Writing Wednesdays (a day late!): How To Keep Going Once You've Begun

We missed our Monday and Wednesday post due to some schedule conflicts (heat exhaustion... and the official creation of the

CBS RADIO SPOT!

) but no worries. My body temperature is back to normal. I've created a radio spot. The day was a success.

All is fine and we're back. And now on to our regularly scheduled, if somewhat late post.

How to Keep Writing Once You've Begun

You're stuck. There's no getting around it.

Your novel/essay/research paper has jelled into a ball. It was flowing and going. And now? It's stopped. Panic sets in.

Similar to Elizabeth Kubler Ross's grief stages, we've got the writing stages.

Stage One: Excitement:

You wake up, your heart pounding. Every idea seems golden and will make you a mint (or give you an A).

Stage Two:  Creative Flow:

You've been pounding away at your computer or scribbling away in your notebook. It's all moving at an amazing pace. Ideas are flowing from your pen.

Stage Three: The Roadblock:

We all hit it. This is the part where your character or plot just winds down. You planned for Little Jane or Johnny to walk to the right. He or she goes to the left. You try a little harder for your character to do what you want. Your book (or paper) rebels. Everything digs its feet into the mud.

Here's where we come in.

How do you get out of Stage 3?

Here's a list of time honored Writing Block Breakers

1. Step away from the computer screen: Sometimes staring anxiously into the monitor just creates more panic. All those words. You're wasting time. Deadline is approaching! Go for a walk. Take twenty minutes and focus on the feeling of your body moving. Relax. Usually, once you've helped your body to relax, your mind will follow suit and you can return to your desk with a fresh perspective.

1. Stretch: Never underestimate the power of movement. Stand up, plant your bare feet and lift your hands above your head. Breathe. Repeat five times. Sit back down.

2. Believe. There is no substitute for straight-up belief. As we talked about here, no one else will take over your body and believe for you. You must believe all on your own. But, I'm here to help with inspiration (for the post on YAWP and self-belief, go here)

Fun Fridays: CBS RADIO and "Tricking the Goddess" Poetry Book

Happy Ganesh is now a proud sponsor of

The Movement Within Radio Show on

CBS Radio

!

Here's what that means for us:

HG is now going to have a radio spot that will be heard during The Movement Within Radio Show, starting May 2, Monday Nights at 6 pm on

CBS Radio

...AND will stream live on

AOL Radio

,

Yahoo Radio

, and on actual HD radio stations in Seattle, Boston, and Detroit.

Here's what that means for YOU

• more services

• more great seminars and one-on-one classes

• the creation of a Happy Ganesh bookstore

• and much much more!

We're very excited!! And a huge congrats to our good friend

April Claxton

who has worked her tail off on the creation of this show. We're so proud to be a sponsor.

Tricking the Goddess

Hits Shelves in May

Plus, the first of two books is coming out in May 2011! My first poetry collection,

Happy Ganesh's Radio Show

Annnnnd.....we're going to have our own radio show. We'll begin sometime in April on blogtalkradio.com and for free, you'll get a full hour of

• astrological happenings

• writing how tos

• author interviews

• author readings

• what astrology means for you, including call ins

• and much, much more!

THANK YOU!

Thank you for being with us! You're the reason we do this at all - because there are people out there who care about Happy Ganesh's twin passions - astrology and books/literature. Because you have a curious and seeking heart and because you want to learn about your world and your life through intuitive readings. Because you understand that the only way out is through and that honest expression is empowerment.

And we could never do this without you.

In gratitude,

Marissa

Writing Wednesday: The Universe and You

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(Note: This article contains YouTube videos. If you're reading this entry in an email, please click through to the blog to see the videos!)

In honor of this week's Writing Wednesday, let's talk about the eternal divine within. I believe the sacred is in you, and learning how to connect to our deeply personal and individual spiritualities is, I believe, a lifelong and intensely personal process.

1. Do you believe in a Higher Power? If yes, does it have a name? Do you call it God? Goddess? Jesus? Luck? Chance? Fate?

2. What is your personal sacred code?

3. What does talking to a Higher Power mean to you, if you pray to one? Do you call your communication prayer? Does it have another name?

4. Describe the face of your own inner divine being. What does it look like? What is the feeling associated with it?

5. What is your favorite communication or "prayer" with the divine? Some of my favorites are "I'm lost", "Help", "F-- This!", or "Thank You."

Some book recommendations are

The Feminine Face of God by Sherry Ruth Anderson and Patricia Hopkins: Anderson and Hopkins explore women's views of spirituality, including testimony from nuns, Buddists, pagans, female rabbis, and women of all kinds, creeds, and belief systems. From the questioning stay-at-home mom to the woman leaving her relationship after fifty years, the book delves into our eternal questions: If God is me, what am I doing here? What is meaning? What applies to me?

The Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie: Self-help household name Melody Beattie wrote this as a daily book of meditations to help us let go, find health, and trust our inner timing. (Melody Beattie also gave the children's book I edited rave reviews. To learn more about April Claxton's wonderful Goodnight Just the Same, click here.)

The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris: The poet Kathleen Norris went to live with Benedictine monks for two years. "Here, she compresses these years of experience into the diary of one liturgical year, offering observations on subjects ranging from celibacy to dealing with emotions," says Amazon.

Women, Food, and God: Geneen Roth was featured on Oprah for this one and it's fantastic. She connects our intimate relationship to food to our intimate spiritual relationship. Wonderful meditation on the ways that our relationship to food parallels our own abundance or perceived lack of  support from a higher power.

The ways that we feel into - or don't feel into - our individual paths can often make or break us in small ways. Here's to loving and accepting our own personal paths, whatever they look like and whatever questions they pose.

And here's a song, "Universe and You" by KT Tunstall.



For any Gray's Anatomy fans out there, here's the "very special musical episode version" that aired last week.  Dr. Arizona Robbins (Jessica Capshaw) sings to her partner Dr. Callie Torres (Sara Ramirez) , now in a coma. (Who was a weepy mess? That would be me.)



Love

Marissa

Manifestation Mondays: Music and Mediation

*** Message to email subscribers - this post contains a YouTube video, so if you're reading it in an email, please click through to the blog to experience the video.***

The theme from one of my favorite movies.

Turn it up.
Listen.
Notice your thoughts. Just notice them.
Relax for five whole minutes.

Fun (and Freaky) Fridays: New Moon in Aries; Aries Energy is Fuel For Change

Major planets move into Aries this weekend, as the New Moon in Aries gears up for April 3. What's a New Moon? As I wrote in a previous post "

“ New Moons dedicate themselves to getting rid of the old and ushering in fresh starts. The sign tells us what area of life we’re being encouraged to restart.  What’s even more powerful here is that – as usual, the sign the New Moon is in, is also the sign that the Sun is in.”

Get ready for the  Sun Aries/Moon Aries on April 3!  Do you feel all that creative and independent "Let's Do It Now" energy? (However, remember that the New Moon is happening in a Retro....so Retro rules apply - you may want to hold tight on the BIG ideas, or at least know that it will become easier to put them in place after the Mercury Retro ends on 4/23). Still, this New Moon pushes us to manifest what

About.com astrologer Molly Hall calls "our own personal radiance."

This New Moon is a great time to manifest your own independence and sheer LIFE FORCE.

You may want to use this time to manifest in the following areas.

• leadership roles

• concepts and images about bravery and independence

• what it means to do your own individual dance in your life

• what it means to Live In the Moment

• New identity or self-concept

Aries Key Words:

• heart

• bravery

• self reliance

• inner motivation

• self-love or self-trust

• uncovering your own self - who YOU are, as opposed to who others want you to be

What really gets me excited here is that we have several major planets in Aries right now.

Mercury (Retro) in Aries

,

Sun in Aries

,

Uranus in Aries and this New Moon (A reminder: New Moons only last for 2.5 days but New Moons open the monthly doorway to that planet's energy and potential). While the Retrograde may make us feel slightly held back, and the Saturn in Libra is still opposing these changes. Overall, despite the opposition, we're being ushered into a tremendous new era of change and chance. It's as if we are being given a karmic birthright - and a direct order, even if we don't like it - to rebuild our lives into what we really want. Fittingly, all of this Aries energy is going to push us through the door and both help us and *urge* us to create the kind of life we want.

In Tarot, the first card in the Major Arcana is the Fool, the spiritual everyman who walks through the Wonderland of images known as life. The Fool is creative, direct and innocent. In astrology, the Fool and the Aries sign are similar - they both begin either the Major Arcana or the Zodiac wheel. He, like us, is uniquely posed to reap the benefits of his inner movement and outward manifestation of what he finds.

While these astrological times may seem challenging, they are ultimately liberating. Now, we are directly being assisted to blaze ahead and create from our souls and ourselves the kind of life and truth in which we long to live.

However a reminder. With Aries energy, there's a danger of burnout, of doing too much, of losing our tempers. We can direct the fire of creativity or we can turn it on others. The choice is, as always, up to us.

I, for one, am very excited to see what the next year holds on both a personal and global level.

See you next week for Manifestation Mondays.

take care,

M