. Not only that, we also know that too-big cocks can hurt.

So why the obsession?  After reading Nancy Friday for many years, I culled the following theories:

1. Fantasies are symbolic of what someone wants in their life. A dream of a big penis, a huge, giant monster that fills you up and satisfies you - well. Sounds like a shout for MORE MORE MORE, doesn't it?

2.That MORE MORE MORE isn't just about sex. It's about wanting more excitement, more time to relax, more ease and just plain more fun. Nothing represents a really great day better than a big, hard penis.

3. It's also a bit of a boast - "I'm such a powerful woman, it takes something powerful to satiate me and please me."

4. That shout of MORE can also represent frustration with the "Good Girl" role - you know, the one where a woman is shamed if she initiates, shares her fantasies, is experimental, or just plain curious. Talk about a rebellion! Desire for more starts every revolution, even a small one where an individual simply wants the freedom to read what she truly wants.

Those are my theories. What are yours?

Story Basics Part IV: The Mentor Archetype

The name Mentor comes from a character in the Odyssey. Telemachus, Odysseus' son, goes on a quest to find his father. The goddess Athena takes the guise of Mentor (a human male) to give Telemachus advice, training, aid, or necessary gifts to finish the search.

The Mentor is a very rich archetype. Joseph Campbell named this role as The Wise Old Man or Woman. The Mentor's job is to represent our highest selves, the part of the heroine who is wise and far seeing.  A mentor decides if the heroine has earned gifts to help her, or can act as her conscience. The Mentor motivates and initiates the heroine, too.

Mentors can be kindly  parental figures or they can be dangerous, teaching the Heroine through hard knocks. A Dark Mentor is one who starts a character on a tragic arc, leading her into danger or destruction. Fallen Mentors have lost their own way, and part of the Hero's story is to make the Mentor pull herself together. There are often multiple Mentors in a story, as well.

After all, James Bond not only has M, he has Moneypenny and Q to help teach him what he needs. Arthur has Merlin, but also his brother Kaye, his father, and even his half-sister to teach him lessons.

Mentors can be funny, mystical, young, old, or even part of the Heroine's inner landscape as a memory or code of honor. They can show up in the beginning, middle, or end of the story. Don't get stuck thinking your Mentor has to be Obi Wan with a beard and a nifty sword. Anyone and anything can teach your Heroine what she needs to know.

Story Basics Part IV: Archetypes and Joseph Campbell

Last year (to the day!), I said I would do a series on various archetypal thought systems that can inspire a writer. Today (and until I get done with it), I'm going to discuss Joseph Campbell's breakdowns according to Christopher Vogler .
Vogler names the most useful, basic archetypes for writers:

• Hero
• Mentor
• Threshold Guardian 
• Herald
• Shapeshifter
• Shadow
• Trickster

First things first. According to Vogler,

The concept of archetypes is an indispensable tool for understanding the purpose or function of characters in a story. If you grasp the function of the archetype which a particular character is expressing, it can help you determine if the character is pulling her full weight in the story. The archetypes are part of the universal language of storytelling, and a command of their energy is as essential to the writer as breathing.  (p. 29, emphasis his)

It's very easy to call character A the Mentor, and that is her only function - to mentor and educate the Hero, then to let her go into the world on her own. But in order to make a story character interesting and three dimensional, the Mentor will most likely play many roles, just like real people. Someone can give you excellent advice one day, then the next tie your shoelaces together. This person has embodied both the Mentor and the Trickster/Shapeshifter archetypes.

For the next few days, I'll breakdown each individual archetype. This is going to be fun!

Story Basics, Part I

My friend Opal Mirror and I have had an interesting conversation since my post on Catching Up On The Classics.

He says he likes to write setting, but has trouble with narrative and character development (whereas I'm all over narrative, but setting is ridiculously hard for me). So, for both of us, I thought I'd go over some concepts and see if it helps us (and you, too).

Character development - creating a fictional person who is as confused and searching as a real person - isn't easy, but there are some tools to help you on your way.

The first tool set involves basic questions such as:

1. What does the person need to learn?  Humility? Self-Confidence? That his uncle murdered his father and then married the widow?
2. What are her flaws? Is she a careless listener? Is he greedy? Hamlet had some serious focus issues, for example. His job was to kill his uncle, not everyone else!
3. What is her greatest fear? Gertrude did not want to face the truth of her actions - that she had committed incest by marrying her brother in law.
4. What is his best quality? I always thought Hamlet's best quality that was he didn't take the ghost's words for granted - he had to investigate and prove the truth to himself.
5. What is the price she will have to pay if she doesn't learn the lesson(s)? Since it took Hamlet so long to learn what was going on, he left behind a trail of innocent dead.

These are just ideas to start the brainstorming process. More character tools to come!

Conversations with The Flaming Chef.

Jason Zenobia, the genius Flaming Chef, replied to my Twilight series:

Amazing themes and discourse here. I've always been fascinated by the symbolism of heterosexual romance. Love of "the other" when the other is physiologically different from you, opens up all sorts of neat ideas.

The idea that women aren't whole until they have men to guide them - I always thought of that as a function of pairing up. (Cultural ideas around marriage in particular.) It follows from what you're saying that this dynamic is as much a function of falling in love (or being obsessed) with someone?

(Places index finger on chin. Makes thoughtful little noise)

And to respond!

One of things I like about the quotes I posted last time is that they comment on the necessity of a woman to embrace her animus (as well as her Shadow aspects, to get all Jungian up in here).

Since women are traditionally discouraged from exploring and expressing their aggression and anger, I believe that one will chose a male partner that best embodies her repressed qualities. Being in love with a man can bring insight to those characteristics that she has hidden or been frightened of.

I feel that romance novels, one of the only genres aimed specifically at women and read mainly by women, give us a chance to examine interactions with the different kinds of male personalities and behaviors. Then, we can integrate those aspects into our psyche with a great deal less danger.

Jennifer Crusie rocks my socks.

For those who aren't familiar with the romance genre, a little back story.

Here's part of what Wikipedia says about Ms. Crusie:

Crusie was graduated from Wapakoneta High School, and then earned a bachelor's degree in Art Education from Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio.^[1] She has two Master's degrees. For her first, from Wright State University in Professional Writing and Women's Literature,^[1] Crusie wrote a thesis on the role of women in mystery fiction.^[2] Her second master's degree is an MFA in Fiction from Ohio State University.^[1] She has also completed work towards a Ph.D. in feminist criticism and nineteenth century British and American literature at Ohio State University.

So we know we're dealing with a driven, intelligent woman who loves romance and who can discourse intelligently on the themes and motifs of romance fiction. On her website, Ms. Crusie discusses her writing process and analysis of genre fiction.


I have to recommend this one, if only cheer about someone mentioning V. Propp's and Claud Levi-Strauss' theories on literature and myth.

This Is Not Your Mother's Cinderella: The Romance Novel as Feminist Fairy Tale.

Feminism for the day!

May I recommend The Feminist Hulk? Smashing the patriarchy with purple shorts and class!

For example:

HULK POLITELY REQUEST CHANGING TABLE IN MEN’S ROOM. HULK CHOOSE NOT TO EMPLOY SMASH IN THIS MOMENT. MULTIPLE TOOLS FOR CHANGE.

Traveling!

I'm visiting my family this week! The plan is to jot as many notes as I can, write when I can, and smile a lot.

A writing game.

A while ago, Jane Porter spoke at my local RWA chapter, the Rose City Romance Writers.

I'll be honest. Jane's blonde, gorgeous, petite, skinny, and looks about sixteen. I was consumed by envy. Then she gave a brilliantly inspirational speech about where your writing fits in the market.

I was expecting something very business-like, maybe a breakdown of the different publishers and what they tended towards.

Instead, she talked about the roots of your writing- the fables, myths, and fairy tales that consumed you as a child. What could you listen to over and over? What were those themes? What keeps coming up over and over for you?

The fairy tales didn't reveal that much about me, I thought. I picked.

1. The Seven Swans: I chose discipline, faithfulness, and sewing shirts out of flowers (transformation) as the themes I loved about this story.
   


2. Aladdin : Flying, courage, and risk.
   


3. Sleeping Beauty: Disguises, awakening to a new reality, and (what the hell) fairies with personalities.
   

I really flailed with these. No common themes seemed to emerge. Then we went to mythology. I chose:

1. Medea: Revenge, justifiable wrath, a woman who controls her life, a woman who kills, escape
   



2. The Golden Fleece: Powerful allies, justifiable wrath, travel
   



3. The Aenead: Rising from the ashes, travel, new starts
   

I suddenly realized why my attempts at light-hearted romantic comedy failed miserably. I had much darker stories inside of me.

I focused on the story that began, "She swam in an ocean of blood" instead of "Lola blinked." I'm pretty sure we can all tell which first sentence is far more attention grabbing. :)
(That's not the first sentence anymore, by the way ;).

Myths, fables, legends, and fairy tales are our playground. They provide the archetypes, the symbols, and the language for our lives.

Play the game with me. What are the stories that have haunted you? What themes do you carry inside of yourself?

Riding the Quote Train.

The most powerful myths are about extremity. They force us to go beyond our experience. There are moments when we all, in one way or another, have to go to place we have never seen, and do what we have never done before. (p. 3)

[Myth] enables us to place our lives in a larger setting that reveals an underlying pattern and gives us a sense that against all the depressive and chaotic evidence to the contrary, life had meaning and value.

A Short History of Myth by Karen Armstrong.

Quote of the Moment.

Sometimes, other people just say it best. Here's Anne Lamott from Bird by Bird.

I still encourage anyone who feels at all compelled to write to do so. I just try to warn people who hope to get published that publication is not all it is cracked up to be. But writing is. Writing has so much to give, so much to teach, so many surprises. The thing you had to force yourself to do - the actual act of writing- turns out to be the best part. It's like discovering that while you thought you needed the tea ceremony for the caffeine, what you really needed was the tea ceremony. The act of writing turns out to be its own reward.

Sometimes I need to be reminded of this.

In Defense of Twilight, even though I hate it; Part--Oh,who cares what part it is.

Just letting you know that, yep. Still hate Twilight. But I still much to say!

Related to my entry two days ago, this entire article treats girls like they are stupid. Except for points 13, 18, 19 and 20, which are actually funny.

Second, I think one of the things Twilight does do well is explore the beauty, intensity, and untamed nature of a girl's sexual awakening. I might roll my eyes at the overblown language when I read about Edward sparkling in the sun, but that's exactly how it feels. I'm about to be heterosexist for a while - forgive me.

When a girl looks at a guy's chest (ass, crotch, arms, hands, back - you get the idea) and gets her first nose full of hot testosterone, your entire being flips around. Trust me when I tell you that Bella's rhapsodizing about Edward's crystalline skin is pretty damn tame compared to the things girls think about when they discover just what that turns them on.

Fiction allows us to revisit the cathartic, life-changing moments of our existences. A woman's first flush of arousal is so amazing, so overwhelming, and so important that we read to reinforce all the lessons we learn from it. We get to find that wonderful, ripe, glorious feeling of sexuality, of power, of delight in our bodies, without the negative side effects of judgment, dissatisfaction, or shame.

I think reclaiming that moment of pure ownership of our senses is something all humans must do. The chills, the excitement, the way the hormones made you feel like champagne flowed through your veins instead of mere blood - the world needs more of that joyous feeling.

If you're a writer, go write some thing that makes you remember an awakening. If you express yourself in other ways, do that instead. If you are in love, tell that someone that you desire how maddening their scent is or the brush of their skin on yours makes you moan.

Reclaim that tension that Bella has discovered again for us.