I just started a new journey, combining my passions for writing, photography and nature. Please visit my new blog, now in bloom: “Lilacs and Light” to learn more, like the meaning of lilacs in the title.
![4290_1140951609985_7212585_n[1]](https://lilacsandlight.files.wordpress.com/2016/02/4290_1140951609985_7212585_n1.jpg?w=326&h=435)
“Words started to mean not just something, but everything.”
I’m looking forward to teaching The Book Thief, by Markus Zukas this semester. Reading and writing our way through trauma can save us, sustain us. Not just in the pages of an imaginary universe. In real life, too. I know books saved me many times.
We’re also be reading Fahrenheit 451 this semester. Our discussions will focus around knowledge & education, censorship, power and authority, fear, risk, survival, reading, story and identity. It’s going to be a fun environment with great discussions. There are so many parallels to contemporary events.
Why, for instance, do some people fear words, and books, so much so that they ban them? Why are 62 million girls out of school, globally? Why did the Taliban shoot Malala Yousafzai in the head to keep her from getting an education? What were they afraid of? And, perhaps just as importantly, why was a young Malala so willing to risk so much to go to school each day? Why wasn’t she afraid (or was she?). Either way, she risked her life to learn. To see.
We’re reading and writing about interesting other stuff too. But this is going to shape our semester.
Welcome to Spring 2016! ~Lisa
This is what I tell my writing students...
Every writer knows, that to make progress you have to take risks. To tell the truth and really leave it all on the page, you will feel vulnerable, like the turtle sticking it’s neck out.
Take risks.
But that’s the only way you’re going to get anywhere. Inch by inch. Little by little. Keep moving forward and you’ll get there. Your readers want truth and risk and all those messy bits of life on the page.
Happy Sunday to my collegereadycoach.com tribe.
xo, Lisa
Dream big.
“Experience is an author’s most valuable asset…”
This is where I did a mini writing retreat last week. I call this lake “My Walden,” because I feel inspired here. My soul drinks in the quiet, the peace, the beauty, like medicine for all the ills of life. Troubles float away and I can find the place within to be still, to listen, to observe and to write.
I hope you find your Walden, too. If not today, then soon. A room of one’s own, no matter where.
Happy Monday my loves~Lisa 💗
“The moment you doubt whether you can fly you cease forever to do it.”
This advice is from J.M Barrie’s Peter Pan…and it works for all of us. Never stop believing in your goal. Or, if you notice that you do stop believing…it’s probably time to find the next goal or chapter in your life.
Because you? You were meant to FLY!
Happy Tuesday, Happy Summer…happy life!
Leave a comment to let us know your summer wishes. Feel free to share this post! ❤
xo~Lisa
ps: I took this photo and I’m pretty happy with the way it all turned out. 🙂
Photo by @english_musings
Here are “15 Things to Give Up” to Get Happy.
This is good advice all year long, but especially at holiday time and as we look towards the new year.
You have the power to flip this script! It might read something like THIS:
-Believe in yourself.
-Think Positive
-Embrace Failure
-Build healthy relationships
-Engage in meaningful conversation
-Speak highly of yourself and others
-Live in Joy
-Eat to fuel your body
-Get up and go
-Positive Self talk
-One step at a time
-Go after Success
-Live in Simplicity
-Be Authentic
-Become comfortable putting yourself FIRST…or at least work up to putting yourself on the list. Take care of you!
When we give up the things holding us down, we make room for more goodness and opportunity to enter our lives.
Drop us a note in the comments on which of these you are planning to give up in the New Year, or turn the phrase around (flip the script) and tell us what you WILL be doing in the days, weeks and months to come to live a healthy, happy life.
And as we approach the holiday season of light and love, we want to offer our appreciation and gratitude to our amazing tribe (that’s all of you–our readers–from all over the world) who make this community a better, brighter, and more vibrant place. THANK YOU.
All the best,
~~Lisa (aka, The Happy Teacher!)
Want to connect with us on facebook? Do that by clicking right here. If you’re on Pinterest, you can find us right here. Grazie!
