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Keeping your Midlife Mojo

5/31/2018

Mojo
(definition)
1. An amulet, charm, or magic spell
2. The art of casting magic spells
3. Uncanny personal power or influence

We all know someone who, despite being older, still has it. Not the desperate, trying to cling to a lost youth persona, but genuinely attractive, super interesting charisma, the whole package type of magic.

Mojo. The people who have it exude chemistry, intrigue, and a sense of adventure. No matter their age, they still turn heads--and say ‘thank you’ for the attention. They seem timeless, or at least relatively unscathed by the passing years, and, in some cases, even seem to get better with age. The relaxed confidence that comes from knowing yourself can be a very powerful aphrodisiac.

Do you feel like your mojo is dead, gone, that it has packed its bags, checked out of your condo, and headed alone to Bermuda? Well, think again.

Your mojo is still here, waiting for you to pay it some sweet attention. Seriously. Your dynamic, inspired, hot to trot self is hiding away, sleeping. Do you want to reactivate it? Sure, you say. But how? Here are some ideas:

Get a fun hobby
Having fun is intoxicating. Laughing brightens your face and causes feel-good chemicals to rush around inside. The glow of enthusiasm, the twinkle in your eyes, the unity that happens when you have something in common with others, is gooey like caramel. It helps you stick together with others, and it is easy to enjoy. Being around others while you are doing something you are passionate about feels awesome. And, it is very sexy. Sexy is fun. Get a fun hobby.

Start with one small win.
If you let yourself think you'll never be able to win again, you're setting yourself up for the very failure you fear. It's easy to feel overwhelmed when you're trying to reverse your mindset, so try focusing on doing small things well. You don't have to take on the world--just complete one small task with focus and excellence. That small win can help restore your confidence. And if you repeat it, again and again, one step at a time, suddenly you will have managed what may have felt unmanageable.

Shift your Perspective. Sometimes you may feel like you're stuck in cement. Nothing you try seems to work. Stop! Have you been trying new things, or just variations on the same things that you already know don't work? To shift your perspective and regain your mojo, try doing old things in new ways. And that means changing the way you look at things. Changing your view and your perspective can help you find new solutions and new confidence.

Talk Positive.
Sometimes we can be our own worst enemy. Especially when you're down, you may judge yourself harshly and speak internally to yourself in terrible ways that you'd never use with anyone else. You can reverse abusive self-talk with the SOS technique:

Stop and take a breath--this gives you an opportunity to interrupt the cycle.
Observe what you're saying to yourself and how it makes you feel.
Shift your response.

Do something that goes against your character
Maybe it’s staying in bed all day with a good book, sumptuously scented tea, and a cat. Maybe it’s flirting with a good looking stranger while you’re out with friends. Maybe it’s jumping off a mountain or doing stand-up comedy. Do something that gets you focused on pleasure, on abandon, and about relishing your life.

Give yourself a standing O
You are phenomenal. You are interesting. You are magnificent. You are amazing. You are beautiful. You are so smart. You are important.
Does all this complimenting embarrass you? If so, it is time to give yourself a standing O…a standing ovation, that is.

The shift in your mojo, once you decide you are truly worthwhile, is huge. You are like no other person on this earth, which makes you priceless. But do you realize it? Do you admit your value and contribution? Do you celebrate your wins? You should, because you deserve it.

Getting comfortable with idea that you matter is essential. Take the time to give yourself a standing O.

Only listen to the people who count--then listen to them carefully
You don’t have the time or the energy to listen to opinions of idiots. That’s one joy of getting older—the number of people whose opinions really, really matter has dwindled to maybe 10. These are the people who know you the best, love you the most. They are the ones who will also tell the truth, and knock you on the side of the head when you’re out of line. You’ve learned through the years of experience who they are. Cherish them and listen to their words carefully.

Live Meaningfully
The trouble with the career advice we receive as young people is that it revolves around the question ‘What do you want to do when you grow up?’

A more authentic decision might be about what kind of person you hope to be. Many people, once they have a solid amount of life experiences, learn (the hard way or not) that the most important thing in your life is who you are, not what you do.

The answer, I believe, is like so many of the most important truths in life. It’s a matter of contemplating potentially conflicting ideas in your mind at the same time: knowing, doing and being. And then, resolving those conflicts keeping your main focus--what will your best self do?—uppermost in your mind.

If you’re living meaningfully, you will remain vital and inspired, no matter your age. You won’t look back with regret, or fear death in the future, because, quite simply, you are living as your best self. So get off your ass and do something. Improve the environment, improve something somewhere in the world. Help the people you love the most. And help yourself to be the person you wanted to be when you received that career advice at graduation.

And if you lose track of the meaning…

Re-Focus on your Mission, not your obligations. If you get caught up in a cycle of obligations but shut off from your own positive forces, you can lose touch with what drives you, and you may find yourself trudging through the day. If that happens, it's time to stop and focus on your mission. Why are you doing what you do? What's the motivation, the drive, the passion, behind everything you're doing? If you can find your mission, you'll get back your motivation, and if you get back your motivation you will find your confidence.

You have mojo. Reactivating it will enliven your creative life. Try the above suggestions for a week and see what happens. You will be amazed at what small incremental changes can have on how you feel.

Now go and be awesome!

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see you next week

5/19/2018

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It's getting hot in Phoenix (above 100 degrees), which always gives me the itch to visit our mountain cabin.

Paul has already put in his garden there. Sigh. At least I still have killer tomatoes here, despite the heat.

I haven't seen Woody or Teak or Sadie (not pictured) for two weeks, and I can't wait to start up our daily walks in the forest.

I miss this guy, Shadow Moon, and his brother Salem also. So much.

No doubt, as soon as I spread out my manuscript papers, Shadow will be on top of them "helping" me.

While I'm stuck in Phoenix feeling nostalgic... Good reading and writing!

See you next Friday.

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Cherry Adair Workshop

5/12/2018

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So excited! I’m off to Reno again, this time to participate in a writer’s workshop led by romantic suspense author Cherry Adair.

I haven’t met Cherry personally yet, but I’m already a fan of her Cutter Kay and Lodestone series. Plus, for the last year I’ve participated in her Finish the Damn Book contest. You commit to finishing your book in a year. She picks a winner from a random drawing of finishers, then introduces him or her to her editor and publisher.

Throughout the year, she gives us pep talks, organizes writing sprints with us, and even volunteers periodically to read and critique pages from your work in progress. The support this woman gives to the writing community is amazing!

This year, I budgeted to finally attend Cherry’s Master Writing Class, held in conjunction with the Romantic Times conference, and meet her in person.

One of her past attendees says, “If you want to learn how to plot, and plot FAST you need to spend time with Cherry. Take her master class. It’s the best thing you can do to jump start your actual writing process.”

I’ve been writing for year, and I’ve taken way too many writing courses. But Cherry’s system is touted as a no B.S., sit-down-and-do it, finish the damn book. It sounds like exactly what I need. She has a patented method to plot your entire book, using a large display board and colored post-it notes.

I’m looking forward to tackling Book Two in my Ancient Magic series, surrounded by other writers willing to help fill in everyone’s plot holes, as we all listen to Cherry’s unedited tips/tricks/strategies.

She said to bring everything I have about the book I want to plot, those scraps of paper with story and character ideas. I’ll come home with a “fabulous, intricately plotted book. Whoopie!

“I loathe writing first drafts,” she says. “To me it’s like wading through wet cement, and it takes me forever because there’s always something I’d rather be doing. Which is why I stopped writing by the seat of my pants very early in my career and came up with my plotting by color method. Now the map of my story is easy to follow and relatively painless. Once that first draft is done, it’s another story. I can’t be torn away from my computer. I go back and layer and texture, polish, tweak, and fluff!

She’s now the author of forty-plus books, so I want to do what she’d doing!

I’m already a plotter, but I can’t wait to learn how to do it faster, and with a plan and structure that will work book after book. Yes, I already know to include an opening hook, a Black Moment, scene goals. But I’ve heard her “9 P’s of Plotting” handout is an eye-opener that will have you planning your book actions with more authority.

Like another favorite teacher of mine, Margie Lawson, Cherry writes everything in color. Backstory is blue, so it’s easy to parcel it into the book in tiny increments. She says that dialogue interweaved with narrative is good, as narrative backstory slows the story down. But—this hadn’t occurred to me—you can do these sections all in narrative to begin with, and then rework most of it into dialog during revisions. Eureka!

She says while you’re writing you should always have open a “snips folder,” Master document and/or Story Bible, and your manuscript. I don’t know exactly what those are, but I’m looking forward to finding out.

She also says you don’t strictly have to write only what you know personally. She likes writing about Venezuela, Egypt and diving, for example, even though she has no desire to learn to dive. And she’s been known to have her students build their characters from Linda Goodman’s Sun Signs. Hey, I’m game. Think I’ll take a deck of Tarot cards for character traits also.

We visited Scotland last year so I could research this next book first-hand, but I feel like there is so much to learn about the Paleolithic sites there that I’m going to get bogged down for months trying to research it all.

For Cherry, research is green. I’m hoping her workshop will help me drill down to the most important places and people, and then be able to slap on those green sticky notes without guilt.

Cherry also talks about good characters, bad ones, and gives special emphasis to the “grey” ones. I have a lot of grey characters, including my male protagonist, Nicholas Orenda. Even without hearing what she has to say, it’s nice to know she acknowledges those people who live on the edge of good and evil (think Severus Snape). I’ve gotten dinged in a few reviews on the first book, Song of the Ancients, because those readers couldn’t understand why Samantha would fall in love with a man like Nicholas. In my humble opinion, ladies, we fall for the Nicholas’s of the world a LOT. And, just like in the series, we often suffer the consequences. But that’s life—it’s not black and white. It’s primarily shades of grey, and the trick is to figure out where we’re going to shove our moral stake in the ground and stand firm.
She also suggests watching movies to see where the beats are, preferably movies you know well. Watch the clock to spot the beats and you’ll be able to translate that timing into your own writing.

“I love, love teaching everything I‘ve learned about writing over the years to other authors,” Cherry says. “It gives me such a kick to see the OMG! look in someone’s eyes a second before their head goes down, their fingers fly as they write or type at lightning speed. I know that whatever I just said resonated, and she’s no longer even in the same room, but off applying it to her own story oblivious to everyone around her. I know what that feels like, and I want the students/writers in my classes to have that ah-ha moment every time I teach the craft of writing.”

Now, you’ll have to excuse me—I need to get to Reno to play in my stack of brightly colored sticky notes—and hopefully come back with the full outline of a new book!

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Rammed Earth Revival

5/3/2018

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This week, I was the lucky recipient of a rammed-earth bench in my backyard.

You may recall, a few weeks back I posted pictures of our backyard beautification-in-progress project.

Soon after, I got a text from two Arizona State University landscape architecture students. One of them, Perry, had been here to attend the Wendy Rule concert last winter, and friended me on Facebook afterwards. When she saw my backyard posts, she asked if she and her partner could use our yard to complete their senior landscape project, a rammed earth bench or wall.

Rammed earth walls are constructed by mixing soil, lime and a small amount of cement as a stabilizer, and ramming it into place between flat panels called formwork. Thousands of years ago, workers would ram the end of a wooden pole into the earth mixture to compress it. The girls used a tamper, about a foot square of metal attached to a pole. Hard work!

When the formwork was removed, we had a compressed earth wall.

The color of a rammed earth wall is determined by the earth and aggregate used.

The ramming process proceeds layer by layer, which produces interesting horizontal stratification to the wall. Sometimes the layers are subtle, such a the ones in our bench. Sometimes they can be purposely dramatic, by using varying soil and aggregates.

Special effects can be created by the addition of different colored material in some layers, and elements such as feature stones or objects, alcoves or relief moldings can be incorporated into the wall.

While we didn’t added colored materials or stones to the rammed earth base of our bench, the girls cemented on a beautiful Sedona-red flagstone top.

Rammed earth is very strong in compression and can be used for multi-story load bearing construction. Research in New Zealand indicates that monolithic earth walls perform better under earthquake conditions. Because there are no flammable components, it is also fire resistant. And because there is no cavity to harbor vermin and nothing in the material to attract or support them, resistance to vermin attack (including termites) is very high.

Because rammed earth is porous by nature, a water repellant coating is often applied after the structure has “cured” and dried for several days. The girls will be back to paint our bench with a water repellant next week.

Evidence of ancient use of rammed earth has been found in Neolithic archaeological sites in China dating back to 5000 BC. Parts of the Great Wall of China were constructed using rammed earth technique and are still standing more than 2,000 years later.
After the U.S. Department of Agriculture issued instructions for how to build a rammed earth home in 1926, they became popular with poor farmers during the Depression. The method faded away after World War II.

But the technique is coming back into more favor today, as builders look for more sustainable and environmentally friendly building techniques that will not contribute to deforestation and greenhouse emissions.

In my opinion, it is a stunning natural element that adds to the beauty of your home.

Thank you, Perry and Mariah, for adding a beautiful and earth-conscious element to our back yard. I hope you both receive an “A” on your final for this project!

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Hollow Bones

Keeping your Midlife Mojo

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Cherry Adair Workshop

Rammed Earth Revival

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