Finding Inspiration

A recent, on-going family medical crisis forced me to behave like a grown-up and to accept the reality that, once your parents reach a certain age, you need to take care of them. Anxiety, uncertainty, decision-making, and doctor-mode kicked in and took over operation of my brain. My writing mojo, consequently, went on hiatus.

In addition to being a daughter, doctor, and crisis manager, I am a writer. I know writing will help me manage my stress and anxiety. I need to get my mojo working again. I sought out some advice from other writers to inspire me to get back to the world of fiction, both as a brain break and as a way to process a reality that insists on intruding on my denial.

“If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.”

–Toni Morrison

“Read, read, read. Read everything – trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You’ll absorb it. Then write. If it’s good, you’ll find out. If it’s not, throw it out of the window.”

–William Faulkner

(I read several chapters of Zora Neale Hurston’s Tell My Horse and calmed down.)

“You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.”

–Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing

“Don’t bend; don’t water it down; don’t try to make it logical; don’t edit your own soul according to the fashion. Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly.”

–Franz Kafka

“To survive, you must tell stories.”

–Umberto Eco, The Island of the Day Before

“I write to discover what I know.”

–Flannery O’Connor

“A word after a word after a word is power.”

–Margaret Atwood

Share some quotes that inspire you. What else inspires you, helps you get “unstuck,” gets your mojo working? Comment on the blog or join the conversation on social media.

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