The Jedi Word (or This Is Not The Word You Are Looking For) —Cin Norris My kids were just shy of middle school when they first came to me with writing assignments. I had unwittingly set myself up as the “English, History, and Geography” parent (as opposed to my “Expert on Every Natural Science that… Continue Reading >>>
Category Archives: Breakthrough Tip of the Week
Alone: Breakthrough Tip for the week of 8/31
How is it to be alone? If being alone is a room; a grove of trees no taller than you; an abandoned lot – something in the southeastern corner, moving, not moving; a car speeding down a desert highway, the windows open, your favorite song whipping past you…will you enter? Now, you think, she will… Continue Reading >>>
What Lives in the Lacunae: Breakthrough Tip for 8/22/2020
Lacuna: noun (pl. lacunae |-nī, -nē| or lacunas): an unfilled space or interval; a gap: the journal has filled a lacuna in Middle Eastern studies. a missing portion in a book or manuscript. — New Oxford American Dictionary Lacuna: Exploring the etymology of lacuna involves taking a plunge into the pit – or maybe a leap into… Continue Reading >>>
A long week, a long month, a long summer: Breakthrough for the coming week of 8/3/2020
Step out of the quarantine of your mind. This is not about the double whammy of virus and deadly ignorance. This is about a brown vinyl couch and how it might be to sit down on it. To be so weary that you have no choice but to sit. To find after a few moments… Continue Reading >>>
Who is your guide? Breakthrough for the week of 7/13/2020
Choose only one master — Nature. —Rembrandt, painter and etcher (15 Jul 1606-1669) Master. Guide. Teacher. Muse. S/he-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed. That/Which/Moves/Your/Writing. Who is yours? If you read Breakthroughwriting, you know mine: everything outside human control. Moss. Boulders. Sunlight. The way light changes. How dark moves over us. Time. Aging. Adoration. Power. Surrender. Fear.The illusion of forgiveness. And,… Continue Reading >>>
You and Now: Breakthrough
Me and Now: Cowboy Benez (Beans), a gray and brown tabby cat with high esteem, shares the desk chair with me. The blessed swamp cooler hums behind us. My pal, Everett, hung curtains over the two doorways to the living-room so the cool air stays in. I drink too much iced coffee and will pay… Continue Reading >>>
Imagine: Breakthrough for the week of June 22, 2020
But the great task of a fiction writer is to imagine our way into the lives and mindsets of others, no matter who they are. This act of radical empathy is so, so much easier said than done. — Alison McGhee You don’t have to make up stories. You don’t have to construct air-tight plots.… Continue Reading >>>
Finding the passage: Breakthrough for the week of June 1, 2020
I had to find the passage back/ To the place I was before…* Where do you find yourself at this instant? Suppose you lie on your belly on the forest floor and see this in front of your face? Who are you? When is it? How have you found yourself here – on purpose, through… Continue Reading >>>
Wildness: Now More Then Ever: Breakthrough for the week of 5/18/2020
Poet Gary Snyder has always invited us to walk the the Way of the Natural World, the Way of the Wild Unknown. Wild cannot survive on social media. It will never be given a seven figure advance. Wild cannot be licensed or commodified, though our capitalist corporate “culture” does its best to get rich off… Continue Reading >>>
Ancestor of Corona Virus: Breakthrough April 30, 2020
We have brought the Plague on us. The Plagues. Our species is filthy – yep, here I go again, and here’s why: I found this Corona empty in the forest. There are dozens of stories about its origin. You go first. You send yours, and I’ll send mine next week. Send your double-spaced writing in… Continue Reading >>>
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