Some Notes that I made before the workshop started. Mindfulness is just a regurgitation of the work that came out of the collaboration between Oprah Winfrey & Eckhart Tolle which resulted in “The Power of Now” a work which is recommended and used by professional psychologists. The original has been revised many times and followed up by other volumes expanding on the root source.
The faddy mindfulness is a ‘cut down’ inferior version of TPON.
Deb Henderson has been looking at some works written by Natalie Goldberg
“Writing down the bones” & “Old friend far away” – Natalie is an author that writes guidance books for other authors.
Preface to the Second Edition of “Writing down the bones.”
A YEAR Ago on a December night in Santa Fe, New Mexico, I attended the birthday party of a young filmmaker I had known only briefly. For about half an hour I stood near the buffet table in conversation with a man in his early thirties, who I had just met. He was obviously a serious poet; I told him I was once a poet, too, before I’d written my first book. We bantered back and forth. I was enjoying myself immensely.
Suddenly, with a quizzical look on his face, he asked, “So, anyway, what have you written!”
“Well, several books,” I said. “but the one I’m most known for is called Writing Down the Bones.”
“You’re kidding!” His eyes bugged out. “I thought you were dead.”
Without blinking an eye, I responded, “No, not yet. Still trucking along, still putting pen to paper.”
We both laughed
He didn’t need to say any more, I understood: he’d read me in high school, All books read then must be by deceased men or women. No author studied in a secondary school institution could possibly be alive.
Writing Down the Bones came out in 1986. I have often told audiences that if it had been published in the fifties it would have flopped. But instead it met this country exactly where it was—great hordes of Americans had a need to express themselves, Writing is egalitarian; it cuts across geographic, class, gender, and racial lines. I received fan letters from vice presidents of insurance agencies in Florida; factory workers in Nebraska; quarry workers in Missouri; prisoners in Texas; lawyers. doctors, gay rights activists, housewives. librarians, teachers, priests, politicians. A whole revolution in writing began soon after it came out. Separate writing sections in bookstores sprang up. One student said to me, “I get it! Writing is the new religion.”
“But why,” people asked me, “does everybody want to write?”
I don’t think everyone wants to create the great American novel, but we all have a dream of telling our stories—of realizing what we think, feel, and see before we die. Writing is a path to meet ourselves and become intimate. Think about it: Ants don’t do it. Trees don’t, Not even thoroughbred horses, mounrain elk, house cats, grass, or rocks do it. Writing is a uniquely human activity. It might even he built into our DNA, It should be put forward in the Declaration of Independence, along with the other inalienable tights: “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—and writing.”
And it’s inexpensive, All you need is pen, paper [of course, computer, if you are so inclined! and the human mind. What crannies of untouched perception can you explore? What autumn was it that the moon entered your life? When was it that you picked blueberries at their quintessential moment? How long did you wait for your first true bike? Who are your angels? What are you thinking of? Not thinking of? What are you looking at? Not looking at? Writing can give you confidence, can train you to wake up.
Writing Down the Bones is backed by a two-thousand-year-old practice of studying the mind. It is not solely Natalie’s creative idea. I wanted to root this work, give it a solid foundation.
At the time I wrote it, I had already studied meditation {or ten years, six in close practice with a Japanese Zen master. Where do thoughts come from? Memories, ideas, even the word The?
Meditation and writing practice are coincident. The more we understand the human mind, our basic writing tool, the better, more secure we can he in our writing.
When this book came out, people called me a genius. I smiled, but I knew I wasn‘t a genius. Maybe the only genius moment was having Zen inform the writing. I had a sincere and earnest desire to figure out this writing life. I very badly wanted to do it and I didn’t know how, and I hadn’t learned how in all my public school education. By college, I think I gave up. But I had a yearning for it way deep underneath, a desire I didn’t even know I had. I was in love with reading and literature. There were stories only I knew about my family, about my first kiss, last haircut, the smell of sage on a mesa and my kinship with the flat plains of Nebraska. I had to get slow and dumb [not take anything for granted and watch and see how everything connects, how you contact your thoughts and lay them down on paper.
I wish now that I had another chance to write that school composition, “What I Did Last Summer.” When I wrote it in fifth grade, I was scared and just recorded: “It was interesting. It was nice. My summer was fun.” I snuck through with a B grade. But I still wondered, How do you really do that? Now it is obvious. You tell the truth and you depict it in detail: My mother dyed her hair red and polished her toenails silver. I was mad for Parcheesi and running in the sprinkler, catching beetles in a mason jar and feeding them grass. My father sat at the kitchen table a lot staring straight ahead, never talking, a Budweiser in his hand.
What an opportunity to recount the crush I had on a blond boy down the block, the news of racial injustice I saw on TV and how I felt confused and hurt by it, how I feared my sister was prettier than me, how I made coleslaw with my grandma. But I didn’t know how to narrate all these things.
In this hook, I instruct all of us how—the old students, and the young.
It is my sincere wish that this hook he taught in all public and private schools. that students learn how to do writing practice, that they come to knew themselves, feel joy in expression, trust what they think. Once you connect with your mind, you are who you are and you’re free.
A long time ago I read lack Kerouac’s essentials for prose.
Four of them, in particular, have provided me with heart for the path:
1. Accept loss forever
2. Be submissive to everything, open, listening
3. No fear or shame in the dignity of your experience, language, and knowledge
4. Be in love with your life
Believe me, you too, can find your place inside the huge terrain of writing. No one is so odd as to be left out. Now, please, go. Write your asses off.
December 2004
THIS IS A GREAT INTRO TO WHAT THIS AUTHOR/TEACHER IS ALL ABOUT.
Deb’s Handout (her personal thoughts and observations about memoires & Mindfulness)
(February 2018)
Thoughttree: Mindfulness and Memoir
‘l long for a day of judgement when the plot lines of our lives will be neatly tied. and all the puzzles explained, and the meaning of events made clear. We take to fiction, I suppose, because no such thing is going to happen, and at least on the printed page we can observe beginnings, middles and ends, and can find out where morality resides. Real life tends to fade out into entropy, all loose ends, and grief for what should have been, could have been, had things turned out just a little differently. Yet probably the life that was lived was the best that could be done: even, to the outsider, better than could have been expected.’
(From Auto de Fay by Fay Weldon)
At school, History seemed to me to unfold as a series of significant events following some linear and pre-ordained plan, like the chronology of the Kings and Queens of England. There seemed
little room for the random accidents and coincidences that frequented the pages of fiction. We all felt safe in the certainty of the past.
Looking back, do our own lives seem as patterned? I updated my Curriculum Vitae the other day. As i skimmed through the landmarks of that all too familiar history, my journey felt not only fixed in time, but somehow inevitable – exam results, career record and personal details which defined the framework of my life to date. But, like an iceberg, it reveals only the tip of the tale, the bare bones without the fleshy detail. Furthermore, as Fay Weldon puts it, ‘The pattern can’t really be completed, of course, until death, when autobiography so rudely turns into biography… Luckily, you’re not attempting to write the whole story, more an aspect of yourself through a certain event, time or place. That is memoir.
Nowadays, of course, History – and English Literature are taught differently. Events don’t just happen and stories have subtext; students are encouraged to grapple with a whole range of social,
cultural and economic perspectives as they question and analyse the War of the Roses or Hamlet. The ground under our feet is no longer as solid; established views are scrutinised and challenged;
the past, it seems, is a matter of interpretation. Ultimately, context is vital, whether we’re rationalising the driving force of Man‘s ambition or the pattern of our own lives. And nothing is
fixed — unless we believe in destiny or the tyranny of the gods.
So, should we dwell in the past or forge ahead without a backward glance? Did we learn from history to acknowledge our achievements and avoid past mistakes? (Why is the phrase ‘history repeats itself” invariably applied negatively?) The fact is, the past, present and future are intrinsically linked. Like wars and history, nothing much happens until everything happens. Life is a
mixture of pleasure and pain, humdrum and bustle.
But what about that Sliding Doors moment, when you remember the choices you made, the decisions made for you by others, the unexpected consequences of fate or fortune – and for an
instant you’re caught in the giddying blast of what might have been? Do you feel blessed or bitter? Satisfaction or remorse? Relief or regret? How has your life turned out? What next?
To find your own voice — and your own story – let’s start in the present and approach it at a slant, instead of head-on. Mindful practise, through stillness and quiet observation, should help you to think a little differently, to write what is really on your mind. As Natalie Goldberg explains:
‘If you are present now, the past becomes clearer, more precise. You know who you are — then what you were.‘
My Work Follows
The first exercise of the day was to do a brief spell of meditation. This would consist of doing a breathing exercise followed by trying to observe what was going on in your mind. There was some discussion about “The monkey Man” the OTHER you that is your unconscious mind, he is the little guy who has one aim and only one aim SURVIVAL. He controls your breathing, body temperature, hearing, oxygen and sugar levels, he makes sure you stay alive. If there is danger he will shoot your body full of adrenalin to give extra energy for flight or fight. He is a great bloke to have on board, we don’t have to concentrate on breathing adjusting our eyes to varying light levels and all that stuff, he does all that automatically. And in the background and we are unaware of him UNTIL own life is threatened or we are hurt damaged or broken and this MAY be physical it could be mentally. Then you will become very aware of him. You ignore him at your peril. He is in also in charge of things like sex drive (because he wants to I’ve on through your children) sometimes he will have a very strong opinion on what you are OR ARE NOT doing. Sooner or later the two of you will e in conflict and let me warn you, no matter how clever you think you are, the Monkey Man will win or destroy you. So when you ignore him he chatters. You close your eyes and you see strange colours or images. He does not know English (or whatever your first language is) s he will use all sorts of different communication methods to get your attention. For some of us there is no let up in the constant barrage of crap he comes out with. Meditation is a way of escaping from the inner turmoil and becoming calmer and more at one with your self. At one is a good phrase, what you really want is for that other little creep to shut up. George Harrison studied Meditation with the Maharishi for many years and his astounding record was that he could go eight whole minutes of complete mental silence. Most of us cannot manage even 30 seconds, so this is a massive achievement of Georges. Let’s assume that images come into your mind. Some of these can be erotic or shocking. Tell them to go away. These may be replaced by colours. Pink is one of his favourites because it aligns in men to a woman past or present that is desired. Oh inner man is quite a naughty little chap. The colours too nor go away aasily, my tip live with them they are not as distracting as images and after a while they may swirl or pixelate or go up and down in intensity, all rather good stuff. Anyway, some people like ot close their eyes and deal with the mental activity that way and others like to keep eyes open and fixed upon an object in the room. Whatever works for you. The aim is to become more relaxed.
Breathing.
Imagine a square in your mind if you can, if you cannot then do not force this. Just use the diagram above as illustrative of what I really mean. 5 & 3 are counts and can be at a speed that suits you. do not struggle with it if you can only manage a slow to moderate count stick with it. imagine an internal body scan that start at your toes and goes logically to every part of your body. toes, ankles, lower leg, thigh, hip, waist, chest, arms, hands, back to throat, chin, mouth, nose, ears, forehead, top of your head. if the scanner picks up aches and pains then note them but let the scanner continue on its journey. whilst this scan is progressing continue the breathing as detailed above.
at the end of the scan, you should feel more relaxed. if you do not then continue the scan in the reverse direction. when relaxed, rub the palms of your hands together vigorously, your palms should feel quite warm (blood flows to the extremities when the body is relaxed. you might feel a tingling sensation, this is normal. Pick up your pen and write Three Things on a list that really excite you and make you feel happy.
my three were
1. The sound of calling sea gulls
2. Sunset Horizons
3. Animals that respond to me.
We all had different lists.
Is there a connection between all three?
mine was life aboard a ship.
There followed a discussion about what is meant by the authors term ‘slants’. A slant is;
• Showing something that relates to something else – a bird in a cage but really referring to a person that feels trapped emotionally or physically.
• an illustration rather than a wordy description that requires the reader to relate with story in their own way. – we are not birds in cages but each of us ‘thinks’ we know how the bird feels ???
• how the bird actually feels probably changes hour by hour, minute by minute, dependent upon lots of variable factors.
slants show different things to different people. – “Whatever particular slant you want to take on that” is a fairly common phrase that is banded about quite a lot.
Life is like that. our view of the world and everything in it changes all the time. what is our belief one day is not our belief the next. our minds make certainties out of chaos. we all have our own view of the world we live in and that changes. scary stuff eh? so basically we live in chaos and develop ways of coping with that. we try to bring order, even when there isn’t any.
TODAY WE ARE VERSION 9.6k of the person we really are. AND YOU THOUGHT YOU KNEW YOU.
So throw out the writer’s rule book, there isn’t actually one, what you write is what you do. On to exercise number one.
Think about your past memories and write about something that happened that you can now see changed your life. Remember: It’s not what happens that changes us it’s how we respond to what happens. There are two ways of looking at yourself. You can be a victim of change. You can change things for the better. This last thought is quite profound and you might like to mull this over before continuing with this workshop.
This space left blank for you notes about this last thought.
my memoire.
The end of a childhood friendship.
I had known Karen and her horrible little sister as long as I could remember. They were my number one friends. I went their birthday parties. Their parents were very wealthy. Dad was a [our] GP and uncle Heimi owned the double2 factory that made shirts for Marks and Spencer. They were looked after by a au pair, she was French and vey nice to all three of us children. Life went by. The au pair taught me how to tide a bicycle in the huge garden at the back of the house. us three grew up very happy in each other’s company. Karen & I would have been about fourteen I would like to say. Up to then the girls had always shared a bedroom. The au pair had gone back to France and we were all missing her. “Come and see my new bedroom…” Excitedly we charged upstairs to the attic room which used to belong to xxx. We had not been in this room ever before. It was definitely an older single girls room. Pretty dressing table, subtle pink walls, embroidered bed linen. Only one chair, both of us looked at it and perched ourselves side by side on the end of the bed together. Karen reached out and picked up her new Bob Dylan LP from the dressing table and was showing me it. For the first time ever I was far more interested in her than anything else and secretly gazed at her. I felt guilty and sort of dirty. After that life changed. The young jewish woman went one way and I another. I think the adults in our lives saw the changes in us and saw challenges ahead. My mum said to me “Karen is different from us.” I didn’t see the girls much after that. It was like teenage years caused many departures, but this is one that stuck forever with me.
END
HOMEWORK [we ran out of time]
Carry out the breathing exercise as before. do not force anything. your aim is to free your mind of distraction. continue until you feel calmer and if it helps concentrate on one of your five senses. I concentrated on the paint pots stuck on the wall for an example of what I mean. You may choose the lady next to you’s perfume. Your choice.
STILL ALICE: is your thought trigger
1. your first thought
2. your second thought
3. your third thought
Think about what it is that connects these three thoughts together. Last time out mine was a life aboard ship and the romance associated with that. sunset horizons, sea gulls calling, the ships parrot and so on. from all this came my memoire about the very Lovely Karen, the first girl that I truly desired.
• single moments, spawn loads of secondary effects
• let your mind wander, abandon trying to control everything
• this is a journey, the destination is a secret at this moment in time
• do not be alarmed by your thoughts, do NOT sit in judgement of your other mind
• you are more than one person, ask any skitzophrenic 😉
• remember their are two distinct mind poles. DOUBT [has the same root as the word double] and FAITH [truth if you have problems with the word, something is after all, only truth if we believe it to be so]
other triggers [just in case STILL ALICE does not work for you]
The very first time that…
1. you had your own front door key
2. you tried a new food and found it to be foul
3. you saw an adult cry
4. you were very different from…
5. you understood something that you knew you really shouldn’t have any idea about
We went home.
