Retreat Day 2: Delight

lizshine74by lizshine74

In Retreat.

cup of coffee next to a bowl of apricots

Yesterday, before the day ended I made it to four hours of deep focus. Not six as I set out to do, but still a win. And pretty impressive considering that I started the day with one hand holding an ice ball to my temple and the other with coffee in hand. I finished one of two goals I set for this retreat, finishing up edits on a short story collection I’m polishing up for a submissions blitz in January.

Today I’m starting strong. It’s 6:30 and the dogs are fed and walked. Before I get started today, I want to begin with a contemplation of delight.

There is far too much talk about the artist’s struggle and not enough talk about this work’s delight. There is nothing quite like the feel of tuning up a sentence to perfection. I can imagine the feeling is the same with certain flourishes of the brush or pen, and certain melodies captured.

Delight is the reason not to take ourselves too seriously on retreat. If we do, we might miss it. It comes in waves to carry you through and takes many forms. A perfect sandwich made on a break and eaten slowly and with gratitude. The flame of a candle flickering on your desk. The feeling of having completed something. That’s one we forget to pause and feel fully. Even better, punctuate it with a squeal or jump for glee. Maybe it was just a chapter or a corner of a painting. Pause and feel the burst of confidence.

Delight can take any form. Eating the chocolates on your desk instead of taking a proper meal break. A pause to read aloud what you just wrote or admire the thing you’ve just made. Putting on your softest pair of socks. Finding an ambient song that gets you flowing.

Delight is the real reason we’re here. At some point, you started making, and you felt it. You didn’t expect it; you’d just moved some words around or put the last touches on a sketch, but then you stood back in awe. What you had created lived up to your vision.

So, on day two of this retreat, let’s look for those moments of delight, notice them, acknowledge them, and let them be. We’re here to make something, to delight in making something. And that means so much more than meeting our goals or clocking in any particular amount to fime.

For futher contemplation, read The Joy of Writing by Wislawa Szymborska. Here are the first few lines as a teaser. Click on the link to read the whole poem.

Why does this written doe bound through these written woods?
For a drink of written water from a spring
whose surface will xerox her soft muzzle?
Why does she lift her head; does she hear something?
Perched on four slim legs borrowed from the truth,

Day 2, begin!

I also work as a writing coach and love helping writers gain confidence, set goals, and develop their work. For more information on coaching, email me at eatyourwords.lizshine@gmail.com.

lizshine74

lizshine74

Liz Shine teaches high school English, writes, edits, and coaches other writers from her home in Olympia, WA. When she begins to feel overwhelmed by it all, she simply looks up at Mount Rainier in the distance and gets back to work. If that fails, she heads to the ocean. She is a founding editor at Red Dress Press. Her Substack Make Time is her gift to writers, like her, trying to magic time in this crazy, busy world. All of those posts are cross-posted on the blog here. You can see more of her writing at lizshine.com and find her on Instagram {@lizshine.writer} cooking, traveling, and in other ways seeking moments of awe. She has been an active participant in communities of writers since the early 1990s. She’s learned that two things feel truly purpose-driven in life: writing and coaching other writers. In the in between (because one cannot be driving for a purpose every moment), she enjoys looking for wonder and connection. She is a lifelong yoga student, an enthusiastic walker along streets and trails, and an amateur gardener and vegetarian cook. She lives in Olympia, WA in the USA. She believes in the power of practice and has been practicing writing since some time in the early 90s when she became an adult in the rain-soaked city of Aberdeen. Writing began with journaling, as a way to understand a confusing, sometimes violent coming-of-age. She writes mostly fiction, some nonfiction, and poetry, and holds an MFA from Pacific Lutheran University’s Rainier Writers Workshop. She has published in Shark Reef, Dual Coast, and Blue Crow Magazine. She is a founding editor at Red Dress Press.