Don’t say what you don’t want…

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I have been mucking out my writing cabin. It is a lot like mucking out a stable, or should be, could be. Except I find that I have difficulty letting anything go. So all the pieces of paper get taken out of boxes and then put back in. I managed to part with a little under two boxes of books, when I really need to let go of 8 or 10 boxes of books. Honestly. (And I will still have plenty of books. No worries of staring, bookless shelves here.)

Yesterday, after several hours of this sort of dithering, I had made a little progress. I put my Scarlet Letter books down on a bottom shelf and put my WWI books up on the go-to shelf, in preparation for my new project. I boxed up drafts of my novel (which is now on its honest-to-goodness final read through…I hope), and when the box wouldn’t hold them all, I put two copies (the least marked up) into the recycling bin. I took pages out of notebooks and set the notebooks aside to be used for new projects.

But there were still all those books, and not enough space on the shelves. I don’t want to have books on the floor and the desk and the chair.

If you had sneaked up to my window and listened you would have heard me saying–

  • I can’t stand to give up my books!
  • I LOVE my books!
  • I have a VERY HARD TIME giving up any books!
  • I NEED my books!
  • My books make me feel SAFE!

After saying these things enough times (or just thinking them, very loudly), I finally heard myself saying them. And I remembered the advice I give my students: Don’t say what you don’t want.

I can’t write. I hate to write. I’m no good at writing. My job, when I hear statements like this is to help students revise what they are saying about their own unlimited abilities and inner resources — into something kinder. I am willing to try this. I can get better at writing. I’m really good at learning and I can learn to write. I’m not afraid to give this a shot and see what happens. 

One of my favorite illustrations of this principle came from the woman who cuts my hair. One day, as I sat, ready to be shorn, she held up a brush, a ruined brush, and said, “Would you look at that! Last night while I was getting ready to leave, I kept telling myself, ‘You are going to forget your brush in the cleaning solution! You shouldn’t set it in there this late, because you’ll forget it and it will be ruined!’ And sure enough,” she finished, “that’s exactly what I did!”

Of course it was. Don’t say what you don’t want. Say what you want.

  • There are more books where these came from
  • The library can help me find any books that I decide, some day, to reread
  • I am safe even without so many books
  • A peaceful, uncluttered space is so great for my writing
  • Books that are stuck in boxes might as well go to someone new who will treasure them
  • My shelves are not going to be empty; I can let go of some of these books and STILL HAVE A LOT OF BOOKS

Okay, so I’m working on it.

What I’m Writing Down

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“The habits of journal writing create a most interesting distance between you and your thoughts. Finding out that your thoughts are not inevitable and discovering that not only your thoughts but also your feelings change when you write your thoughts down, you can shift the emphasis, style, and content of your thinking. Experiencing your own powers of observation, coupled with a greater awareness that you have choices, increases your sense of self-mastery and inner stability. That is no small thing.” –Stephanie Dowrick, Creative Journal Writing, page 32

I’m mad at my husband. He decided a few weeks ago that he should replace all of the interior doors in the upstairs of our house. He hated the old doors, he claimed (we have lived here for 17 years, and that’s the first I’ve heard of it). Now that I look at that statement, it seems interesting psychologically. If he were a character in a novel, I wonder what his back story would be?

When I fight with Bruce, I feel like a child again. I feel helpless and out of control. I feel overwhelmed and besieged. I want to find a place where I can be alone, a defensible fortress of solitude. There was no place like that in my house last night. I also didn’t feel it would be fair to absent myself from my daughters.

For the record, I didn’t want Bruce to take on this project with the doors. I told him, very clearly, that I didn’t want him to. We have a houseful of kids right now, for one thing; this particular weekend is Emma’s big choir concert. Annie is home, and she’s borrowed a friend’s three-year-old.  When I thought I’d help out by making dinner, Bruce announced that he had dinner “under control.” Tarps on the kitchen floor, sawhorses, sawdust, random boards. (It was really no place for a three-year-old, or for a fifty-seven year old, for that matter.)

 

We fought. He won and he cleaned up everything and made dinner. He yelled at the three-year-old when she got underfoot and upset everyone (Annie cried). The wise child said, “Uncle Bruce is sad.”

After dinner I got out Dowrick’s book and my journal. I kept repeating to myself the words, you have choices. I didn’t work all the way through it, I admit, but it helped. My journal, if nothing else, is my defensible fortress of solitude. When I was ready to come out and be part of my family again, I felt stronger.