Clara Black Ink

Though it took years to arrive here I no longer wait to be inspired in order to work on creative projects.

The air continues to cool but mostly it is the dispersing humidity that has made it begin to feel more like fall. There’s still heat but there’s a subtle change in the light too. (more…)

My #hmmmtober #artchallenge plans

The last two years that I’ve participated in Inktober I have had such a great time! This year, on trend, Inktober is a bit more complicated than usual. I will still participate in the art community challenge during October but there’s a lot to unpack with regards to Inktober.

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It feels like I've been in a bit of a bubble world since the end of June.

It feels like I’ve been in a bit of a bubble world since the end of June. By mid-June my spouse began reporting that his coworkers were coming in contact with COVID-19 either in vague ways like partying in Miami while the city’s case numbers were rising or more directly in the case of one who had a friend over who tested positive (unclear if this was before or after the friend came over). Earlier…

Some days there are these beautiful moments of insight that solve creative problems sifting in the background. Usually they're terribly fickle and cannot be chased. This morning was one of those moments.

Some days there are these beautiful moments of insight that solve creative problems sifting in the background. Sometimes they happen in the middle of work and those rare gifts are pretty much everything. Usually they’re terribly fickle and cannot be chased. This morning was one of those moments.

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Inspiration is a wonderful fleeting affair that some regale and others revile. It isn’t terribly dependable as fodder for finished art and writing but it can make the difficult days worthwhile knowing that inspiration is as delightful as it is capricious. I’m not sure when I stopped chasing inspiration and started focusing on doing the work. Honestly, I may never have stopped but perhaps I became…

Often productivity and purpose become conflated. #writingcommunity #writing #productivity

Something I see a lot right now when I browse my usual feeds is people talking about how unproductive or productive they are during lockdown. Essential workers are the rare exception and speak to their inability to fit in time to write or create between weeks full of overtime hours. For a variety of reasons I went through my own crisis of productivity prior to 2020 and had already developed a…

Over the years I have explored many ways of coping with fear, uncertainty and trauma. Some were so ineffective as to be laughable, others were reasonable but didn’t work for me and mostly I learned that usually it’s a moving target. Not everything works all the time. More recently when I try to decide how to spend my time I have been exploring this thought experiment.

1. If I knew that today was…

There are still feelings in the background that I expect will continue until this resolves. Often, there is no response apart from sitting down with a book.

These are weird times. A few weeks ago I wasn’t blogging because I was caring for an injured stray cat from my neighborhood who has since insisted on returning now that he’s feeling better. Recently, of course, there’s coronavirus/COVID-19 and the ripple effects of that. For me, my husband and my neighbors there’s also a note from our landlord informing us that we will either move to a more…

Perfection is an easy excuse not to try. The gentle daily reminders that my work is waiting for me does more than the sense that the opportunity will slip away ever did. #writing

As a follow up to last week’s long post I thought I would post the basic steps I follow in order to make time and space for writing and art in the midst of my energy drain.

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My energy levels fluctuate between 15-45% and the result is that I can feel the physical and mental drain of writing and creating #writing

Maintaining motivation when energy levels are below 20% of your usual maximum, when your mind is hazy and when you are physically unwell is unreasonable. A lot is said about being productive by employing any number of useful tips and tricks such as: getting enough sleep, exercising, eating healthy, scheduling the work and sticking to it. Not much is said about the sense of crushing defeat…

Screaming Into the Void and Other Occupational Hazards

If you’re a writer who wants to write a great book that sells itself then the advice about how to use social media can end up being counterproductive. Good books rarely sell themselves, they need to be discovered by readers who are innervated by them and that’s the hardest part. Lately I’ve become active in Twitter’s writing community and it is a wonderfully diverse community of writers who are…

Finally, after reflecting on ten years of journals I have some thoughts and plans for moving forward into the '20s.

Finally, after reflecting on ten years of journals I have some thoughts and plans for moving forward into the ’20s.

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I left for my health and during that November I won NaNoWriMo with the very first draft of the novel I'm still working on.

Continuing the recap of the last ten years picking back up in 2013 when I began to create light in my life through creativity while the life I’d built had begun to crumble.

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It is hard to be honest with yourself if you are writing with the knowledge that a future you is looking over your shoulder in judgment.

I spent an entire day sorting through journals in order to make a list of the trends of my last ten years as written. Not just in terms of what was happening to me or what I took on but also in terms of how the act of journaling changed the way I lived my life and how I interpreted those things. (a bit of a warning that this reflection includes a deeper dive into depression, health issues and…

My New Year's practice of revisiting old journals for the opportunity to be honest in reflection and prepare for new goals in ways that are beyond wishful.

My favorite holiday is New Year’s. It isn’t just the creation of resolutions, reflection on the past and hopes for the future. There’s a sense of death with the promise of renewal. The two in concert seem to demand a type of honest reflection and a willingness to be humble in order begin the new year in a way that makes it possible to achieve renewal. My New Year reflection starts around…