What's Your Creative Type? (Take the Quiz!)

By Lisa Alber

Last week on the Jungle Red Writers blog, author Meta Wagner introduced her book WHAT'S YOUR CREATIVE TYPE?: Harness the Power of Your Artistic Personality. I'm a sucker for this kind of thing, so I took the online quiz, which you can find here: http://snapp.to/2lHVOEY.

I wasn't surprised to find out that I'm a sensitive soul, which is defined as, "Brimming with emotion, you’ll use your art to explore your personal history and as a catharsis."

 The other possibilities are:

• Artisan: "You’re here to create, you enjoy the process itself."
• A-Lister: "You want to have an emotional impact on the audience, you live for the applause." 
• Activist: "Through art, you want to change the world. Wherever you go, you see wrongs ready to be righted."

The most interesting thing about the Jungle Reds blog post were the comments it inspired. People tended toward being sensitive souls and artisans, which you might expect from a bunch of writers and book lovers and aspiring writers. But then, the topic came up that doing any kind of quiz like this is limiting, because we may feel tied between two options.

OK, then, I and many of the commenters went through the quiz again, choosing our second choices. At this point, many people got "a-lister." I found this intriguing because we so often don't want to admit to wanting fame and glory for our creative endeavors. God forbid! However, it strikes me that writers who are artisans or sensitive souls with a-lister tendencies might be highly motivated to "make it" and do all the work required to "make it."

(The question becomes what is your definition of making it? I'm using the notion that many of us creatives have, which is to earn a nice income, which is closest to "a-lister.")

In any case, it's a sliding scale. None of us are only one thing. That said, I was oddly bummed when I took the quiz a second time and came up with "artisan."

WHERE'S MY A-LISTER!??! I'd love to be a little more a-lister, but apparently, I'm not. I'm all about self-expression and the process, and all that airy-fairy stuff. I even tried to be an a-lister, but my second choices didn't lead to that outcome.

I even did it a third time -- and I still got artisan!

Sigh ... Does this mean I'm never going to "make it"?

Of course not, but it did make me think about this: If I'm not an a-lister type, going for the glory, how do I reconcile that with the external pressure to be more of an a-lister? Do I care if I see my fellows who are a-listers get the glory, while I remain a relatively unknown, midlist author? (Of course, I care; we all like to succeed -- I guess the question becomes how I deal with my feelings around this.)

In any case, I had to laugh that even when I try, I'm not a going-for-the-glory kind of person. So figures. But, on the other hand, I don't think that matters in the long run. The work itself matters. That's all. Whether any of us "make it" or not isn't under our control. And not making it doesn't lessen the creative endeavor or the value of our work.

All creative expression is good -- and **necessary** in this weird world we're living in these days.

P.S. I'm going to buy the book ... Just to see, you know, what the author has to say about all of this. :-)

What's your take on all of this?

Maintaining Balance in a Creative Life

by Sheila Webster Boneham

Balance. I’ve long been a great believer in balance in life. Not necessarily moderation, mind you, but balance. Hard work balanced against hard play, or hard rest. Think very long nap on a rainy afternoon after writing from seven until noon, with a couple of hours bicycling or hiking in the early evening. Balance.



Indian Paintbrush looks to me like
creativity feels.
©2011 Sheila Boneham, Evans Canyon, Reno, NV



For creative people – writers, painters, musicians, actors, crafters, and more – balance can be hard to achieve. The siren that is creative work is seductive. It can sing its way into our brains and make us attend to its needs until our joints lock. That same siren, though, can be painfully shy, hiding itself at the first hint of distraction. Something good on tv? You can write that poem later! Friends want you to come play parcheesi? The painting can wait. The socks in your sock drawer are rebelling? Clearly more important to organize them than to write that novel.

I jest. Sort of. The truth is that there’s ALWAYS something else to do. Some distractions even look from the outside very much like actual work. You’re a writer, you’re on the computer – checking what’s happened on Facebook in the last ten minutes, and reading the latest writers’ group digest post, and checking the five hundred blogs you frequent because HOLY COW! You might miss something that will make or break your career!

There's always some seductive path
calling, "Follow me!"
©2011 Sheila Boneham, Wrightsville Beach, NC

I confess. I do all those things. Sometimes. But in the past fifteen years I’ve also written twenty three and a half books, sixteen tons of articles (more or less), a pile of short stories, a small clutch of poems (very recently!), and the various related documents – query letters, proposals, blurbs, bios, bull..., er, marketing materials. So, rumors to the contrary aside, I do maintain some degree of balance.

How? A surprising (to me, anyway) number of people ask me that. It’s no mystery, really. Like many busy people, I compartmentalize my time, and have done so for so many years that my "time habits" are part of me. I write in a local café every morning, beginning around 7:00, ending around noon, with a half hour or so off for breakfast with my husband. I go home, have lunch, have tea. I read for a couple of hours. Take a short nap most afternoons. Go for a long walk, sometimes with my dog Lily, sometimes with my camera, sometimes just with my thoughts. I often write more in the evening, or meet my writers’ group, or friends, or go to an event or movie, or paint and listen to music, or watch a movie at home. And, yes, reading social media and posting on my Facebook author page, or updating my website or my own blog.  And ok, maybe an hour of Frasier reruns. Hey, we all have our vices. I read some more late at night, when everything is quiet. I sleep. And the writing gets done, because I know I have those four or five hours of dedicated writing time, and I use them to....write!



I find that other creative pursuits,
like painting, help feel my work as
a writer. Creativity begets creativity.
©2011 Sheila Boneham, "Sydney," watercolor

Balance, of course, should extend to all of life, not just work. Because creative work is so personal, it can be very difficult to separate the artifacts of our creativity – the books, the paintings, the hand-thrown pots – from our Selves. But the truth is that our creativity comes from without as well as from within. We need experience of the world to feed the fire inside. The precise experience each of us needs varies, but we all need something. A few days without my writing time make me crave my keyboard, but I know from experience that if I lock myself away to do nothing but write for more than a day or two, my siren stops singing. I need time in nature, travel, long walks, cuddles with my dogs, talks with my husband, flowers, music, my friends, good books, photography, art, and more in my life if I am to have anything worth saying.

What do you need to create balance in your life and work?

Memoir, Mystery, and the Muse

by Sheila Webster Boneham


I recently taught a six-week "Write Your Memoir" class through the Cameron Art Museum here in Wilmington, NC. I love teaching through the Museum School - we get terrific students. Writing is rather new to the Museum School's offerings and we are still building up that portion of the catalog, but things are looking up as people find out about the writing classes. 

Now that "Memoir" is finished, I'm back to focusing on the third book in my Animals in Focus Mystery series, tentatively titled Catwalk, and I've been thinking about some of the links between memoirs, mysteries, and that slippery character, the writer's Muse. Creativity, after all, works in similar ways regardless of the genre -- or even the medium -- in which we work.  

One of the tools I shared with my memoir students was a series of questions to ask of old photographs. We've all heard that a picture is worth a thousand words, but a photo (or other visual image) may also help inspire and expand ideas. It's no surprise that photos can be used to bring up memories of places we've been, or people and animals we've known, or events we've experienced. 

What may not be so obvious is that  photos can be useful creative tools for  writers in other genres, including mystery. Images of settings, people, animals, or objects can serve to inspire short stories or scenes in longer works, especially when the narrator or a character answers the questions I pose below. An image might even provide the kernel for a longer piece of writing. For instance, one of my inspirations for The Money Bird, which will be out in September, was a photo of an escaped pet parrot in a tree in the Midwest. 

So if you're looking for a way to go deeper, or wider, or to find new ideas, try "interrogating" a photo or painting. Better yet, have one of your characters do it. Start with these questions:

• Where is this?
• When?
• Why are you there?
• Who else is there?
• Have you been there before?
• What is happening, or not happening?
• Is some object in the photo significant to you?
• Is a person or animal in the picture significant to you?

Now dig deeper:

• What do you hear?
• What do you smell?
• What did you eat or drink?
• What does it taste like?
• What’s the weather like?
• What time of day is it?
• What are you wearing?
• Who else is there?
• What do you feel with your hands, your feet, your skin….
• What emotions do you feel?

And so on....

Give it a try. Let me know how it goes. Send a picture! You can find me at www.sheilaboneham.com or on my Write Here, Write Now! blog. 

Decisions, Decisions

Cricket McRae

Last weekend I led a workshop on avoiding self-sabotage at the Northern Colorado Writers Conference. Even when I proposed it to the conference director, I wondered if anyone would show up. The things that writers do to get in their own way often seem like dirty little secrets.

All of us are, after all, highly efficient, well-organized, fabulous time managers, and understand that nothing is ever perfect so we know when to stop agonizing and move on. Furthermore, we never procrastinate. Ever.

Right?

Nevertheless, I thought I’d share one thing I learned when putting the workshop together. This is about writing, but also applies to just about any other artistic endeavor.

I went to hear the comedian Lewis Black speak when he was on a book tour about six years ago. He said, with his typical New York sass, that it would be a good long time before he wrote another book. Someone asked him why.

“Because when you’re writing a book it feels like you’re a ten-year-old boy, and it’s Sunday night, and you haven’t even started your homework yet. And it feels like that ALL THE TIME.”

I laughed. I winced. It struck home.

There can be so much anxiety about not writing when you’re not writing. How can that not provide the impetus to chuck your dinner plans, put the kids to bed at six, and race to the keyboard?

Because writing can also cause anxiety. And if it doesn’t, at least sometimes, then it’s possible we’re not challenging ourselves quite enough.

But why would it cause anxiety?

Because we have to make decisions. In fact, we make decisions about every single aspect of writing. Even after we’ve decided between fiction and nonfiction, long or short, genre, subgenre, and even sub-subgenre, we have to decide about plot, subplot, setting, character, scene placement, pacing, overarching themes and meaning. And then? Every sentence and every word is a decision. The more we do it the easier some of those decisions become, but they’re still there. Then comes the editing – what to keep, what to toss, what to add.

Not to mention the decisions we have to make once we’re finished. After we’ve actually decided we’re finished, of course.

Yeah, yeah. Life if full of decisions. So what’s the big deal? Buck up.

Of course. But it’s helpful to be aware that decisions are exhausting. Literally, physically exhausting. Our brain makes up about 4% of of our physiology, but uses 20% of the available glucose in our bodies. The more it has to work making decisions, the more glucose it uses.

In study after study, subjects who have recently eaten display more willpower than those who don’t. (Hello, procrastinators! Have a snack and try again!)

They also make better – or at least better thought-out – decisions. For example, a study of judges showed that they were more likely to grant parole to prisoners whose parole hearings were first thing in the morning or shortly after lunch. If a prisoner was unlucky enough to be scheduled for a hearing late in the afternoon the chances that they’d be granted parole went way down.

It was determined that was in part because the judges had used up the ready glucose in their systems and so tended, in essence, to not decide by simply choosing the status quo. It was also in part because they were suffering from decision fatigue. The more decisions you make, the harder the next one will be.

And we already have a lot of choices in our lives already. I don’t know about you, but after a good, strong writing session of three or four hours I can walk away feeling stretched thin and acting pretty spaced out. Forget asking me what I want for dinner.

Does any of this resonate with you, whether in writing or another form of creating? Or does it sound like a bunch o’ hooey?

(p.s. – the workshop was packed!)

On Desire, Work, and Success

by Sheila Webster Boneham


Shannon Baker’s wonderful Inkspot entry on Monday, including the insert by Ira Glass, got me thinking about the whole business of wanting to do things and sticking with them long enough to really improve. In the context of Inkspot, the pre-eminent "thing" is writing, but the concepts that Mr. Glass discusses and Ms. Baker underlines really apply to most pursuits.

"I want to write a [novel, memoir, poem, book about...]...." When I teach workshops or participate in mixed-level writers' groups, I hear this all the time. The impulse to do something, and especially to create something, is widespread. I’d even argue that it’s a fundamental human drive, because it’s hard to find a child who isn’t eager to learn and make and do things. I would definitely argue that the creative urge plays out in more than the fields we typically think of as "creative" – writing, visual arts, dance, music, and so on. Take dog training.

My new "Animals in Focus Mystery" series focuses in each book on a different animal activity, with dog obedience in the spotlight in book one, Drop Dead on Recall. In fact, the title is a play on the name for one of the exercises in open- (mid-) level obedience competition. For more than a decade I taught obedience classes, mostly to pet owners who wanted gain some control of their dogs. Many did fine, and emerged at the end of the class with slightly improved skills for communicating with their dogs. Some were inspired to continue training, and a few of those eventually went on to compete. At each step up that ladder from "my dog is dragging me down the street" to "my dog just earned an obedience title!" there were dropouts, because I’m here to tell you that as easy as it looks when you see a well-oiled dog-and-owner team perform (like my friend Gayle Watkins and her lovely Corey, below), it took them a lot of hard work to get there.

So it goes with writing. Many people begin with an urge to write. Some have a specific project in mind – often a memoir – but some just feel they’d like to try writing and find their subject as they go. They take a class or two, or join a writers’ group, or go to a conference. It’s fun at first. Then the fun becomes more complicated. And painful. Not all criticism is "constructive," and even when it is, it’s hard to hear. Don’t even think about rejection – except if you’re serious about publishing, you’d better get used to the idea! (Ah, another topic for another day.) So like the doggy-school dropouts who don’t want to spend time teaching the things their dogs don’t learn (or obey) quickly, a lot of beginning and intermediate writers dropout when the pleasures of writing begin to bump up against disappointments and plain old hard work.

And it takes a lot of hard work to be good, much less great (at writing, at anything). Many people quit when this becomes evident. I'd say that's sad, but I'm not sure it is. I think we should try something new every so often. I encourage everyone to do so, especially anyone who teaches – take a class in an art form or a sport or a subject completely new to you. It will expand your own frame of reference, and it may lead you to a new passion. It will also remind you how hard learning is so that you’ll see what you teach from a newcomer’s perspective.

As for the quitting, I think that’s okay too. Because quitting doesn’t mean failure. It means we have successfully identified our lack of interest or skill in a particular activity. It means we can move on to try something else, or we can go back to what we already know and love. Poet Jack Gilbert wrote, "Everyone forgets that Icarus also flew....I believe Icarus was not failing as he fell, but just coming to the end of his triumph."

I agree.


Thanks to Gayle Watkins and Corey (U-CD LornaDoone Encore! Encore! CDX SH MX MXJ NF WCX OD VCX CCA TT) for permission to use the video. All other photos except book cover from iStockphoto.


Sheila W. Boneham, Ph.D., is the author of the forthcoming "Animals in Focus" mystery Drop Dead on Recall (now available for pre-order) as well as award-winning books about pets including Rescue Matters! How to Find, Foster, and Rehome Companion Animals (Alpine, 2009), The Complete Idiot's Guide to Getting and Owning a Cat (Alpha, 2005), and fifteen others. Sheila's books are available from your local bookseller and on line. Learn more at www.sheilaboneham.com or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/sheilawrites.

Layers of Creativity

“Invent first, then embellish. The production of something, where nothing was before, is an act of greater energy than the expansion or decoration of the thing produced. Set down diligently your thoughts as they rise in the first words that occur; and when you have matter you will easily give it form.”

Samuel Johnson.

Long ago (25 years) and far away (okay, about three miles away) a logic professor told our class that learning something – anything, really – was always easier than creating something brand new on our own. I’ve never forgotten that. Probably because even then I wanted to be a writer, and his statement was a reminder that creativity can be, well, work. Good work, of course, but not to be taken lightly. Apparently Samuel Johnson agrees.

The Johnson quote above relates to the idea that there are different layers of creativity within most from-scratch projects. Painting a picture, the interior design of a room, planning a landscape bed, or inventing a recipe all require the spark of a beginning idea, the first implementation of that idea, and then subsequent improvements.

It’s certainly true of writing. The spark is hard to define. That “where do you get your ideas” thing that I can only answer with “everywhere” and “the weird acrobatics my brain does with my life experience.” Beyond the spark is what Anne Lamott calls “shitty first drafts.”

I love shitty first drafts. They’re freeing. I can experiment. More magic happens when I’m not trying to write something perfectly. My mind is open to greater possibility. And I really love shitty first drafts because then I get to fix them. Fixing a first draft is [almost] always easier than coming up with one in the first place, and each improvement provides a ping of satisfaction that feels like a wee hit of dopamine.

Fixing is the next layer of creativity. Problem solving. Working out the glitches. Making it smooth and clear and pretty and maybe even a little funny. For a room or a garden it’s adjusting the visual flow, changing texture, balancing beauty and practicality. Or a recipe may require a little more cinnamon or the addition of a savory herb to complement all that cheese (and bacon!).

In any creative endeavor you have to know the basics – grammar and storytelling, how ingredients work together, how colors complement each other or affect mood, what grows in your zone and blooms in each season. That knowledge is available – especially with the Internet – and easy to learn if you’re truly interested. Plus, it will grow with each use, increasing with your passion for whatever creative outlet you love.

I’m embellishing, as Johnson put it, a lot these days. And then? Onto another shitty first draft!

Wish I'd Thought of That

It’s amazing how some people can take the ordinary and make it into the extraordinary—then make a profit with it.

Take the Silly Bandz explosion: colored rubber bands shaped like animals, objects, letters, numbers, etc., priced within a kid’s reach at $4.95 for a twenty-four pack. For a while, they were a must have, fun to trade. Even movie stars wore them.


The latest example I’ve seen is duct or duck tape. How many years have I been looking at this stuff, primarily in the standard gray color, lying on my husband’s workbench? This weekend I took my daughter to the store so she could use her Christmas money to buy Color Duck Tape, specifically hot pink and zebra striped, to add to her growing supply. She uses it to decorate her school folders and notebooks and to make flowers on the ends of pens and pencils. Now it’s a must have, and the local craft store had plenty of it at $3.99 a roll, well within a kid’s budget.


You may remember the story of the accidental invention of the sticky note or the Post-It Note. The adhesive’s invention was accidental, but its uses were ingenious. I’ve got yellow, hot pink, blue, and green Post-It notes on my desk. I know artists have used them to create wall art, and some writers use them to create movable storyboards.

I guess that’s what’s referred to as “thinking out of the box.” Apparently, I’m firmly nailed inside my box, because these sorts of ideas never occur to me. It’s noteworthy that I’m even thinking they might, because I’m usually trying to think of something for dinner.

So, what about you? Anything like these few that you wished you’d thought of?

A long time ago the Pilgrims sailed,

To find a brand new land.

They wanted to worship God themselves,

Not by the King's command.

So begins an eight-verse epic poem written by yours truly in November of 1971. I was a fifth grader at Norfolk Elementary School in Massachusetts, steeped so deeply in the lore and legend of the Mayflower, Squanto and Governor Bradford that I felt as if I, too, had planted my shiny black-buckled shoe upon the famous Plymouth Rock.

Growing up in the Bay State it was hard to avoid the Pilgrims. The wide-brimmed hat sported by Pilgrim men (called a capotain) was on signage for our highways, the state flower bore the same name as the Pilgrims' sturdy ship, and Plimouth Plantation, the living history museum replicating a 1627 English village and Wampanoag settlement, was the default class trip for hordes of school children, including those of us from Norfolk Elementary.

It's not surprising that a young girl who feverishly penned poems, short stories, soap operas, and magazine advice columns should turn her attention to the most famous immigrants of all.

What is surprising is what happened after I wrote the poem.

I recall the noisy auditorium of the school, the kids antsy to go home for Thanksgiving break, and me, wearing a plaid dress no doubt, ushered by my teacher up to the front of the assembly. Did I read the poem slowly, emphasizing the dramatic moment when the Pilgrims nearly starved? Or did I hurry through the verses, eager to get back to my seat?

Here is what I do remember: knowing deep in my core that I am a writer. It's a feeling as solid as Plymouth Rock itself, one that reviews, contracts, and sales figures can't touch, and for that I am grateful.

Today I'm taking a little detour with my daughter before joining the rest of my family for the holiday. A pilgrimage, if you will, down the coast to Plymouth. Having been born and raised in Maine, my kids missed out on the whole Pilgrim-related indoctrination.

Fortunately it's a heck of a long ride. Happy Thanksgiving!

Of Bikes and Blogs

Next week I will spend three days pedaling my bike more than 180 miles in the Trek Across Maine, an annual fundraising event for the American Lung Association. It's my third year participating, and before you say, "Wow, sounds like fun! Sign me up!" let me remind you that Maine is very hilly (mountainous, actually) and that last year's ride can be summed up in one adjective: miserable.

Without a doubt the first day was the worst. We woke to soaking rains, temperatures in the forties, and a forecast that promised only more of the same. Normally about two thousand cyclists ride, but the extreme weather whittled down our numbers to less than half of that. Those of us still hardy (or foolish) enough to wrap ourselves in Gore-Tex and brave the downpour shivered at the summit of Bethel's Sunday River Ski Resort, waiting for the start gun and wondering what the heck we were doing.

The deluge never stopped. Sixty miles up and down Maine's twisty roads and around her scenic lakes, with every single part of every biker's body soaking wet and cold. The rest stops, where hundreds of volunteers hand out granola bars and Gatorade, became La Brea-like mud pits. The port-o-potties, those odiferous (and yet roofed) structures, seemed like sacred places of refuge from the tempest. (Imagine wanting to go into a port-o-potty and you get a sense of how bizarre the day really was.)

Days two and three were only marginally better, and yet I found myself signing up again this year. What gives? Am I a masochist or do I just love soggy granola?

I do the Trek because I believe in healthy lungs and clean air, and am willing to fundraise and ride to support these goals. I do it because I enjoy the camraderie of the other cyclists, as well as a break from my everyday routine. I find it satisfying and oddly relaxing to spend a few days doing nothing more than getting from point A to B, even if I have to climb some hills to do it.

Another reason: I enjoy training for the ride. Logging one hundred miles or so a week in preparation for the Trek means I get in some nice long rides whenever I can. And those rides are not just good exercise -- they are periods of creativity. There's something about the repetitive motion of pedaling that generates a calming effect in my head which in turn leads to insight. I've brainstormed titles; composed poems; and worked out character issues. Some call it a form of meditation; others liken it to runner's high. I call it an unexpected gift.

I'm curious as to what activities fuel your creative fires. Are they solitary pursuits or group events? Do they involve nature, or technology? I'll watch for your responses and think of you next week as I pedal under (hopefully) sunny skies.