My writing students complained the other day about certain canned responses to their disappointments: Well-meaning folks assured them, "Everything that happens to you is for a reason!" I asked them to raise hands if they agreed or not with this statement. 75% said they disagreed. I'm their writing teacher, and find cliches born of other people's discomfort with our discomfort hard to stomach too. But I suggested a revision: what if you said to them (and yourself), "Everything that happens to you...is for art?" A common problem: Where can I say how I really feel? At a seder this weekend, an older female guest in a glow-worm white jacket confided in me, "We're about to lose our family home. My husband got forced out of his work two years ago. I'm so sad--'" she lowered her voice, "but no one really wants to hear about it." I am always interested in what's really going on for people, and as a result, even strangers often open up for me. I felt for her, what felt like losing her roots. And she was right: it was hard to elicit the empathy she really needed. Much worse things were happening to people everywhere...but so what? This was her grief. She should be able to find an ear for it. My philosophy: Everything That Happens to You Has a Home in Your Art I couldn't tell her this, then, nor did I know if she ever wrote, but we could say: Every single thing that happens to you has a home in your art. That annoying comment your teacher made about your test. That t-shirt you won at the fair. The way your mom looks at you when you get home late. The family home you lost. The cough that wouldn't go away. The school you didn't get into. The kid you hope to have. It doesn't matter what it is: art can handle it. Art will hold it. Art gives you a place to hold it and understand it. In my intro to personal essay class, "Word UP," I ask my students to call out, "Thank you, Life, for giving me my material!" It's goofy but accurate and it never hurts to be Continue Reading …
transformation
Writing Change and Loss
September 11th, a day of tremendous change and loss for so many in NYC and their families. Every year, the old is new again. If you're applying to college now, you were barely born then; or maybe you newly knew how to say plane, tower, fall, fire, help. You didn't know how to deconstruct it, or what it really meant. This terrible catastrophe was emblazoned in American Consciousness-- you were there even if you weren't THERE. That's because all of America was there, vicariously. Everyone knew 9/11 marked a seismic shift in how we thought about our vulnerability, how vulnerable we really are. Memory Challenge Memory is funny that way. Remember when the Challenger Space Shuttle blew up? You were definitely not alive then if you're just applying to college now. I was, though. In my mind, I'm again watching the disaster at blast off happen on TV, the huge TV they wheeled in to our elementary school classroom. On our walls were block-letter ideas of the future-- how we could write more clearly, add more exactly, have dreams, penmanship, and punctuation. Everyone took the same freaked out breath at once, and the sky streaked with grey. A decade and a half later, bodies fleeing and jumping from the sky. God, that third grade teacher, Christie-- (was she?) floating back to earth, detached from ship and smoke. No more report cards. I don't know why I imagined her landing in a pile of old math worksheets and guinea pig pellets, in the yard of some public school somewhere, some school inevitably just like mine, kids pausing their ball games and pulling each others' bright plastic barrettes to go check out the damage. We are still checking out the damage. I figured, with my kid-logic, that her astronaut suit- though burnt-- would provide the necessary extra padding so that she didn't smash onto the concrete, but landed gently. Oh, to be on the earth again, oh that the tallest things fall. After a Big Continue Reading …
The real secret value hiding in your college application
Best chance at college application success = Give your perspective a tune-up! Adjusting how you see the enormous, time-consuming college application process-- from writing your name on a million forms to submitting your last supplemental essay-- will add positive value as fast as neurons can fire. Which is pretty fast. Here's why we're all about doing this. The status quo when our Hero begins to question things: For too many students, the college application process is something to just "get through." Does this sound like you? Do you see its value only as a means to a coveted end-- Higher Ed, baby!? Well, guess what? For too many adults, life is a string of things you just have to "get through." It's a means to an end, too. What end? Don't ask. Ugh! Junior year, standardized tests are you regular weekend dates, and college applications (and all that writing) loom. By the end of the summer before senior year, you're feeling dread, mixed with some anticipation. Senior year fall, you're clobbered. And, then, finally, after some sucky months, you've submitted everything, and you get temporary relief. That is, until you near the deadline for results, when you're an anxious mess again, your self-worth trashed if you don't get the acceptance letters you wanted or expected. Sounds like the opposite of fun, no? Our hero is feeling a little defeated in advance. His wings are wet. Her magic sandals have broken straps. And what if the results aren't what you hoped for, since we all know it's a big gamble? Since you really can't control the outcome? Isn't there a better way to go through this rite of passage than as a stress-ball? Don't you want even more value out of your college application? Our hero gets a hunch: For a happier you, redefine the work ahead YEP! A happier you-- a more functional, present and energetic you-- will be the result of challenging this paradigm. Start right now. Right. Now. Most students view their college application and Continue Reading …