What is the creative process and how does it work? This is a question that intrigues me. I teach an elective course in Lesley University’s creative writing program called Creativity and The Unconscious Mind. In this class, we explore techniques for engaging the unconscious mind in the creative process. We experiment with a wide variety of writing exercises such as wordplay, free writing, clustering, and literary collage.
Here are some of the resources I use for the course, a small sampling of the myriad books and articles about the creativity. I am always eager to find out about other resources, so let me know if you have a suggestion!
Information for Aspiring Authors
Here are some resources to help you on your journey, ones that I find helpful. Both of them will lead you to many other sources of information about writing and publishing.
SCBWI:The Society for Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. This organization is worth joining as they offer a wealth of information about the art, craft, and business of writing. They host conferences, publish newsletters and a magazine, and sponsor writing retreats. They are open to published and pre-published writers.
The Blueboard: Do not miss out on this resource! The Blueboard is an interactive forum where writers discuss all kinds of topics related to books, writing, and publishing. You can peruse past conversations about these topics or start a new conversation.
Persistence: I firmly believe that getting published involves inspiration, hard work, a little bit of luck (being in the right time at the right place when the stars align) and, most importantly, PERSISTENCE. Never give up. I almost did (several times) after receiving many rejections and encountering some unexpected bumps in the road. However, each time I gave up, I picked myself up and out of my despair and kept on writing and submitting.
