First Sunday Q&A: Elizabeth Jarrett Andrew on Sustainable Writing Practice

I doubt author and teacher Elizabeth Jarrett Andrew would call herself an expert in staying present, but having read her newsletter, Pen Feathers, and her writing for years, I’d say she’s pretty good at trying to live that way. Elizabeth and I have crossed paths for a long time but always at a distance. We both taught at the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis. We shared many students. I’ve long been an admirer of her work and her approach to “writing about writing” and to living a creative life with a spiritual perspective.

I love how she explores the interior side of the writing life, especially how we as writers stay true to ourselves as creative people, especially when sharing our work with the world. Elizabeth has published a lot, but I particularly love her trilogy of books about the writing process, the inner work of writers. I wanted to catch her for this column as book three has just been released October 1. The Release: Creativity and Freedom After the Writing Is Done (Skinner House) is about what happens after the writing is out in the world.

So my questions to her were about her writing practice, the everyday of it, and how the act of staying present enters into this work. Here are my questions (and I’m thrilled that she took off in new directions from them):

Where do you write best?

What do you use to write? How do you go about it, specifically?

And what makes it satisfying?

Welcome, Elizabeth!

Guest post by Elizabeth Jarrett Andrew

My writing practice begins early, in pajamas, with a cup of matcha.  I shuffle to my reading chair, jot down dreams, and ask myself, “What’s stirring?”  I journal by hand with a fountain pen in a hard-covered Moleskine, sensory pleasures that compensate for the early hour and any hard-to-swallow revelations that pop up.  Then I read for a bit, some sacred or mystical text.  I like a dose of stimulation first thing and find this steers my day toward what matters most.

With few exceptions (early motherhood, menopausal insomnia), this ritual has begun my days for thirty-five years.  It works on me the way Julia Cameron suggests morning pages do, as a way to clear out the flotsam and jetsam that have washed up in my brain.  Like so many others, I write to find out what I think and feel and believe.  Morning “red chair time” is both a daily check-in—where am I at?—and intention-setting—who do I want to be today?  

Journaling is the most important writing of my day.  I think of it as “horizontal writing,” a daily practice of generating that widens the worn path between my interior and the page.

On days I have to get my daughter to school I then launch that flurry of activities; otherwise I walk the mile to my office along the north side of a city lake and through the neighborhood.  I used to bike the distance but have found that 15-20 minutes of walking is the perfect bread for my writing sandwich.

I’m immensely grateful to have a “room of my own” away from the rambunctious cats, ringing phone, and general chaos of our household.  My desk there remains empty.  The space stays clean.  I begin with centering prayer, a form of silent meditation.  This practice exercises my capacity to release thoughts and is directly applicable to writing.  Art is always a dance between exerting agency and surrendering to the Muse.  While I’m great at having an agenda and riding my will onto the page, being receptive to inspiration is much harder.  So I practice, both in meditation and in writing.

By the time I’ve eaten breakfast, it’s 8:30, which gives me three-and-a-half hours to write.  Here is my “vertical writing,” time to go deep with a project.  Sometimes I draft in spiral notebooks but usually the more formal composition happens at the laptop.  That much time at a screen is hard on my body, though, so I try to interrupt with hourly stretches and small chores, usually making more tea, and sometimes returning to longhand.  

As for what gives me a sense of accomplishment during that time, I’m less interested in volume than absorption.  How immersed have I been?  If I’ve reflexively checked my email all morning, that’s a disappointment.  If I’ve lost myself in the writing, I’ve had a good morning.  By “lost” I mean forgotten—I’ve allowed my project to fill my being and the room and the whole city; I’ve given no thought to audience or end product or worthiness or “art.”  Moments like that are gifts.  I love how the quiet of my office penetrates my mind.  When this happens, the words emerge from someplace other than my busy brain, without judgment, without “hope or despair,” as Isak Dinesen once said.  

But times like this only come when I’ve given myself over to creating.  My job is to be fully present, to bring forward skill, talent, agency, and energy, and at the same time be willing to set all that aside in favor of inspiration.  The more I can show up to this creative exchange, the better able I am to show up in my prose, meeting the reader with a full heart.  Honestly, it’s hard—just as hard as silent meditation.  Even when my focus is great, I’m tempted to skitter away into an easier subject or to hammer at my agenda or add some literary flourish to call attention to my brilliance.  Most days I leave the office only having had a glimmer of grace and hours of plain old effort.

Which is why the walk home is perfect—time to “moodle,” as Brenda Ueland called it, or “mail my project to my unconscious,’ as a friend of mine says.  My body, weary of sitting, needs to move, and my mind, weary of concentrating, needs to wander.  When I remember, I try to honor what’s happened at my writing desk with gratitude.  Often little inspirations come and you’ll find me making voice memos mid-stride.

Back home, I head right to the refrigerator.  Then the money-earning part of my day begins.  Noon’s a firm deadline; I can postpone others’ demands on my time only so long.  Generally, though, I’m ready to leave writing behind for lunch, human interactions, cat massages, and ordinary tasks I can complete in an hour or less.  Writing practices are unique to each writer; this one has been decades in the making.  This rhythm to my days keeps me vital, on the page and in my being.

Elizabeth hosts a free online writing community.  Folks can learn about it here: https://www.eyeoftheheartcenter.org/writing-community  And check out her brand new book here.

_____________________________
Elizabeth Jarrett Andrew
www.spiritualmemoir.com
www.elizabethjarrettandrew.com