Lotus Ink Newsletter #3
December 6, 2002

Notes from the Ink of the Lotus Blossom
Trust your perception. Listen to your intuition. Tune into yourself.

What's this newsletter all about?
Readers are those who describe themselves as creative. Its mission is to help readers increase their creativity, productivity, and self-esteem.

Feel free to pass this newsletter along to a friend.

What's in this issue?
Find your creative self and become friends
Skullduggery Signings -- it all starts this weekend!



Find your creative self and become friends
This week I was researching a book on opera divas for my next mystery novel, a sequel to Skullduggery, and came across a wonderful ritual performed by Leontyne Price in "Diva: Great Sopranos and Mezzos Discuss Their Art" by Helena Matheopoulous (Northeastern University Press: 1991). Ms. Price retired from the operatic stage in 1985 and is known as one of the greatest Verdi sopranos of all time. In looking back upon her career, she tells the author, "I did something right. I took care of the most extraordinary thing I have: my voice. And [laughing], I think I've had one of the most beautiful lyric soprano voices I've ever heard. I'm mad about my voice. It was gorgeous. I loved it so much that from time to time I used to take out one of my best crystal glasses, sip a little champagne and toast it."

I loved reading that passage and ended up going back to it many times with a smile on my face. As a creativity enthusiast, I saw how we could all apply Ms. Price's ritual in our own creative lives. Many successful creatives know how to celebrate their creativity, but I'm sure these sorts of celebrations came only after they learned how to love and nurture their creativity. But wait, to love someone means you must know them intimately, which brings me to the topic of getting to know your creativity.

To discover your creative self, ask yourself "what if" questions. What if I personify my creative talent? Would it be a man or a woman? (Of course, mine would be a woman.) What would her name be? What's her personality like? What would I do with her? How would I spend time with her? And what was she like as a child?

Ahhh, the childhood---my favorite subject and how it links to our creativity. Maybe we could get to know our creative child, then "raise" her in the ideal manner so that she would grow up to be a confident and creative adult. Like all children, our "creative-self" child wants love and attention. If your "real adult" self received healthy love and attention as a child from both of your parents, this will not be a difficult exercise. However, if you were treated strictly and harshly, and with not "enough" attention, this exercise will be more difficult. It is very, very common in our society, in every country on this planet, that the needs of a child often come second to the needs of the parent. This time, let the needs of your creative child come first, before the parent's.

The concept of "enough" love is never-ending, but the bottomline is this. A child who receives "enough" love and attention will blossom and thrive. This is the goal--blossoming and thriving, not just getting by. To be creative, you must have an internal feeling of blossoming. So your creative self--the child you are now becoming acquainted with--needs "enough" love and attention to thrive and blossom. What's "enough" love and attention? It will be "enough" when the creative child begins to thrive and blossom, unfold her creativity, and move forward as a creative adult through a difficult market with confidence and high self-esteem most of the time.

If you feel frustrated that you can't give "enough" love and attention to your creative child-self, be open to the possibility that this may be linked to the amount of love and attention you received as a child from your parents. If this line of thinking feels very uncomfortable (and I've noticed that it does to many people) you don't have to dwell on it. This is common territory that many creatives explore, and it is the sort of thinking that, for some, leads to professional therapy to resolve difficult issues. I cannot overstress the beauty of loving and attentive therapy in helping to unblock your adulthood creativity when it is linked to not receiving "enough" love and attention from your parents. The loving and attentive therapy, when done well, is a balancer, an equalizer, that helps you recalibrate the uncomfortable juxtapositions of what your childhood was like and what it "should" have been like to help you blossom and thrive as a creative adult. (You many have gotten "enough" love to get by and be functional in society, but you are now raising the bar and aiming for thriving and blossoming in your creativity.)

But moving forward with this exercise, get to know your creative child self. Find a picture of yourself as a child. Is there one of you alone smiling and looking happy? That would be an excellent one to frame in one of those expensive baby frames. In my case, when I was growing up, those sorts of frames were not invented (or if they were, they were considered much too extravagant in our household), and I never had the pleasure of seeing a picture of my child-self put in that sort of a frame. As an aside, there is no one secret "thing" you can do to unblock; it is all a journey of unfoldment and experiments that accumulate, until one day, after many days, or rather years, you do feel creatively unblocked.

Set that picture somewhere special and gaze upon it with love and attention. This can be your creative self as a child. If the child in the picture didn't find the "ideal" creative path, think about why that happened. Then steer your thoughts to pointing out the "ideal" path for this child to thrive and blossom. In your imagination, let this child live it out fully and completely. Give this creative child all the opportunities and "lucky breaks" that you didn't have, for whatever reason. Put your creative child self through a variety of happy scenes that you wish you could have gone through, but couldn't, for whatever reason. Know that these imaginative journeys will have a tremendous effect on that creative child's adulthood creativity.

I believe the tendency is to downplay such journeys and call them "extravagances," yet to unfold our creativity, such imaginative journeys should be viewed upon as necessary as oxygen and food for our physical bodies. You will eventually find beautiful significance in these sorts of internal journeys. Along the way, imagine loving looks and warm support from this creative child's parents, relatives, friends, teachers, and mentors. This creative child self will only receive looks of approval. Protect this creative child from any harmful and negative criticisms, any disapproving looks, because those can kill the creative spirit. Believe that this sort of upbringing can result in a loving, productive, and creative adult.

A couple of weekends ago, my friends threw me a private book-signing party (thanks Alice!!) and I received a few bottles of champaign to celebrate. One of the bottles even wore a fur coat--I swear to God, I'm not making this up! Maybe I'll open one of those bottles this New Year's Eve, pour the liquid bubbly in a beautiful crystal glass and toast my writing. After all, I'm mad about my writing. It's gorgeous. :)

Promise to give birth to the new creative you this New Year.

Skullduggery Signings
This weekend launches my first public appearances with Skullduggery.

I'll be signing copies at the following locations in Chicago:

Saturday, December 7, 2002: 1-5 p.m. Our Lady of the Snows (Winter Fest) 4858 S. Leamington

Sunday, December 8, 2002: 1-5 p.m. Borders, 2210 W. 95th Street

Monday, December 9, 2002: 7:30 p.m. Twilight Tales, Red Lion Pub, 2446 N. Lincoln Ave.

Sunday, December 15, 2002: 3:30 p.m. Waldenbooks in Ford City Mall, 7601 S., Cicero Ave.

Wednesday, December 18, 2002: 6:30 to 9 p.m. Brighton Park Library, 4314 S. Archer

Saturday, January 25, 2003: 2 p.m. Centuries & Sleuths, 7419 S. Madison St., Forest Park

Saturday, February 15, 2003: 3 p.m. Barnes & Noble, 1441 W. Webster

What are people saying about Skullduggery?
"You don't believe anybody could make Chicago politics weirder than life? Silvia Foti comes close. From the first lines, in which the Mexican mayor of Chicago flattens Gypsy Magazine feature writer Alexandria Vilkas by dying on top of her, to the undying interference of Alex's mother in her life, it doesn't get much weirder than this. Oh, and did I mention that Crystal Skull seems to be dictating even more, if that's possible, than Alex's mom? Vivid storytelling."
--Sara Hoskinson Frommer, author of The Vanishing Violinist

Book Readings and Workshops
Contact me at lotusink@aol.com for hosting a book reading on Skullduggery, or for doing a lecture on unleashing your creativity.

Story ideas and letters to the editor
Do you have a question or issue on creativity you'd like Lotus Ink to investigate? Send your idea to lotusink@aol.com

Feel free to pass the Lotus Ink Newsletter along to a friend.

Bloom Like the Lotus