when I talk about a writing life, I'm talking about a life in which writing is the dominant response to living.

When we clear the physical clutter from our lives, we literally make way for inspiration and 'good, orderly direction' to enter.

In order to have a real relationship with our creativity, we must take the time and care to cultivate it.

Creativity flourishes when we have a sense of safety and self-acceptance.

Here's what I like about God: Trees are crooked, mountains are lumpy, a lot of his creatures are funny looking, and he made it all anyway. He didn't let the aardvark convince him he had no business designing creatures. He didn't make a puffer fish and get discouraged, no, the maker made things - and still does.

If you think of the universe as a vast electrical sea in which you are immersed and from which you are formed, opening to your creativity changes you from something bobbing in that sea to a more fully functioning, more conscious, more cooperative part of that ecosystem.

As artists, we belong to an ancient and holy tribe. We are the carriers of the truth that spirit moves through us all. When we deal with one another, we are dealing not merely with our own human personalities but also with the unseen but ever-present throng of ideas, visions, stories, poems, songs, sculptures, art-as-facts that crowd the temple of consciousness waiting their turn to be born.