Align Your Creative Energy with Nature's
"Everything we know about creating," writes Tina Welling, "we know intuitively from the natural world." In Writing Wild, Welling details a three-step "Spirit Walk" process for inviting nature to enliven and inspire our creativity.
"Everything we know about creating," writes Tina Welling, "we know intuitively from the natural world." In Writing Wild, Welling details a three-step "Spirit Walk" process for inviting nature to enliven and inspire our creativity.
"This book will help you learn how to really see and come more fully alive. I love it!"
- Penney Peirce, author of Frequency
"Before I was a full chapter into Tina Welling's book, I found myself breathing more deeply; by chapter 2, I was outside - with the book, my notebook, and a pen....What a gentle guide and rich companion for explorations of our wilderness - both inside and out."
- Judy Reeves, author of A Writer's Book of Days
"Tina Welling says, 'Writers need nature.' I can hardly wait to introduce my writing students to this book - and encourage them to write outside, to get a word-tan, to let rain hit their journal pages, and to sit in the elements they are trying to describe - both inner and outer."
- Christina Baldwin, author of Storycatcher
"A thought-provoking read not only for writers but for anyone who wants to deepen their connection to the world around them."
- Kyle Mills, New York Times bestselling author of The Immortalists
"This book is as delightful as it is thoughtful. Spend a day with Tina Welling in the woods and feel your writer's heart burst open on the page."
- Susan Chernak McElroy, author of Animals as Teachers and Healers
"Writing Wild is an impressive guide to feeling, seeing, thinking, and writing about the beauty, sadness, and wonder of life. Tina Welling has created a gift for us all."
- Tim Sandlin, author of Rowdy in Paris Tina Welling is the author of Cowboys Never Cry and two other novels. Her nonfiction has appeared in Shambhala Sun, Body & Soul, and a variety of anthologies. She lives in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Introduction
One summer day, I hiked Josie's Ridge on Snow King Mountain. Large clouds moved across the sky and periodically put a lid over the sun. I paused to catch my breath from the upslope climb and gazed around the shadowy forest of tall, lanky pines. My glance caught on a fully rounded tree, leafless and apparently dead, standing upright with an abundance of sweeping limbs, making the tree stand out from others. At that moment, the sun broke through cloud cover and as I stood there, a dense, dew-beaded spider web, lacing the branches top to bottom, became abruptly illuminated.
One moment, the dead tree was notable only for its shapely flare, unusual in a harsh, high-altitude environment. The next moment, it was aflame with stars. My throat tightened and tears stung my eyes. The forest was silent, I was alone, and the tree spangled before me, woven with fairy lights. Then the clouds closed over the sun again, and the sparkle was gone.
I stood in those shadowy woods looking at the bare tree and my mind experienced a gracious leap. Skipping over the small steps of understanding, I knew suddenly that there was an interconnectedness between the earth's creative energy and my own personal creative energy.
WRITING WILD was conceived right then. I wanted to understand more about this connectedness. I wanted to explore those small intuitive steps of knowing to lay them out one by one, untangle the workings of that connection, and learn how to use this natural resource.
In our daily lives, you and I may be unaware that everything we know about creating, we know intuitively from the natural world. Yet when the light shines just right, we sense that we are part of the whole energy system of the universe, poised endlessly to express itself.
WRITING WILD is based on the ancie
