Flow Activities

Which activities make you lose track of time?

Those of you who follow me have heard me talk about “flow” before. I’m a flow evangelist, ready to talk about this amazing force in our lives which brings us closer to meaningful happiness.

Why do I mention “flow” with this particular prompt? Because one of the characteristics of flow is losing track of time when engaged in activities that bring flow. If we’re talking about losing track of time, we’re talking about flow activities.

“Flow” is a concept brought to us by the happiness psychologist Mihaly Csikzentmihalyi. It is built into the PERMA model of happiness under “A” for “accomplishment” and “M” for meaning.

What are other characteristics of flow activities? They should engage us with challenge without being too challenging. They should totally absorb us, almost like a meditation. They should provide a sense of accomplishment, even in a small way.

My flow activities are writing and moulage (casualty simulation makeup). I may have others, but these are the two I have discovered. Things that are not challenging enough for flow: Doing dishes. Things that are too challenging for flow: Dancing. Definitely dancing. But one person’s flow is another person’s aggravation.

What are your flow activities?

About Hypocrisy

What bothers you and why?

If I have to pick one thing that bothers me, it’s hypocrisy.

Calling out someone else for failings when one is just as guilty pains me. Often it’s done to detract attention from one’s own faults, and that irks me the most. Other times hypocrisy results from blindness to one’s own faults.

I am a hypocrite. I can’t stand hypocrisy but I’m certain I’m guilty of it. I try to stomp it out, because I can’t stand it in myself. The only way out of hypocrisy I can see is to be unflinchingly honest about one’s faults, to be able to say “I, too, am guilty”. I probably fail at that, too.

I wonder if we are all doomed to occasional hypocrisy, being human, and being less than self-aware as a defense mechanism.

A Little Bit of Writing: Short Stories

I wrote a little on my short story today, not as much as I would have liked. Combining my 30-year-old fragmented knowledge of Chicago with Google Maps and my near-future dystopic imagination is challenging. The result will hopefully be a background story developing a one sentence aside of the book I just wrote. Many of my short stories begin as character sketches, and this one is no exception.

I would like to write more short stories that don’t tie into characters in my novels. If I do that, I might submit more writing to Submittable contests and publishers. If you don’t know what Submittable is, it is a website that publicizes writing contests and journals and magazines that are looking to publish poetry and short stories. It’s a great way for a writer to get some exposure in those venues. There’s often a small payment for readers or subscription fees, but it’s rewarding to be published even in small venues. The last story I got published was “The Inner Child”, which was published by Flying Ketchup Press last fall.

I feel like I would have trouble publishing my tie-in stories because they are so character driven, but I guess I could always try to see. I have had little luck publishing them in the past, but had one story receive an honorable mention, so there’s that. Although I write as a flow activity, I still have a desire to be read.

Wish me luck!

Addicted to the Flow

I sit in my writing chair (the loveseat near the front window) feeling uninspired. This doesn’t sit well with me, because I am addicted to the flow.

I’ve talked about flow before, but it’s worth mentioning again. Flow is a state in which a person is completely involved in what they’re doing. Time slips by and the person experiences mastery of the task, an optimal level of challenge and competency. Flow contributes to well-being through accomplishment and a state of near-meditation.

I get my flow from writing, and that’s what brings me back to writing again and again. If I never published again, I think I would still write because of the feeling of flow. It took me years to accept that experiencing flow was enough of a reason to continue writing.

I’m looking for my state of flow today, and I don’t know if the current project is captivating enough for me to find it. I’ll be looking for a new project soon, maybe the right short story.

Putting Myself Out There

An indie writer needs to market themselves. It’s perhaps my worst failing that I don’t do a great job marketing myself. I have trouble exclaiming to people, “You need to read my writing!” Call it Midwestern Female Syndrome¹, but it’s real.

This blog is part of marketing myself. To be honest, the main purpose of this blog is to talk about writing and my thoughts about it. When you read my blog, I hope you’re thinking “That’s what it’s like to be a writer.” Hopefully, it also makes you want to read what I’m writing.

Just like my newsletter right now — blank.

I post now and again on Facebook/Twitter/Instagram using Loomly, a social media manager. I post mostly silly things (did you know it was National Kitten Day on Tuesday of this week?) but that’s to get my name out there. I also advertise my books there.

I also write a newsletter every three weeks. If you’re familiar with my blog, you’ll be familiar with what my newsletter is like. I talk about life as a writer, my books, and plans in a chatty way. I try for more atmospheric, with pieces of my surrounding life included. Once I wrote about the gift I received of an Emotional Support Pickle, for example. If you would like to be on my newsletter mailing list, please drop me an email here.

These are all suggested ways to promote one’s books, but I can’t help but think I’m not doing these right. I’m not good at self-promotion, as I have said above, and would like to get better. My Midwestern Female Syndrome keeps me from bragging too much. Would anyone like to read a book?

Midwestern Female Syndrome is the internal desire to be perfect combined with the desire to be outwardly unremarkable; to be outstanding but not to stand out.

Every trip is a mini-writing retreat.

I’m at the Hotel Kansas City grabbing some breakfast and writing time before my next intern. I have a rose-lavender latte with me and am waiting for breakfast. The whole place has a private club vibe — as it should, because it used to be a private club. In its heyday, I would never have been allowed in, because private clubs were men’s only. The whole place smells of the fireplace in the restaurant.

We end up staying in these places randomly, because we use Hotwire to book the room for an overnight. Prices are reasonable, doubly so if you’re traveling on a weekday. If you’re booking in downtown KC, you’re more likely to get boutique hotels at our price point than typical mid-price chains. And Marriott and Hyatt are doing much to collect boutique hotels in their portfolio, so interesting gems like this are easier to find.

We splurged for dinner last night (the university does not pay for meals!) at the hotel restaurant, which had a James Beard-nominated executive chef. Imaginative food, small portions, intimate atmosphere. We weren’t that hungry after pork tenderloin and curly fries for lunch.

I have one more intern, but before that, I have an opportunity to write at this lovely table you see pictured. Mini-retreat plus internship visits; just what I needed.

Out of Office

I’m on a trip downstate to visit a couple of interns at their sites, so I don’t think I will have time to write the next couple of days. I will bring my go-kit (iPad, keyboard, mouse, power supply) in case I get some time to write on the trip. I’d have to find something to write, as Google Maps and the interstate system (long story) have foiled my story idea.

Have fun!

The Rabbit Hole of Research

I’m writing a short story based on the Hidden in Plain Sight books, about some characters I spend less time with. It takes place in Chicago, and I’m racking my brain to remember Chicago, which I remember as a disconnected series of commercial and residential areas.

I try to jog my memories (as inadequate as they are) by looking at maps — a Google map and a Chicago neighborhood map. I just reemerged from a two-hour reverie of putting names and places to various places I remember from over thirty years ago. The No Exit was in Rogers Park, which is almost Evanston. My boyfriend’s mother lived in North Austin, and his grandparents lived in Hermosa. I spent a spring break at a storefront loft in “unredeemed Bucktown”, as a friend of mine from (I believe) Lakeview. I remember a great Korean restaurant in Lincoln Square and had one of the most frightening experiences of my life in Lincoln Park.

Two hours later, I have gotten no closer to writing the story. I don’t even know where I’m going with the story. But I have sorted out a series of mental Polaroids that represent my memories. As these memories are thirty years old, I had buried those Polaroids in a closet I seldom go into.

Excited? I‘m pretty mellow about the future

What are you most excited about for the future?

I don’t get excited these days. I’m sixty and I’m on good medication for my bipolar, so elation is a thing of my past. Thank goodness, because elation is exhausting, and it usually precedes a big depression.

That doesn’t mean I don’t look forward to things. I have a mini-trip to Kansas City to visit interns this week, and I look forward to both KC barbecue and getting internship visits over with.

I will be doing a major disaster preparedness exercise in August at Disaster Disneyland (official name: New York State Preparedness Training Center) that I have to prep for. I am the moulage coordinator for the exercise, which means I turn volunteers into victims.

The beginning of the school year is coming up sooner than I’d like. I am looking forward to all the beginning of school activities and teaching some new classes.

I’m looking forward to publishing Kringle Through the Snow on October 1. And, if I don’t chicken out, publishing Reclaiming the Balance on Jan. 1. I need a writing retreat, and am about to drop the hint to my husband (when he reads this). That’s something else to look forward to.

So, nothing exciting, but I have a full calendar to look forward to.

Blogging as a Writing Ritual

Lately, I have been blogging in the morning before I write (or edit), intending to use it as a warm-up to those activities. So far, it has been working well.

One thing it yields is a daily blog, and my regular readership has increased from four people to ten. I’m not sure what it takes to get my readership up further. But I’ll take any improvement I can get, so thank you readers!

Another thing it yields is more reflection on writing as a discipline. This helps me to think of myself as a writer. It’s strange; I rarely think of myself as a writer, just as a person who has a habit of telling stories to myself. But saying “I write my blog as a ritual before I sit and edit” makes me feel like a writer.

But the biggest reason for the blogging ritual is that it warms up my mind for writing/editing. It signals to me I need to focus on words. Even the suggestions ProWritingAid makes to my writing help me warm up.

There are other ways I could warm up, but blogging efficiently yields a useful result. And you get to read it.