Introducing NibLit!

In the first edition of NibLit I explain how the series works and my take on what brings me back to the desk, what sentence I hear from my inner critic, and what my favorite writing prompt is.

Welcome to NibLit! Thank you for being part of this community – at the beginning! I’ve been nurturing this idea for years and am thrilled to bring it to life here, with you. May it be a spark. A balm. A reminder that we never write alone.

NibLit is an interview series. For every installment, I will interview a writer or an artist and ask them the same three questions. I thought it only fair that I go first.

Question 1: What brings you back to the desk? (Which is another way of asking: Why write?)

I keep coming back to the desk because I like myself better when I’m writing. And the people I live with like me better too. I’m less agitated. Less resentful. More grounded. Happier. Writing is also how I understand myself and the world, though maybe understand isn’t the right word. Maybe orient is better. Writing is how I orient myself in the world.

Even more deeply – and this feels vulnerable to share – I believe when I write I am offering healing backwards and forwards and repairing my ancestral line. I imagine it like stitching with thread, mending. So, before I write, I make several stitches in a piece of cloth I have on my desk. I don’t know how to sew but knowing how isn’t the point. Stitching is the point. Remembering is the point. This symbolic act reminds me what I’m doing when I write.

I’m thinking of the poem “Kindness” By Naomi Shihab Nye. She writes:

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.

When we make art, we’re all making stitches in that large and sacred cloth that Naomi Shihab Nye writes about.

Question 2: What sentence do you hear on repeat in your head that gets in your creative way – and what is your antidote sentence?

This is an exercise that we do in the Word River. Choosing to be an artist means choosing to be in relationship with your critics, forever. They don’t go away. They do shapeshift and sometimes get quieter. But they’re still there.

I used to think I needed to banish my internal critics, tell them to shut up. But then one of my teachers reminded me that we can’t heal what we hold in contempt. She encouraged me to welcome them, to bring them close, to thank them for trying so hard to keep me safe, to ask for healing.

I’m in the process of writing my first novel, and when I began this project, the sentence in my head was this: You don’t know what you’re doing. You’re going to ruin your writing. You’re going to ruin your career. Go back to the writing you know. Who do you think you are?

My antidote sentence? I always want to be at the edge of my writing abilities when I start a new project; the unknown is a sacred place to be.

I’ve been working on this novel for a few years now, and my critic sounds different: This book is crazy weird. People are going to think you’ve lost it.

My antidote: So? The world needs our biggest and wildest ideas. Hold nothing back.

Question 3: What is your favorite writing prompt?

My favorite writing prompt is a variation of a prompt I learned from Nick Flynn in a workshop I took with him through Tin House years ago. I call it “The Accordion,” but I don’t think that’s what Nick calls it.

The idea is to double your writing. Take a paragraph or page of your existing writing. This should be a section that needs work or feels important or has some heat to it. Now you are going to copy an existing line of text, then write a new line. Existing line, new line. You are basically writing in between the lines of your own writing, doubling it. It’s helpful to bring a question to this work. Here are some that work for me and writers with whom I work: What are you avoiding? What are you writing around? What would you write if you weren’t afraid?

So many of the writers I see in my workshops need to be reminded to take up more space on the page. I think we often pre-edit – we hold ourselves and our ideas back, thinking no one wants to hear them, believing they’re boring, doubting the ideas that visit us. But we need to write a lot, and then more, and then more after that, to know what we’re really trying to say. Take up space. Give yourself permission. Be patient. Let your writing teach you. All writing leads to the writing we need to do. Trust you can edit it later. There will be plenty of time for that.

So there’s a glimpse into my writing process! I hope it helped you better understand your own. Ancestors, critics, language, healing – we get to be in relationship with such big energy when we choose to be artists. What a gift.

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Next up on NibLit: Charlotte Wood! She’s the author of STONE YARD DEVOTIONAL, shortlisted for the Booker Prize (!), among many other books. I love her writing, and I love hearing her talk about writing. She also inspired the WORD CAVE, the four-day virtual writing retreats I’ve been offering for nearly a decade. If you love the CAVE, you have Charlotte to thank. She changed my life and my writing practice, and I know reading her answers to these questions will probably change yours. Look for Charlotte’s NibLit in June!

Interested in Word Project Workshops?

Most workshops for 2025 have SOLD OUT. But don’t worry. There is still room in RIGHT TO WRITE, the monthly generative writing workshop series. Two hours of generative writing prompts on a theme, every month. I love this workshop, and if you miss the live sessions, they are recorded.

And there is room in the upcoming WORD RIVER, which starts in August. The RIVER is 6-months of twice-monthly workshops. If you’re looking to finish a project, if you’re looking for accountability and community, if you’re looking for ongoing support, this is for you.