Word of the Week: question
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The scientist is not a person who gives the right answers,
he is one who asks the right questions.
~ Claude Levi-StraussDear
,
Happy New Year! I hope you are already loving 2013! What are you dreaming up to make it a joy-filled, fulfilling year?
This year, instead of making my usual list of resolutions, or even going with the word-of-the-year tool of my business mentor Christine Kane's that I got so much value from last year,
I'm switching gears: I've formulated a question to, as poet Rainer Maria Rilke suggests, "love" and "live now" all year. (See his quote from Letter Four of Letters to a Young Poet below.) And might I suggest that you do the same? (See this week's writing prompt for more on this.)
After all, we writers have something in common with scientists -- we too understand the power and possibility that dwells in a well-executed question.
I first learned the value of questions from my big brother Mike, pictured here in January of 2007 with me and our dad in Hawaii, where I got to help a bit with measurements for some forestry research Mike was doing there. (He and his wife were both on the team of Colorado scientists who won the Nobel Peace Prize for their work on global climate change -- you bet I'm proud!)
But before that, back when I was a kid, Dr. Michael G. Ryan was just my adored big brother who loved to ask questions like, "How sick will Maureen get if I trick her into eating the cyanide-ridden inside of a peach pit that happens to look like an almond?" and "Will rubbing sausage grease all over the suitcase Maureen is taking to Girl Scout camp lure any wild animals into her tent?"
I not only survived his early scientific experiments, I learned that his imaginative questions made for some interesting stories! And I went on to notice that the books I love the most are those in which the author was writing, not to pontificate or enlighten, but to explore,
ponder, delve, probe, investigate, challenge, ask... in a word, question.
For example, in her memoir An American Childhood, Annie Dillard writes of running down Pittsburgh's Penn Avenue sidewalk "full tilt" when she's ten years old, testing her belief that, "with faith, all things are possible." Could she possibly really fly?
It's a gorgeous piece of writing. I can feel my own arms waving "ever higher and faster" as I read it. Hearing how she'd "once tried to heist a five-pound
box of chocolates, a Whitman sampler," because she had confused "sampler" with "free sample" made me smile. But it is the questions she asks -- "For what were the people on Penn Avenue to me, or what was I to myself, really, but a witness to any boldness I could muster...?" and "What's a heart for?" -- that make her words
resonate. In fact, "What's a heart for?" is one of my all-time favorite questions, one that has often led me to be a bit more generous, more forgiving, or more adventurous. Maybe you'd like to choose it as a question to ask in 2013? (I'll divulge mine on www.facebook.com/wordplaynow sometime this week, so come visit if you're curious.) I'm also going to be posing some questions and posting some ways to use questions as powerful tools in your own writing.
Love and light,
Maureen
Upcoming WordPlay
THE FIRST EVER WordPlay "STEP INTO YOUR WRITING DREAMS" COACHING PROGRAM (Fulfilling Writing Dreams & Goals; Creating New Writing; Revising & Polishing Your Writing)
I'm so excited to be able to provide you, through an exciting new venue, with the same tools, strategies, and mindsets I've used to help my private clients "birth" books and other writing projects into the world! Here's what you'll get to support you in moving past that nasty, critical internal critic and bringing your writing dreams to life:
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Six weekly training/coaching teleclasses you can participate in via phone, web, and/or replay
a weekly laser-focused writer's craft lesson (our topics are voice, character, dialogue, setting, timeline, plot) - A weekly laser-focused "banish" lesson (our accesses to banishing writer's block are belief, action, inspiration, intention, support, and habit)
- Several live critique walk-throughs to model how you can revise your own writing (and how to give useful feedback to others as well)
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The opportunity to ask questions and/or request solutions for your writing challenges (via phone and/or webmail)
- Six weeks of "week-daily" coaching/writing lessons (presented in audio and written form)
- A private online group location where you can share writing questions, wisdom, and advice with your fellow participants
WHERE:
The comfort of your own home
WHEN: January 14th through February 18th, 2013
(The six training/coaching teleclasses you can participate in via phone, web, and/or replay are 7 to 9 pm, Mondays (or at your convenience, as these will be recorded)
TO REGISTER:
Click here to download a printable registration form to mail in. Or register online via PayPal or with a credit card by clicking:
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=RD3WZ6PEZ9AES
(Or paste into your web browser.)
For details about more 2013 offerings, visit www.wordplaynow.com/current.htm.
Here are a few to whet your writing appetite:
GIFT OF MEMOIR (Preserving Family History through Personal and Family Stories). $207 for 7 sessions includes handouts and an audio recording of all classes.
WHERE: 1000 East Morehead St., Charlotte, 28204.
WHEN:
January 17, 31, February 14, March 7, 28, April 11, 25, 10:00 am - noon.
TO REGISTER: Click here to download a printable registration form to mail in.
Or register online via PayPal or with a credit card by clicking:
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=UPZ9UC7QAV6HW
(Or paste into your web browser.)
UNDER CONSTRUCTION (Fulfilling Writing Dreams & Goals; Creating New Writing; Revising & Polishing Your Writing) $397 for 12 sessions of inspiration, support, and feedback on your writing project. Top of Form
WHERE: 1000 East Morehead St., Charlotte, 28204.
WHEN:
Thursdays, 7- 9 pm, January 17 - April 25, 2013 (No class on February 7, 28 or March 21).
TO REGISTER: Click here to download a printable registration form to mail in.
Or register online via PayPal or with a credit card by clicking:
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=LD26F7KU4ERQG
(Or paste into your web browser.)
EVERYTHING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT POETRY (But Were Afraid to Ask)
(Poetry Knowledge, Tools and Techniques). Introductory price of $97 includes a toolkit with 21 poetry-building tools!
WHERE: South Charlotte area. Details will be provided upon registration.
WHEN: Wednesdays, January 23, January 30, and February 20, 7:00 - 9:00 pm.
TO REGISTER:
Click here to download a printable registration form to mail in. Or register online via PayPal or with a credit card by clicking:
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=66WGQ54T9J3YJ
(Or paste into your web browser.)
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Featured Quote
An Excerpt from Letters to a Young Poet
by Rainer Maria Rilke
...I want to beg you, as much as I can, to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves -- like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given to you because you would not be able to live them. The point is, to live everything. Live the questions now.
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
WordPlay Now! Writing Prompt
This is WordPlay -- so why not revel in the power and potential of one good word after another? This week, it's "question."
Whether or not you are interested in creating a question to "love" and "live now" in 2013, try this deceptively simple exercise I first saw in Michael J. Gelb's book, How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci: Seven Steps to Genius Every Day --
give yourself an uninterrupted thirty minutes to an hour of time to generate 100 questions. These can be whos, wheres, whens, whys, or hows about anything -- yourself, others, life, and or anything in it. Questions about writing projects can be very useful too. Your questions can be playful, profound, provocative, or any combination of the three.
Once you've generated your questions, read back through them and put stars next to the ones that you feel excited about exploring. Is there one that you can keep asking, that seems full of possibility, that offers clarity, grace, and/or mystery? If so, you've found your 2013 question to ask!
O
Want to be featured in a future Word-zine?
S
end in a piece of your writing that you think could inspire other WordPlayers to write. 500-word limit, please.) You can send something inspired by this writing, or anything else of your choosing. Email your words to WordPlay here and your piece may be chosen for a future Word-zine.
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MAUREEN RYAN GRIFFIN, an award-winning poetry and nonfiction writer, is the author of Spinning Words into Gold, a Hands-On Guide to the Craft of Writing, a grief workbook entitled I Will Never Forget You, and two collections of poetry, This Scatter of Blossoms and
When the Leaves Are in the Water. She believes, as author Julia Cameron says, "We are meant to midwife dreams for one another."
Maureen also believes that serious "word work" requires serious WordPlay, as play is how we humans best learn -- and perform. What she loves best is witnessing all the other dreams that come true for her clients along the way. Language, when used with intentionality and focus, is, after all, serious fuel for joy. Here's to yours! 
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