Lisa Tener

Book Writing Coach

joy of writing

Day 13: October Journaling Adventure with The Joy of Writing Journal

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These posts are designed to work with The Joy of Writing Journal: Spark Your Creativity in 8 Minutes a Day. If you haven’t bought your copy yet, get it here and join us for the free October Journaling Adventure!

We have a few celebrity novelists in today’s video: New York Times Bestselling author (for multiple books) Jaquelyn Mitchard (watch for her new book The Good Son: A Novel coming out in December!), Global Read Aloud winner and multi-award winning author Padma Venkatraman whose novel, The Bridge Home, won over 50 awards (“Gorgeous Storytelling” – The New York Times Book Review) and Kristin Bair O’Keefe, author of Agatha Arch is Afraid of Everything, PEOPLE Magazine’s “Best New Book, 2020” among new writers to discover!

Of course, you may prefer to respond to the prompt, “A stranger knocks. What happens next?” before you watch the video or read my excerpt. Start by listing 5 possible next lines. Which one inspires (or scares) you the most? Write from that one!

My own dream-like response to this prompt surprised me. I run out the back door!

The stranger pursues me.

Finally, I’m cornered at a chain link fence. Here’s my excerpt:

I hear his rapid breathing, then his heartbeat, feel his breath on the back of my neck.

Still, I face the fence, eyes closed, my own breath shallow, stomach clenched.

“You Lisa?” he asks.

“Why?” I open my eyes but do not turn toward him.

“I got your mail. By Accident. I live next door.”

I turn then, mesmerized by his blue blue eyes. I don’t hear what he says. I’m lost in his gaze.

The stranger hands me my mail—two letter sized envelopes and a thick 8×10 package.

My taxes.

I knew I should have run away.

Your Turn to Journal

The Joy of Writing Journal: Spark Your Creativity in 8 Minutes a Day

I hope you had as much fun with this prompt as I did!

What ideas came up? Which did you choose?

In the comments, share an excerpt or just a first sentence.

Or share what surprised you about the experience.

How have you been enjoying the October Journaling Adventure? Are you able to journal every day (or close to it)? If not, what do you think you need to commit more deeply? What’s missing? Do you need to use the planning page to schedule specific times? Put your journal in a different place so you see it daily?

If you’re journaling daily, share what’s helping you be consistent. Your insights may help others!

Day 12: October Journaling Adventure with The Joy of Writing Journal

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My list for today included many places I’ve wanted to visit for a long time—India, Iceland, Utah—and a few I briefly glimpsed and wish to really see—Mount Shasta, Thailand. But the last entry surprised me—Israel.

Tel Aviv, Israel
Photo by Shai Pal on Unsplash

You could say I’ve internalized my parents’ fear of danger there—from the violence and bombing throughout my childhood. You’d be half right.

Beneath, “Who will put their lives in danger by traveling to Israel?” is a deeper impulse—to leave the past—along with our Jewishness—behind. Assimilate.

Once again, a seemingly innocuous prompt—to imagine a visit to one of the places on my list—provokes an exploration of deep-seated beliefs and internal restraints, which have less hold for me when I bring them to the surface to examine them.

Rereading my journal entry, I realize I didn’t even do what the prompt says. Instead of imagining a visit, I explore why it surprises me for Israel to come up on the list! As you work through The Joy of Writing Journal, feel free to improvise and follow your muse.

Your Turn to Journal

A prompt is just that—something to prompt you. Where you go from there? That’s wide open.

The Joy of Writing Journal: Spark Your Creativity in 8 Minutes a Day

As I mentioned yesterday, when I wrote The Joy of Writing Journal, I intended to help spark my readers’ creativity. I went for a light touch, focusing on qualities like playful, quirky and fun. But sometimes a prompt provokes a more intense exploration.

Today’s prompt may inspire a deep dive for you too, or it may just as likely bring up a long held desire to visit some exotic or beautiful land. Or perhaps the land of your ancestors! Maybe it will inspire your next vacation!

Where does today’s prompt lead you? Share an excerpt or any surprises, insights or delights that arose when you journaled today.

Day 11: October Journaling Adventure with The Joy of Writing Journal

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Today’s prompt stirs memories of my cousin’s bar mitzvah—all the ancient relatives from my dad’s side that I’ve never met before, or met once or twice. I’m eight or eleven and confused by all these seeming strangers.

Stella Andre

I feel particularly embarrassed when Grandma Stella sings. Her intense emotion makes Barbara Streisand seem tame...

…Now that I’m older, I’ve begun to appreciate what Stella must have gone through on her journey to America—the pogroms she survived, the exodus portrayed in Fiddler on the Roof. Only, in the real life exodus people stumble along the way. As a young girl, did she have to step over bodies to keep going?

Her singing provided a way to express her pain. I think the root of my own shame is in the pain she expressed. As if I wanted to stop her and say, “No. It’s too much.”

The Joy of Writing Journal: Spark Your Creativity in 8 Minutes a Day

When I wrote The Joy of Writing Journal, I intended to help spark my readers’ creativity. I went for a light touch, focusing on qualities like playful, quirky and fun.

But when we immerse ourselves in writing—be it journaling or other creative writing—we cheat ourselves if we try to control our emotions and remain in a comfort zone emotionally.

There’s power in exploring our shame and other uncomfortable emotions. Often, when we allow ourselves to feel and explore these emotions, we discover a certain freedom, and insights we would not have experienced had we stayed comfy and safe.

Your Turn

When you give yourself “permission to be bold” where does it take you? What did you write about today? Share a snippet or some of your experience in writing today. Or even post a video of you reading some or all of your entry!

Day 10: October Journaling Adventure with The Joy of Writing Journal

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I love to write in the morning but it’s rare that I wake pre-dawn. Today’s prompt reminds me of a particular summer morning before or after ninth grade when I woke particularly early. While everyone else slept, I wrote in my journal.

I lay in bed in our old Victorian New Brunswick summer house along the Fundy coast.

This is the house and my old bedroom is to the left of the cupola.

I woke to the shifting colors of pre-dawn—dark purples and blues turning to fiery orange. Then the sun rose over Fundy Bay and Nova Scotia on the opposite shore.

I wrote three or four poems that morning, entering the ecstatic state that writing (or creativity) sometimes brings—a feeling of elation, in harmony with myself and the world….

Writing integrates me. It makes me feel whole and holy. The greatest gift I can give myself is time to write.

The Joy of Writing Journal: Spark Your Creativity in 8 Minutes a Day

Your Turn

Do you have a special time to write?

Feel free to share a memory of writing at a special time of day when creativity flowed for you. How did it feel?

Day 9: October Journaling Adventure with The Joy of Writing Journal

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I made my list of quirky character traits for Day 9 after writing in my dream journal and felt utterly uninspired to turn my traits into actual characaters.

Lisa Tener Joy of Writing Journal

Or maybe just resistant. I hadn’t attempted fiction in ages. Or maybe I just wasn’t ready…

Who am I to judge myself? Or anyone, for that matter.

A day later, I looked over my list. Twice. Maybe I’ll start with a character who sings off key. Only when I imagined my character she sang in a beautiful, haunting voice. Then I remembered another trait from my list—communicating with fairies. After that, my sprightly story wrote itself.

The Joy of Writing Journal: Spark Your Creativity in 8 Minutes a Day

Your turn.

List some quirky character traits. Then pick a few for your character(s) and start playing.

Share a snippet or share something about your experience, as I did.

Remember, we’re just playing in our journals, no need to polish anything you share. This is just for FUN, to get our writing muscles working, to cultivate a sense of play and to experience writing in a supportive community.

Of course, if and when you stumble upon delight…that’s a gift, too.

Day 8: October Journaling Adventure with The Joy of Writing Journal

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Today’s meditation “Explore Your Inner Garden” came to me during a writing retreat at Kripalu Yoga and Conference Center. I was working on another book (the one I plan to publish next) and the whole garden metaphor came up as an inner landscape we can use to tap into our creativity and explore at will.

When the idea for The Joy of Writing Journal came up, I stole my own idea and put it in this book first.

Photo by Jernej Graj on Unsplash

Here’s a snippet of my exploration:

I immerse myself in the center of the pond…Drenched, I feel the water within me resonate with the pond water, as if all the crazy energy of being a human in a modern world dissipates and the water within me takes on the freshness and aliveness of the pond.

Your Turn

joy of writing journal

Listen to today’s meditation and root around in your own inner landscape.

Then write! Does the inner journey spark anything in your other creative projects or a writing piece you’ve been working on?

Share a snippet from your writing, if you like. Remember, we’re not editing or polishing, we’re delighting in the rough and tumble of the journal. So allow yourself to share something brambly and unfinished.

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