Today’s post is probably going to get hokey-pokey pretty fast, so this is your fair warning.

This phrase is on my mind: “Travel lightly and deeply.”

I’m currently reading If You Feel too Much by Jamie Tworkowski, which is where I read these words for the first time. I couldn’t quite let them go once I’d read them. Not in a stuck-in-my-head kind of way, but in a I-need-this-idea way.

Sometimes I need someone else’s words to sum up what I’m feeling before I can ever fully explain it myself. Sometimes, other people’s words are a bridge to understanding myself as much as my own words are a bridge to understanding myself. One of the reasons I write is to be understood and known. That’s always been the appeal to me, and that’s why I know I make so much more sense on paper. I use books to understand others, and I use writing to understand myself and be understood.

When I speak audibly, I almost always fail at expression. It takes hours of thinking over a subject and rehearsing my own made up lines in my head to explain myself coherently to anyone else. During the last few years, I’ve put a lot less effort into that preparation because it’s exhausting. Do I really want to spend my life in that limbo when it’s so much easier just to make myself known on paper? Time is too precious.

All of the above feels necessary to say, but it also feels so necessary to look at that sentence more closely. The line, “Travel lightly and deeply.” speaks to me, but it also sounds like a dream, something to aspire to. It’s hard to imagine that it could be something I start doing today without preparation, but there’s a part of me that thinks it’s supposed to be that simple. I have a tendency to over complicate things, and I have a suspicion that, while this phrase holds a lot of weight, it may not take that much dissecting to understand.

Travel lightly: my first thought in response to these words is that I should give away all my belongs and only hold on to the few things that are near and dear to me, but I think this phrase means something much deeper (and who knows why I have this fascination with getting rid of things. That idea seems to glom onto any even remotely philosophical idea even have.) “Travel lightly” on a deeper level means “lay down your burdens.” Let it go. I struggle with this. I like to hold on to things, especially negative energy, and it’s so bad for me. I still do it. I hate the idea of laying down a thought before it’s fully processed. Before it is dissected, and understood, and mined for its value. But that thinking relies on a falsehood - you don’t learn from bad circumstances by dwelling on them. You learn by accepting them and staying open to learning. I’ve never once learned anything while I was angry about my situation and riling up my attitude every five minutes because I’m prideful and was born with a chip on my shoulder. Traveling lightly, in short, is about accepting life as it is while knowing that brightness and light are in even the bad places.

Travel deeply: give importance to meaning. Whatever is meaningful and good to me is what I should dwell on. Dive in, and experience life in whatever way I think will uncover meaning for me. Obviously, I wouldn’t encourage anyone to do something damaging just for the sake of experience, but by definition we’re talking about making our lives better here, so maybe that goes without saying. That word “deeply” just strikes me so much as the meat of life, the purpose. I don’t believe any of us were made shallow. The spiritual part of us that I believe in creates too vast an expanse within ourselves for me to ever think anyone is incapable of depth. The deep, inner part of our lives is one of the most meaningful aspects of human life, and it’s where meaning itself is derived. We go into our deep, inner space when we think about what’s meaningful to us. We’re in our deep space when we’re acting out our passions and being intentional with our lives. That deep space is critical, and we should not neglect time spent with it. I want to learn to be alone with my thoughts a little more often. I want to learn that I don’t have to chase the next idea, the next thought, the next piece of media to consume just to make sure I’m moving forward or not bored. I don’t have to always be moving forward. There is a time and a place to sit, be quiet, and look back.

This is the part when I realize the yin and yang of this whole idea: to go lightly and to go deeply through life are in some ways opposites, but married together they mean so much more. Their meanings rely on each other. You can’t truly go lightly without digging in and learning from the past because it’s necessary for acceptance, and there is no use in sitting down to contemplate the past if you don’t stand up and leave the burden on the floor, going lightly away from that place. A yin. A yang.

These are just some thoughts that are on my mind today. I hope you can find some kind of meaning in them. I hope you’re encouraged or inspired or thoughtful after reading them, but no matter what, just know that your life matters and you can make it matter to you. Keep your perspective on the light and the deep and reach out to others when you need to.

If you have thoughts, please share them in the comments, as always. Thanks for reading this far.

It can be difficult to find literary journals to submit your writing when you're first starting out in the publishing process, and it can be just as hard when you've been submitting for a while and feel as if you've exhausted your options. I want to share a quick list of places you can send your poetry. These journals either have cheap reading fees or no fees at all and accept submissions year round. I've written posts like this before that focused on literary journals and magazines that accept submissions from multiple genres, but today, I wanted to do a post specifically for the poets out there looking for places to submit. Let me know in the comments where you've submitted your writing lately, or whether you're just starting the journey to publication! 

Asks for 3-5 poems. Looking for, “… unpublished poetry that demonstrates originality, intelligence, courage, irreverence, and humanity.” $3 fee. Submissions accepted year-round. ​

I just got 2 rejection letters within five days of submitting to the journals. I received those letters within a week of each other. ​

Usually submission responses take several weeks or months to receive, so when you get a rejection letter within a few days, it can catch you off guard. I worked on my university’s lit journal for a semester, so I know that it’s easy to quickly read a submission and make a quick decision about whether it belongs in your journal or not, but it still stings (a lot). There’s nothing menacing about it. The piece works or it doesn’t. Really the only reason my teammates and I ever deliberated whether we should accept or reject a piece was because there were so many of us and doubt creeps into the decision making process when so many people with different tastes are in the same room. At the end of the day, though, I knew the pieces were either right for our journal or they weren’t. There was only so much space in our print version, so there wasn’t room to accept poems that fell in the grey area. That’s not to say that we only received a few great poems to put in the journal. We received a ton of great pieces, but they didn’t always fit the theme and feel of our journal.  
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Recently, I read Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert, and there’s a chapter that focuses on how Gilbert dealt with rejection, especially in her early years of writing. She describes using a “boomerang” technique to deal with rejections, which I have discussed in previous posts. She got the rejection letter and immediately took her manuscript out, stuck it in another envelop and sent it out to a different magazine. She did it automatically. Almost without thinking. Later in the chapter, she encourages writers to do what they need to do to deal with rejection (let themselves feel sad for a little while, get angry, whatever), but she encourages writers not to waste too much time before getting back to work, either by revising or sending their work right back out into the universe.

I’m trying to adopt this method, but so far it’s been a little more difficult than I thought. Finding places to submit to takes a while. You want to find a place that you’ll be happy to be published with and not just any old place that’s open for submissions. It also helps if your work just seems right for the magazine, either because you’ve looked into what they’ve published over time and it seems up your ally or you’ve read their about page and really feel pulled toward their publication. That process takes time, but it’s meaningful. I’ve never liked the idea of sending my work out at random where it could potentially be accepted, but not really appreciated or understood. Granted, it’s hard to know which places are going to treat your work well upfront, but knowing I have the publisher’s respect is important to me. Important in an “I’m not just random content for you to throw up on your website,” way. For that reason, I’ve been a little slow to send my work back out, but I am committed to continue. I really believe that 98% of the work you send out is going to be rejected whether it’s good or not (because, again, there’s only so much space), but you keep going so that you can see the 2% that does get published.

It’s not about accolades or recognition for me, (although to each his own). It’s honestly about having the chance to tell people a story. Storytelling, whether the medium be fiction, poetry, or nonfiction, is an art form I respect deeply and want to engage in. That’s why I keep writing despite the rejection letters, despite the negative workshop comments, despite people in my life just not getting it. I still want to be a writer, see where my stories take me, and see what readers the stories pick up along the way to enjoy the ride with me. We say that writing is so solitary, so lonely, but to me writing is all about people. You share something you worked hard on, and other people engage with your art whether it’s as an editor, or a reader of a journal, or someone reading this blog. Rejection may sting, but writing doesn’t. As difficult as starting out as a writer is, I hardly feel alone. I hope you don’t either.

Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments. Let’s encourage each other. 

When other people talk about their goals, it motivates me. Being around friends trying to change their lives has always given me a reality check. It makes me think whether I’m taking active steps toward my own goals. It helps me realize that I can do the same things my friends are doing. With that in mind, I hope my goals give you ideas or just help you stay motivated during this first month of the new year.

I learned this from Elizabeth Gilbert in her book Big Magic, although she didn’t call it a rule. She says back when she was still an unpublished writer and rejection letters came in, she took her story out of the envelope, read it over, decided whether to change it, and then resubmitted it. I appreciated the urgency she placed on getting her work back out in the world. She felt disappointed when she opened the rejection, but she didn’t wallow. She revised, then submitted her work elsewhere. As soon as a rejection comes in, I’ll send my work right back out, and, eventually, some of those letters will turn into acceptances instead of rejections.

I’ve always been on the fence about article writing. I wasn’t sure if it was my style or if I could be formal enough. This blog has made me more confident in my abilities, though, and I want to branch into writing for websites. I have a few websites on my list along with article ideas I’m drafting, My goal is to have one article submitted by the end of January.

My biggest hang up for writing fiction is plotting. I’ve researched a few books to help me, and I’d like to read those by the end of the year and maybe even draft a novel. This, funnily, is one of my more difficult goals for the year because I’m primarily a poet, not a fiction writer.

This seems like a no-brainer, but after you’ve gotten a lot of rejection letters (like we all do), it's tempting to throw your work out at random and hope it sticks. Not only is this a bad method to find magazines that are interested in the themes you’re writing on, it’s also a bad method for finding publishers who care about your work. I want the places I'm published in to give my work the right attention. My goal this year is to make sure every single place I submit to is one that I will be very proud to point at and say, “They liked my work!”

This is a rule I’ve always tried to follow, and it’s one that defends me against writer's block because it teaches me that I don’t always need the inspiration to write. This year, I’d like to continue with this rule. In the past, when I’ve gone through busier seasons of the year, it’s been easy to push writing to the side because it could wait. I don’t want to do that anymore. I want to carve out 30 minutes to an hour every day to write, even if all I can do is put a few lines down in my journal. An important part of a writer’s career is having a nice backlist of work to draw on, and I want to build mine up.
 
January can be an overwhelming time knowing that the whole year is ahead of us, but it can also be a time of happy expectation if we let ourselves dream. Those are my writing goals for 2018. Let me know what yours are!

I have a lot of favorite books, so I don’t want to write at length about why I loved them (that would probably get boring for both of us!), but I would like to give a short tidbit about why these books have stuck with me this year in case you were thinking of giving them a try and I can persuade you to give them a chance.

The Sun is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon
I read this in May, and it was the first book of the year to stop me in my tracks. The writing is beautiful, the plot is set up amazingly, and the characters really felt real to me. Some people won’t like this for its “insta-love” aspect, but in my opinion, the quick romance didn't hinder the story at all. An awesome book.

Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert
There’s a lot of great tidbits about writing in Big Magic. I’m still thinking about them months later. It can be a little hokey pokey, but I urge every writer to give it a shot anyway.

Heating & Cooling by Beth Ann Fennelly
I read this in one day. It’s short but immersive and expressive. I felt sucked in by the end of the first chapter. I will definitely be keeping this one of my shelf to share with others.

Coraline by Neil Gaiman
I like stories about brave little girls. Coraline is a gem that I actually couldn’t get into the first time I tried to read it two years ago, but recently, I read it in one sitting and found myself cheering Coraline on and empathizing with her fears.

Turtles all the way Down by John Green
I needed this book. There are a lot of valid critiques out there of John Green’s characters, but I think this book shows just how powerful his characters can be. I needed a book like this to know that I’m not alone, and I am incredibly thankful to Green for publishing it

Animal Farm by George Orwell
I read this late in the year for the first time and really enjoyed it. There’s humor, horror, and familiarity, and it all sums up to a great story.

The Subtle Art of not giving a F*ck by Mark Manson
Again, another book that I needed, full of tidbits that I will take with me. The thing I remember the most from this book is Mark urging the reader to take responsibility for their own happiness. He said something along the lines of, “even if the problem is not your fault, take responsibility for how you will respond to it.” (Paraphrase). I’m still thinking about The Subtle Art months later.

Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg
I devoured this book. I stayed up late to read it and procrastinated on work to finish it. It gave me the encouragement I was looking for and the kick in the butt that always motivates me. I’ve been telling other women (and even men) to read this book since then.

The 4 hour Work Week by Timothy Ferriss
There’s some great stuff in here, but unfortunately, the presentation just wasn’t for me. I felt like it was a one size fits all prescription for success when only 20% of it was truly applicable to all people. That doesn’t mean that Ferris doesn’t have some great insights. I believe he does. But based on my reading, there just wasn’t enough room in his ideas for people to do their own thing and do what works best for them personally.

Uglies by Scott Westerfeld
I really enjoyed the first half of Uglies, but my wave of excitement leveled out quickly. I felt the story dragged out too long. I’m not a fan of super long books unless every single paragraph is critical to the story. Otherwise, I just feel like my time is being wasted. If you like dystopian, you may still like this story anyway, but unfortunately this one wasn’t for me.

Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler
I expected to really like this book, but it got cliched fast. I hate critiquing a story as “cliche” because I think people misuse the word (especially in writing workshops, but that’s beside the point). What I mean by cliche, is that the same old problems were met with the same old solutions. High school characters were presented in stereotypical ways instead of complexly. Some old tropes of YA lit were met with resolutions that just didn’t surprise me or provide deeper insight at all. I expected more from this book; however, that doesn’t mean someone else won’t like the story.


That's the great and the bad of what I read in 2017. Are there any books you’re dying to get to this year? New genres you want to try? Did any of my favorites or least favorites surprise you? Let’s chat in the comments!