How to Get Nuggets Out of Your Noggin

First, a word about inspiration. I once believed I had all the time in the world to amaze and amuse myself and others. But that was long ago. I soon learned there are two approaches to inspiration.

Option A: wait for a bolt of brilliance to strike one unaware, or
Option B: make a practice of heightening one’s awareness so that wherever one goes, one is inspired by absolutely everything.

Option B is the same program we’re actively pursuing at ages two, three , and four – all quivering with wonder, because every single thing we see and feel is utterly fresh! So which approach – (a) or (b) – do I recommend? . . . You bet!

“I love smooth words, like gold-enameled fish
Which circle slowly with a silken swish.”

--Elinor Wylie, from “Pretty Words”

High awareness
Not that kind! Geez. Heightening one’s awareness in the way that I’m talking about, well, it just doesn’t happen overnight. In our book Writing from the Body, John Lee and I waxed philosophical, poetic, and wildly passionate about the kind of attentiveness – body, mind, and soul – that allows a writer or the artist entrance into the hallowed halls of inspiration. Inspiration is a kind of mystical experience, and for that reason I put down my peanut butter sandwich and bow in the direction of the public library whenever I speak of it. How to come by this heightened awarenss that fuels inspiration?

Try this right now.
Stand up straight wherever you are, breathe deeply, and find something interesting in the room. Anything . . . the warm curve of a cup. Light reflected off a painted windowsill. On the floor, a stray computer wire forming a jagged hieroglyphic. Whatever you land on, focus on it. Keep watching until it becomes something else. The door handle curves and dances itself into a 1920s flapper gal who kicks up a little fringe-tossing flip of her skirt. The light on the windowsill begins to effervesce like Alka-Seltzer until out of the mist steps a critter from Planet Wynot with a message for all humankind. Meanwhile, on your desk, the circle of jagged wire evokes a child’s game of marbles: Shoot! Missed it . . . Line ‘em up again, Skeeter!

And that’s how it happens.
You begin by breathing deeply, and becoming aware. Follow a flight of fancy and it’s liable to take you clear to . . . Inspiration. Where truth spills out of innocent doors and windows like nobody’s business. And it is. Nobody’s but your own. Should you decide to share the wealth, remain aware. For as my Uncle Opie often says, once a nugget leaves your noggin, it gains the power to perform alchemy upon itself. Once it burns down to a fine glow, it may even become a good book. And that’s pure gold.

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<$Writers: How to Get Nuggets Out of Your Noggin$>
<$Two approaches to inspiration: (a) the bolt of brilliance and (b)the practice of heightening one’s awareness so that one is inspired by absolutely everything.$>