A postcard from Colorado’s Western Slope: The resident cranes are so beautiful on this almost-spring evening. Even so it was late and I was hungry, couldn’t help but pull over and marvel at them and their shadows.
Preview: Episode 35 on Creating Sustainable and Inspiring Routines with Science Journalist Jill U. Adams
How could postcards help with perfectionism? We talk with Jill U. Adams about her daily postcard ritual—and a few other curious practices in this episode on creating and sustaining creative routines. We talk about the resistance to creating a routine, how to structure it, how to modify it, how it might nourish your creative practice, how you might nourish it! Plus Christie and I talk about all the ways we sabotage our creative routines.
Jill U. Adams is a science journalist who reports on health, psychology, teens, and education. She lives in upstate New York and tweets as @juadams.
Things We’re Reading:
Rosemerry:
It’s International Women’s Day! And I’m thinking about one of my favorite poems celebrating women, Phenomenal Woman, by Maya Angelou.
A book I return to again and again for how-to and for craft advice is The Practice of Creative Writing: A Guide for Students by Heather Sellers. It’s my favorite for all genres—poetry, fiction, non-fiction. She manages to find what the genres have in common and presents a comprehensive way to meet our creative selves—finding focus, becoming better readers, developing strategies. Indispensable!
Christie:
I absolutely love this essay by Mira Ptacin, “The Art and Education of Owling.”
"When we owl, we return to our truest selves. We are reminded that we humans are not the biggest things," she writes. "To owl is to have an experience that cannot be bought...It asks nothing but holds all we need to be truly awake."To search for an owl is to dance with nature in real time.”This essay by Lindsay Crouse, “Why I Stopped Running During the Pandemic (and How I Started Again)” feels very timely as we reach the one year mark of this damn pandemic. “I discovered that maybe one way to deal with pandemic burnout isn’t going easier anymore — it’s trying something hard.”
I loved reading this Open Notebook medley of origin stories from science writers. (Disclaimer: yes, I’m among them.)
A Creative Collaboration with a Past Guest
Who knew that our fabulous guest Holiday Mathis—who has written over 8 million words in horoscopes and who is a multi-platinum song-writer (for Miley Cyrus and others) is ALSO an amazing film director? And in fact, she has been creating cinepoems with Rosemerry’s work—here’s their first collaboration, with another being released within a day or two!
Two Questions:
(share your answers with us here on Substack or in our FB group)
What kind of creative routine do you practice?
How do you keep yourself accountable for your creative routine?