by Laurie Wagner | Mar 29, 2017 | Blog
“Oh mom, you’re going to be fine.” That’s my 21-year-old responding to me this morning on Facetime when I told her that I was flipping out about my brand new 5-month Wild Writing Teacher Training, which starts in one week. “You got this,” she said, rolling her eyes, and moving on to things more pressing, like “look how my skin is clearing up,” she says, bringing the Iphone up against her forehead so I can see every pore on her sweet little face. She’s right. I could teach the training this very minute, even if I’d gotten no sleep, hadn’t put my contacts in, had shown up with bed head, not enough coffee, no notes, and had forgotten to put on my pants. I mean, I’ve been doing this work for 25 years. It’s in my bones. But apparently, so is anxiety and perfectionism because I seem to need to go through a sickening amount of grief before I can swim like a brave little fish into new waters. Will the students be happy? Is there enough content to warrant a real training? Will my brain go blank in the middle of teaching and I’ll forget what I’m talking about? Can I really help these good people become Wild Writing teachers? Will they get their money’s worth? Is the coffee strong enough? Should I have gotten more chocolate? Nothing like a good dose of perfectionism mixed with the fear of humiliation to keep me awake at night. Not only that, but this anxiety has had me stay as close to home as I could these last few months, begging...
by Laurie Wagner | Dec 14, 2016 | Blog
Readers, friends, writers, artists, As straightforward as I am, there’s so much more honesty and courage inside of me angling to get out. Let 2017 be the year I pay even more attention to the tiniest of feelings – that whisper of “no” I often hear but override. Here are my Notes to Self for 2017. Just because “I can,” doesn’t mean “I should.” I’m tired of being nice. It’s exhausting, That’s not to say I’m not a good person – I am – but I’m more interested in getting better acquainted with my fierceness. “No” is my word for 2017. You can help me practice by asking me for things. If I say yes, cock your head and ask me one more time. If I say no, kiss me. Sometimes I say yes, and then an hour later I realize I meant no. Note to self: Don’t be afraid to change my mind. I’m not a flake, it’s just that my internal listening after 56-years of not listening so well is a little fuzzy. Every time I have the courage to have a difficult conversation with someone ten pounds are taken off my shoulders. It turns out that getting people mad at me doesn’t kill me. My propensity to be helpful often occurs because I’m uncomfortable being with people who are unhappy. They make me nervous. Like, unless I try and fix them they might kill me. Note to self: Let unhappy people be unhappy. Sadness is a path too. The big problem with my beautiful 21-year-old daughter and her lack of plans after graduation from college is me,...
by Laurie Wagner | Nov 30, 2016 | Blog
In the days since the election, since the great dismantling, I haven’t had a clue how to approach the business of selling my writing classes. At first it just felt too smarmy to put a picture of myself on Facebook with a note about the January 2017 teaching schedule. It felt wrong, indecent. How could I possibly want to turn the conversation back to me and my work when we’d just given the keys to the castle to the swamp monster? At the same time, it was selling season – that’s what I call it – the month or so before new classes go live – and I’d need to let people know the schedule so they could sign up. This is how I spread the good word about Wild Writing and the other writing adventures I’m a part of. This is how I make my living. But Trump had won, the world had changed, so I lay low and joined the bigger, more essential conversation about how the hell Trump happened and what we were going to do about him. For the last month I’ve been across the world in Bali, teaching, but there was so much to read and so much to learn, and for days, most of my free time was spent reading editorials and stories and trying to get a handle on the situation. For a few days the internet was on fire with intelligence and energy. It felt like the world was having the same vital conversation, and maybe because I’m so far from home, I latched onto every word I could read. While...
