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Are You Phosphorescent?

Every quarter I contribute an essay to Elan Vitae Magazine. For Spring 2024, I wrote an essay entitled “Phosphorescent,” which was inspired by my March 2024 blog. (If you are curious, you can read that HERE.)

Every issue has a theme, and the Spring 2024 theme is Light. I love to create some contstraint when writing—these guardrails give you a place to start—but when I first thought about Light as a starting place, it confounded me. There were so many ways I could go with this essay—not much constraint there!

Spring Is On Our Doorstep and Writing Awaits

Spring is on our doorstep. You can feel the groundswell of energy waiting—and not patiently. Daffodils have started to burst from the soil even amidst the snow melt that still remains in places. Green is beginning to creep back into the landscape— the soft, tentative green of spring.

Wintering in the Absence of Mothering

As we head into a time of Wintering, a time of receding and regrouping, a time of cocooning and hygge, I am abundantly aware of the stillness and silence that surround me – especially since my daughter left for college. The silence really isn’t silent, though, and the stillness seems to be an illusion as well. Or maybe it’s just that my expectation of these isn’t what I am currently experiencing. 

How Did NaNoWriMo Work for You?
compassion, fierce compassion, self-compassion, writing Heather Fraser compassion, fierce compassion, self-compassion, writing Heather Fraser

How Did NaNoWriMo Work for You?

November was National Novel Writing Month. I hear people start to talk about this in late October, “November is National Novel Writing Month! I’m going to do it this year! I’m going to write my book in November!”

Let’s be clear about something from the outset, here. I think NaNoWriMo is awesome. I think it inspires people to think big and imagine a world where they are writing daily and that vision seems exciting and sexy, and also a little scary. And if you sign up for NaNoWriMo on their website — if you look around a little before November 1 — you will see that the good people who birthed this idea intend a few things…

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