Love Your Mess, Free Webinar on Wednesday, October 12

As you know I am hugely interested in creativity: what boosts or enhances it, and what gets in the way of it. So this Wednesday, I'm being joined by my guest, author Allison Nazarian, to talk about concepts from her book Love Your Mess.

Why Should You Love Your Mess?
If you try to run from your mess, you're not going to get very far. Like the Zen masters say: Wherever you go ... there's your mess! Denial isn't the answer.

What if your mess was part of your process? Part of the process? Might that not be a liberating thought to embrace?

On Wednesday, October 12, at 8 PM Eastern (7 CT/6 MT/ 5PT), Allison and I will get down and dirty (pun intended) about being with what is and how it can serve us as creative types. We'd like to have you with us.

Register your messy self for this call:
http://stephaniegunning.com/teleseminar

Mess is there when we're at home, in the office, on a diet, starting a new business, engaged in our relationships, and talking to ourselves in our heads. There's a strong temptation to deny it, avoid it, defy it, resist it, and wrestle with it. It can get the better of us ... bring us to our knees ... but we've got to take the power back.

The best way to do that is to get on board with the mess.

By now, you know I'm not referring to the socks on the staircase. (Even though that mess can be a manifestation of the "mess" I am referring to.)

Mess is an inside job.
Real life can be messy.

Date: October 12
Time: 8 PM Eastern
Duration: 60 minutes
Recorded: Yes (so you can replay later)
Cost: zip. zero. nada.
You: Register (this way I can send you a reminder)

We're going to have fun and hopefully be a little inspiring on this call. Allison Nazarian is a copywriter, business owner, mom, walker, reader, texter, Howard Stern superfan, Counting Crows devotee, eater of very dark chocolate, lover of ladybugs, football fan, and much, much more, who lives a very messy life in Florida with her kids, dog, and a bunch of other messy folks.

Me, well, I try to hide my mess a lot, but it's there. I'm quite familiar with it. I even get emotional about it of an evening when the to-do list got longer instead of shorter, when I made a choice I don't admire and I'm wondering how the heck I can go on.

So, no gurus are going to be on this call (unless you're a guru--LOL). Come talk to us anyhow. This is a call for real people with real messy lives.

The Feng Shui of Marketing Your Book: Which Elements Do You Use?

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Mother Nature is a powerful presence, as has been demonstrated: Earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes, and other natural events show us that we are not in charge here. But we are not separate from nature; nature is within us as well around us. Ancient philosophical and healing traditions teach us to work with the energy of nature in our bodies and in our environments. Having worked as an editor on several books about feng shui (including Nancy SantoPietro's book Feng Shui & Health) I feel inspired today to see if there might be something we can draw upon as we consider the daily activities involved in book promotion. The main thing to remember is that the four primary elements must always be harmonized. In deference to Hurricane Irene, let's start this exploration with the element of air.

Air: Air is the invisible element. As we breathe, it sustains us. The act of breathing is to take in and to expel, which is the most essential of patterns in our lives--receiving and then giving, and then receiving again. Without oxygen-rich air, we cannot generate energy. In writing we receive ideas and we give ideas; we circulate those ideas just as the wind circulates air throughout our planet's atmosphere. In terms of marketing, it is the capacity of air to be a medium for the transmission of sound waves that we need to think about: Where are we speaking?

Any balanced book marketing plan should include person-to-person communication. Whether that is a one-on-one talk with a reporter, lecturing to groups, or broadcasting your message on the radio or TV, speaking must be included in your plan. Just try not to be a blowhard, full of air without substance, or someone who never receives fresh input or inspiration.

Water: Flow is the primary quality of the element water. Persistent, drop by drop, immersive marketing takes place on the feeling level of our engagement with our readers. Beginning with our choice of the title of our book, our deep understanding of the needs of our target audience must always be considered as the basis of our efforts. In marketing behavior, water relates to the pace and frequency of interactions: steady and yet flexible, spontaneous and adaptive to market conditions. Learning to trust your instincts and impressions from your subconscious mind that show you what to do on a daily basis means you can swim and not drown in your efforts.

With your book promotion plan, seek to find the niches where you flow into--the spaces that are thirsty for some cool refreshment or the benefit of cleansing or immersion in what you offer.

Fire: The heat of passion and inspiration are the fire that keeps us going. In book marketing, there are always specific efforts made whose essential purpose is to light a fire in the potential book buyer. Think of these as calls to action, trigger points, decision points, offers that ignite. Ready, aim, fire! Push the button, click this link, sign up here. Come to this event. Use this coupon.

Another place where the element of fire is present is in electronic marketing efforts. Your plan must include online networking and spreading, through a combination of e-mails, social media interactions, blogging, and websites. Each of these tools gives you an opportunity to catalyze prospective readers to purchase your book and possibly engage with you further.

Earth: Stability and structure are earthly qualities. No determined book marketer can survive for long without establishing support systems and infrastructure. Fortunately, many of these systems are pre-existing and we can access them for a fee, or for free by the design of their creators. As an example, Amazon.com has created an infrastructure to support authors in marketing their books as a collaborative act because both the company and the author benefit whenever a book is sold on their website. The same is true for all other online bookstores: Most understand how valuable the author presence is to their success. Stability comes from having in place the right equipment (a computer, a smart phone, an online shopping cart), the right people to form your team (e.g., a virtual assistant, a search engine optimization expert, or a graphic designer), and the right plan of action to guide you. Without a skeleton the body would collapse. Without a strategy to follow as a framework for your activities your marketing will lead you to collapse. Amorphous marketing leads to amorphous results.

Any element alone is not sufficient. Passion without flow is an explosion waiting to happen. Flow without structure is like rain in a field of crops without irrigation channels. High winds that blow without ceasing in the mind dry up the juice of the imagination. Ideas that are disconnected from the heart cannot ever fulfill or soothe the soul. The elements temper one another.

Is Your Creative Process a "Ring of Fire"?

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Walking past the carousel in Central Park on Sunday I heard strains of "Ring of Fire" by Johnny Cash piping through the air. Besides being slightly thrilled that New Yorkers are raising their kids to appreciate good music, hearing that song reinforced an idea I've been playing around with related to the archetypes of writers. If we had theme songs, what would they be? Like Johnny, are writers falling down, down, down into the burning ring of fire? Hmmm.




I read somewhere that there are only seven basic plots beneath the stories of cultures from around the world. While I can’t absolutely verify that idea, it’s something to consider: whether the story is rags to riches, overcoming the monster, rebirth, voyage and return, or something else.

Acting teachers tell us that plots either have to do with love or power. Numerologists tell us there are only nine numbers in the world that influence our lives. Healers say it’s the consciousness of the energy of the seven chakras . . . Astrologers say it’s the twelve Zodiac signs.

Is this too simplistic or a great jumping off point for further exploration?

My view is that we get to decide what our lives are about—including our creative lives—and I believe it’s an essential decision. But it’s also not the end of the world. Take it lightly and you’ll be on the right track. Grind on it in order to find a quest to undertake or a monster to slay and you’re really not there.

Lightness of mind, high energy, peace/joy, fluidity = right track.

Cloudy mind, drained energy, pain/sorrow, rigidity = wrong track.

When you’re writing, just understand that the source of your desire may be the story that runs the infrastructure of your life. If you’re stuck (aka on the wrong track), change your story.

I am not a burning-pit, flames-of-hell kind of writer, though I do grind a bit too often. Fundamentally, I am engaged in a love story with myself and the world. My heart has been broken more than once, and so I sometimes forget that this is my essential story, and yet wherever I honor love my life gets better.

This week, I’m going to take more walks in the park and still get my writing done.

Audacious Creativity Technique #1: 7-Day Mental Cleanse for Writers

Among the 12 most powerful keys for dissolving creative blocks and soaring as a creator is also perhaps the simplest: the mental flush. Use this technique first thing in the morning on a daily basis, and you'll soon notice you have a new degree of lucidity. Think of this flush as a process of dumping, a chance for the mind to let go.

Have you ever noticed how the first thought of the day often is the most vulnerable? That's because you release conscious control over your mental processes while you're asleep, and as you rise back into consciousness--in the moment just before you re-exert control--one last unconscious thought is picked up in the open: "I'm so angry with so-and-so!" "I feel terrible, GUILTY, about what I did last week!" "How am I ever going to get everything done on time? I'm in over my head." "Couldn't I just stay here in bed and rest some more?"

Your brain is readying you for the day and doing its best to make its priorities known; especially by revealing your innermost feelings--including those that are normally concealed. It feels dangerous and sticky to dwell on certain images, so your mind may immediately respond by shutting them down. Vulnerability is not normally a revered condition, although the longer I am a writer the more I appreciate it. When I compiled Audacious Creativity (2010), I became fascinated by what it took for contributors to deliver me a simple article. Some hemmed and hawed and resisted; others flowed their pieces out, seemingly effortlessly. I saw that the ones who wrote most freely did not avoid negativity, but had a way of responding to it that was healthy and simple.

Remember, all of this resistance of our thoughts and feelings happens in a flash. It's not something we necessarily do on purpose. It just is. The brain is tasked with keeping us alive, so it acts defensively. But when it comes time to create a life we love and really live forward toward our best intentions, ideally we want to be friendly with our subconscious thought streams--and this means letting them have their say. Good ideas are to be found in the recesses of the mind.

This is where the Mental Flush comes in. So, here are a few basic instructions.

Get out a clean piece of paper and a pen. For four minutes, write down every thought that comes into your head, without rushing, but also without pausing in the middle. You're going to throw away the output at the end, rather than save it. So you don't need to concern yourself with punctuation, grammar, or readability. Beyond giving your mind a chance to speak up, be heard and accepted, in this process you are enabling the rational mind to integrate the input of the feeling mind. Metaphysically you are recycling energy that otherwise will remain trapped inside your biofield.

At the end of four minutes, stop writing. Then throw away, shred, burn, or otherwise dispose of your handwritten pages. Resist the temptation to use this process for the generation of content. If you want to create good content, do the mental flush first, and then do your content-creation process second once your mind is clear.

Do mental flushing for a minimum of seven days in a row, and notice whether there is a shift in your consciousness. This prepares open space in your inner landscape where your inner creator can flourish and flow, functioning in peace and harmony.

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