I tell wonder-filled stories about hope and healing
I had the extreme pleasure to interview the talented partners at Prehype for a piece I wrote for PBS MediaShift – Collaboration Central. The piece is live and available for your reading inspiration. Hop over and have a look by clicking here. My thanks to the keen editorial mind and eyes of the site’s editor, Amanda Hirsch.
Yesterday I finished my ebook about my trip to India. In Search of the OM in Everything: 8 Days in India will be available for download from the iBookstore for iPhone and iPad on Monday and as a high resolution PDF from this blog. The moment I finished it, I felt an enormous sense of relief. I didn’t realize how much energy the project took to sustain. Now that I can release it out into the world, I feel a lightness. I have more room. Finally those stories will be out of my head and in the world.
I’ll publish the links on Monday once I complete my final practicum and presentation of the book as my research project on the last day of my 300-hour yoga teacher training at ISHTA Yoga this weekend. Until then, I’ll be basking in the glow of “The End.”
These may be the only instructions for life we’ll ever need.
5 years ago this weekend I started this blog. I never thought it would become such a labor of love that would bring so many incredible gifts. And finally, after all of this time, I got it together and created a Facebook Page expressly for the readers of this blog for several reasons:
1.) To provide a way for me to connect more closely with all of you and for readers to connect with one another
2.) To promote the works of other writers and to give readers the opportunity to do the same
3.) To offer all of us a way to share what inspires us – books, articles, photographs, stories, good works in our communities, quotes, travels, ideas, questions, etc.
4.) To give writers another way to promote their own work and connect with other writers
5.) To connect people who are taking big leaps in their careers and lives
I want this page to be a place where we can all offer up ideas and commentary in a supportive and thoughtful way. As I’m preparing to make my own professional leap, I’ve met so many people who are in the process of doing the same thing. Here’s our chance to get behind one another and encourage each other on the path forward. I really want this page to be incredibly dynamic with many contributions by a wide circle of people who are curious and passionate about living their best lives.
I really hope you’ll all join me, like the page, and then let the sharing begin at http://www.facebook.com/ChristaInNewYork.com.
“That which you create in beauty and goodness and truth lives on for all time to come. Don’t spend your life accumulating material objects that will only turn to dust and ashes.” ~ Denis Waitley
It’s with more than a bit of irony to find this quote among my reading during the holiday season. It seems that almost everyone except me went on a buying frenzy in the midst of Black Friday madness. Then they got their credit cards statements and logged an unprecedented number of returns. This is a good sign for American society – perhaps we’ve turned a corner when it come to how we think about stuff. It is all just stuff.
I think about stuff a lot because I am, by profession, a product developer. However, most of the products I’ve created aren’t tangible products. They are Broadway shows that inspired people, nonprofit programs that benefited worthwhile causes, and experiences that celebrated our creative spirit.
The tangible products I’ve created over the last few years for my current employer are things I am less than proud of, actual things that I have relegated to the back of my mind, and conveniently left out of my portfolio. Creating them has afforded me a salary that has helped me to pay back a good chunk of my student loans from business school and to save an emergency fund as well as another savings account so that I can chase my dream of starting my own nonprofit. I am grateful for this gift, particularly in a time in our economy when so many people have struggled financially.
If I think about the last three years of my professional career strictly from a product development perspective, they have been wildly pointless. I have churned out product after product that I don’t believe in, would never buy, and would never counsel anyone else to buy. These three years were really just about survival in a bleak financial market. The joy has gone out of my work.
Personally, these three years have been staggeringly exceptional. I have learned more in this time than I ever thought possible – about myself, the world, and my purpose. I have made oodles of friends along the way, reinforced my confidence and convictions, and found my voice as a teacher, writer, and leader. It has been nothing short of a blessing. It has been a transformation. I found and live the dream of my life, even if at the moment it is only after regular working hours.
This dichotomy – an enriching personal life and a stagnant professional life – has been brewing for some time now. I’d say it was at a slow boil for about a year, a rolling boil for another year more, and has been at a flat out screaming boil over 2011. The only thing that can possibly come next is a quick evaporation altogether. And that’s rather what my latest career decision feel like – an evaporation of what doesn’t matter in favor of activities that do matter, to me and to the world. Compass Yoga is my attempt to follow Denis Waitley’s advice to build something beautiful and good.
It’s going to be a beautiful 2012 – just wait and see!
Last week I wrote about taking the scary step of starting to contact literary agents through query letters. I have been pleasantly surprised to hear back from a few of them (which I was not at all expecting since I just started to send a handful of emails.) Yesterday, I heard from an agent who requested a formal proposal – the next step in the agent finding process.
While a query letter is very concise (a few paragraphs), a proposal is much more detailed. Again I consulted my guidebook on publishing, and found followed the formal format of a proposal. It contains:
My query letter is less than a page while my proposal clocks in at 22 pages (double-spaced). Proposals are a much larger undertaking, for the writer and the agent. It’s the next step in the “getting to know you” process and feels as much like a business plan as it does like a piece of narrative.
In addition to understanding the heft of the proposal, I also learned a few lessons through its writing that I thought would be helpful to those of you considering a similar route:
1.) Exercise great care in a proposal’s composition. One of the main tenets of Zen cooking is, “Treat your pots and pans as if they are your own eyes.” This is wonderful advice for all chefs. A book proposal in many ways is the writer’s equivalent to pots and pans. That proposal makes the creation of the book possible.
2.) Read the agent’s bio again, as well as agency’s website (particularly if it offers submission guidelines.) Initially, the writer reads the agent’s bio on the agency website to find out if he or she is accepting proposals, and if so what genre those proposals should address. A word to the wise – if an agent says either A) he or she is not accepting submissions or B) they list the genres that interest them, abide by their wishes. No matter how great your cookbook is, if the agent isn’t accepting cookbook projects at this time, don’t submit one. All you’re doing is clogging their in-box with spam, even it’s eloquently written spam. You’re wasting your time and theirs.
3.) Clearly understand your audience and competition. Who are you writing for, what do they need, and how does your book fulfill that need? I use the same construction that I use on a daily basis as a product developer. It might feel great to say, “My book is for everyone.” It’s not. You are writing on a particular topic that has a particular appeal to particular people. Talk to them. And know who else is talking to them so you can differentiate what you have to offer. Your book may certainly be useful to others beyond your target audience, but your target is your main concern. Focus – in trying to serve everyone, you serve no one.
4.) Have the proposal ready to go before you ever hit “send” on a query letter. You never know how fast the turnaround will be on your query and you want to have the proposal ready to go at a moment’s notice. If an agent writes to you and asks for a proposal, you don’t want to keep them waiting for weeks while you put it together. Also, the query letter takes most of its cue from the proposal and the proposal forces you to get clear on why you’re writing the book and what you have to say. My advice is to write the proposal first and then craft the query, even though you send the query to prospective agents and the proposal only to agents who express interest in reading it.
5.) Don’t get discouraged. Just as some agents may never respond to your query, not all agents who request a proposal will be interested in your book. It’s also helpful to know that when reading a query or proposal, an agent considers whether or not they have the connections (or can easily get them) to make the book successful. While your writing is a very personal matter, the agent’s decision-making process has more to it than whether or not they like a potential client’s writing.
“For some of us, books are as important as almost anything else on earth. What a miracle it is that out of these small, flat, rigid squares of paper unfolds world after world after world, worlds that sing to you, comfort and quiet or excite you.” ~ Anne Lamott
Anne Lamott is one of my favorite authors. I keep her books close by – she’s taught me about writing and faith, fiction and biography, the human heart’s resilience even when faced with the toughest human conditions. She made me realize the wonder of thoughtful writing.
I use books and writing to take me away. When I was younger, I used them as a way to let my imagination travel. They would help me consider new possibilities; they helped me learn how to dream bigger and brighter. In books, there are no boundaries, and so I realized the same was true of life.
In many ways, I became a writer to pay it forward. Books made me free, even when my circumstances seemed so binding. I wanted to give that gift to someone else, anyone else who wanted as extraordinary life as I want. Books and writing give us a way to give and to get exactly what we need.
In the past few months, I’ve been working on some fiction writing for a young adult audience. It’s a fun and interesting project, and it stretches my skills as a writer. I can write lifestyle-type pieces, as I do for this blog, with a certain ease after 4+ years of daily writing. Over 1400 days of practice, and counting.
Fiction is something different. When I write for this blog, I know where I’m going. With fiction, the future is an open road and while you may have a map, the characters take on a life of their own. You have to find out what they’re feeling, and why they feel that way. Sometimes they make you laugh out loud and sometimes they break your heart. The author may create these characters, but like children they grow up to be independent with their own ideas about the world they live in. The author just has to get it all down as honestly as possible.
The story I’m trying to tell is fantastical and though I’m not a terribly visual person, I’ve found myself imaging scenes and colors, as if I’m on the outside of a large picture window, peering in with my hands framing my eyes. I’ve struggled a bit with how to describe in words what I see in my mind’s eye, with how to communicate to a reader everything that I imagine. How do I get the reader to see all of the detail I see, exactly as I see it.
And then I came across “The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore”, a creation of Moonbot Studios. The story is not quite a cartoon, not quite an ebook. It’s a delightful mash-up of the two, and it is the new poster child of just what’s possible with electronic books, particularly for a young audience.
After watching “The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore”, I realized that writers and storytellers have just picked up another hat. I can now imagine a time not too far off when people will laugh about the term “transmedia storytelling” because all stories will have to jump across different mediums with ease in order to delight an audience with increasingly savvy expectations. It won’t just be a nice bonus, but required development. Writers, grab your virtual paintbrushes – you’re going to need them!
“I spent my entire complaining that no one ever listens to me and now look what happened. I can’t believe I’ve gotten to have this experience. I say this at every talk I ever give and no one ever prints it: Thank you, thank you, thank you so much for caring this story.” ~ Matthew Weiner, Creator of Mad Men, at the 92Y on Thursday, December 16th
I went to the 92Y on Thursday night to hear Matthew Weiner speak. I’m an enormous Mad Men fan because I love the intensity of the writing and how true he is to the time period. I left the talk loving Matthew Weiner as an inspirational writer who believed so much in the power of good content and in his Mad Men concept. He used the pilot script for years as a writing sample, his calling card, to get writing jobs. When he began to seriously shop it around after finishing his time as a writer for The Sopranos, HBO turned it down.
Weiner talked a lot about nostalgia, “the pain from an old wound”, and its place in the lives of the characters and fans. “In the 1960’s, being an intellectual was in style,” he said. “Advertising used to be a dead-end, a haven for creative people with lofty aspirations.” Now advertising, in its traditional sense, has fallen out of favor as viral and social media mechanisms have become more effective and efficient. The men of Madison Avenue must shake their heads and wonder how their world changed to drastically. “I’m writing a story that everyone knows the ending to,” Weiner stated. “It’s really a recipe for disaster.” And still, we watch. The power of nostalgia, of the desire to know and understand a time so different from ours and yet not that far into our past.
The concept of “The Other” also dominated quite a bit of airtime at 92Y. Weiner is fascinated by the concept of a foreigner, an outsider, someone who doesn’t belong. These Others are the truth-sayers, the mirrors for the rest of us who try so hard to push away any story that doesn’t fit our own narrative. The Other, in life and in good storytelling, has the ability to expose injustice and get at the reality underneath> They foreshadow what’s to come, just around the corner, no matter how much we deny the impending events. So long as The Other stands with us, we are forced to face the music, to recognize that life as we know it will never be the same. The Others are what cause heroes to rise up and villains to fall, eventually.
I loved Weiner’s raw honesty on stage. he was fully and unapologetically himself, neuroses and all on display. He didn’t put on airs. He didn’t try to be someone he’s not. He didn’t hide or dodge a single question or comment. His emotions and responses were authentic and genuine. Success seems to have had little effect on him except to shock and surprise him. He’s at once enormously proud of the work and pinching himself to make sure this is all real. He’s the kind of writer that should serve as an inspiration for anyone trying to make it in the world with this demanding craft. “If you push stories away, they’ll destroy you.” Better to tell the tales we have as fairly as possible, take whatever praise or lashings they garner, and keep going. It’s the only way to both persevere into our futures and preserve the pasts we come from.
“Celebrate what you want to see more of.” – Tom Peters
I went to a set of focus groups this week that reaffirmed my belief that most of the time focus groups are useless. I left the event rattling off a million complaints about the session. Mentally complaining about the session was ruining my mood.
On the way to work the next morning, I was flipping through my emails and saw the quote above from Tom Peters. I love Tom Peters because he strikes the perfect balance between optimism and criticism. He doesn’t see everything through rose-colored glasses but he also refuses to say that “this is the way it is because this is the way it’s always been.” He thinks differently. He evolves.
Criticism is easy, which is why almost everyone has the ability to be critical. What’s unique is when someone is critical and wants to be helpful, when someone wants to shine a light on things she loves and cast a shadow on things that she wishes would slunk away. Reward only good behaviors and in time they will prevail over the bad ones – very similar to the training I do with my pup, Phin.
To kick off some celebrating today, I wanted to tell you about my friend, Sharni, and her incredible efforts to support Afghan Women’s Writing Project (AWW). Sharni is a friend I met on Owning Pink and then have gotten to know through an exchange of our blog writing, tweeting, and Facebooking. I think of her as my blogging sister down under and although she makes her home in Australia and I make my home in New York, our brainwaves seem to meet up all the time.
Have a look at the video she created for the Afghan Women Writers project: http://www.sharnanigans.com/2010/12/this-is-a-call/. It’s inspiring. She’s running a 5K to raise money and awareness for AWW. We need more people like Sharni who passionately care about our global community and use their own personal resources to create the change they want to see in the world. Cheers to Sharni, her efforts, and all of the women who will benefit from her work!
Christa Avampato 