April 30: count your blessings

celebrating the work

Apr 30, 2022

Good morning. It’s April 30, the last day of National Poetry Month.

I love beginnings and endings—the chance to reflect on how a project went, an opportunity to look toward the future. So this is the end of the daily writing exercises, but it’s also the start of something new. No matter when you joined or how many of the exercises you completed, you likely wrote more than you would have otherwise. That feels like something to celebrate.

today’s exercise

I associate the phrase “count your blessings” with my maternal grandmother. I can’t remember now how she said it—as encouragement to be mindful of the good things in your life, or chiding to stop complaining when it could be worse—or even if she said. Let’s take it as encouragement to reflect on your good work this month.

Today, scan through everything you’ve written across the month. You might have lines and freewriting and drafts in a notebook, as well as digital files. You might also have notes in your phone, or voice recordings. Highlight your favorite parts—the bits that interest or surprise you, the moments that feel like they have some heat, or something you can build on.
Two options for moving forward:
- Make a cento out of your favorite lines.
- Get some index cards and make an inspiration deck, with one image or line or phrase or idea on each index card. I described the deck in the first post from last year’s series. Your goal is to create a pack of mini assignments or starting points you can use for writing going forward.

deadheading

I’ve been thinking also about deadheading, or what you need to cut away so new things can grow. I’d encourage you to think also about what you’ve learned about yourself as a writer this month: what kinds of exercises help you get started? what do you need in order to write?

And perhaps more importantly: what can you let go of? There might be content you’ve worn out, stylistic tricks that have become tics. But this is also a good moment to consider your beliefs about writing and perhaps yourself as a writer, and to give up the ideas that aren’t serving you. It’s so easy to tell yourself that you need two hours and total silence to write, or that you can’t write now because there are papers to be graded or dinner to be made or emails to answer, but you’ll get to it later. (There is no later, as Emily O’Neil writes in her wise essay, Every Day is a Writing Day, With or Without an MFA, about the idea of getting to your writing “someday”:

Someday is a convenient stand-in for applied effort. Someday is a thing I say to myself about circumstances so large they resemble immovable objects. Someday cannot and should not be applied to writing.

One thing I hope this month of daily practice has shown is that you can write into little pockets of time, that you can get inspiration from all kinds of places. An imperfect and inconsistent practice now is far better than the dream of a perfect writing life later.

So, as we close out this month, I’d encourage you to think about what you’re taking away and what you’re giving up. You might write yourself a note and post it somewhere you can see as you write.

Share Write More, Be Less Careful

Moving forward, this newsletter is going to a monthly format, with an occasional mid-month pop-in to share great things I’ve been readings or events I think will interest you all. The monthly newsletter will go out the Sunday before each new month starts. (I could say the last Sunday of the month, but that’s sounds so final, doesn’t it? I’m really thinking about looking ahead.) I like to spend that Sunday before a new month thinking about my goals and intentions for the new month, and I’m looking forward to sharing that space with you.

As we close out our month, can I ask two favors? Would you share something you’ve written, either in the comments below or via email or on instagram/twitter? It’s really been such a joy to get to read the snippets and drafts people send me, and I think would be great for you all to get to see each other’s work. And if this practice has been helpful for you, would you share this newsletter with someone you think would also enjoy it?