The opportunity to teach or get taught comes up multiple times a day if I’m paying attention. The process of writing my memoir is a great teacher. Last Tuesday, I felt like I made a breakthrough in how to write a scene. I submitted the scene to my coach, and I waited excitedly to get her feedback.
When I got it, I felt deflated. She said the writing was technically good, but she didn’t think it had the emotional depth it needed to carry my story along. She asked me to brainstorm a list of other potential scenes that would make my point better.
My coach is tough, fair, honest, loving, and encouraging – all the things I need a coach to be. Something in my body told me just to sleep on the feedback. I needed to process it and then decide if I agreed with her or not.
The next morning, I did the brainstorming, and I emailed her back. I decided to take part of her advice, but not all of it. I’m keeping the original scene, AND I’m writing additional scenes to show how my thoughts and behavior were changed by the first scene, adding the depth she is asking for.
But before emailed her, I consulted the I Ching for the first time in a long time. The last time was almost exactly two years ago, also with a writing-related question. The I Ching is a fabulous teacher, too. Instead of addressing my personal question, it addressed the larger world situation.
I got two hexagrams, #33 Withdrawal, with a moving line suggesting that this retreat is done under constraint. Okay. That sure fits. And the second hexagram was #12 Stagnation, Obstruction. “Mean men are at the centre of things, superior men at the fringes. The way of the mean waxes, that of the Superior Man wanes.” That seems to fit, too.
The bright side? As with everything in the Book of Change, this too shall pass.
