Where do you get your ideas? And also you deserve the world!

Just finished an article by Alice Mattison in The Writer's Chronicle on where writers get their ideas. Two parts I want to share with you (my emphasis):

"How do we invent? The answer I want won't be simple; it's not a set of instructions. Yet I believe we can come to understand something of what writers go through as we find a story. There is some process we have in common--not a dignified one that could be given the pretentious name "craft," which suggests a number of things that rarely leads to good writing, including a recognized procedure--but a sloppy, indefinite, uncertain, embarrassing process involving fooling around, moving haphazardly from whatever (in life or not) we began with, in the general direction of something else. 

Craft is neat but this process is messy, even dangerous. Craft is something you can do in public and explain in public, while good writing is more like taking your clothes off when that's not appropriate--something that may even do harm or make our friends and family ashamed of us. And "craft" suggests control, while a good book requires surrendering control, at least at times. It's good because what happens in it corresponds in some way--speaks in some way--to what's most intense in the author. We write books because there is something unspeakable--something we cannot explain in words, or not adequately. And the book--the events in the book, the content--must give words to the unspeakable. That's not craft, it's trying to stay alive."

That whole part about the writing process being sloppy, indefinite and uncertain--I've just realized that's MY LIVING PROCESS. Everything I do turns out to be sloppier than I intend it to, and I often find myself wandering through my days "haphazardly" from one thing to the next, sometimes forgetting to do things but also discovering new things....but somehow, somehow, I progress...

While I don't base much fact in this idea, sometimes I'm nearly convinced that my personality and habits stem from my hair--I have a head of unruly curls, always doing their own thing and never ever certain, and never sleek or put together--always there are frizzies and flyaways...

this is how i feel!

 Anyhow, Mattison ends her essay on THE IMPORTANCE OF HAVING AN OPEN MIND AND HEART:

"Any moment in a story, memoir, or poem, however simple or complex--whether it is imaginary or not--is only one of a great number of moments that could be written about. . .

We need to become receptive so our minds will learn to swivel easily through the many things that could happen to imaginary characters, or the many things in our lives that could go into stories, essays, or poems. We need to be open in order to be flexible enough to make up story. And we need to be open in another way as well: open to the intense feelings, whatever they may be, that have made it necessary and possible for us to write. Openness to the intensity of our own feelings will make us able to choose topics or incidents weighty enough to correspond to the size of our emotions. . .

We get our ideas, then, by listening for them, but listening with enough patience and playfulness that what we hear won't overwhelm or frighten us, even if it's ethically suspect. We have to listen to ourselves like psychotherapists who have learned not to be shocked at what people come up with or with the intensity of their need."

This is a good place to end because not only am I thinking about these words in terms of writing but, again, in terms of living. I may be indefinite and uncertain about many things, but one thing I am very certain about is the importance of listening to yourself, of being your own best friend. We always talk about having open minds and hearts with other people, which is good, but too often we let ourselves slip away, as if we're not one of those other people...as if the self is not also a human being, deserving of love and compassion and open arms. YOU, DEAR READER, DESERVE THE WORLD.