Free Your Pen: Applying Lojong Slogans to Writing

27/03/201720/02/2018 Jessica DavidsonLeave a comment

This is the final extract from Free Your Pen: Mind Training for Writers. In the last post we looked at how to practice with the slogans in general. Here we look at one slogan in depth – first by exploring the original teachings and then applying the slogan to writing. Slogan 1: First, remember the… Continue reading Free Your Pen: Applying Lojong Slogans to Writing

Free Your Pen: How to use Lojong Slogans in your Writing

20/03/201720/02/2018 Jessica Davidson2 Comments

Continuing the extracts from Free Your Pen: Mind Training for Writers. In the last post we looked at the traditional practice of lojong and its teachings. Here we explore how to apply the slogans to writing and daily life in this extract from chapter three: How to Practice with the Slogans If you want to… Continue reading Free Your Pen: How to use Lojong Slogans in your Writing

Free Your Pen · Writing

Free Your Pen: Lojong for Writers

16/03/201720/02/2018 Jessica Davidson3 Comments

Continuing the extracts from Free Your Pen: Mind Training for Writers. In the last few posts we explored why the mind is such an unruly place and what we can do about it. Now we dig deeper into the source of mind training practice and look at some of the ideas that underpin the teachings… Continue reading Free Your Pen: Lojong for Writers

Free Your Pen · Writing

Free Your Pen: Finding the Courage to Write

13/03/201720/02/2018 Jessica Davidson3 Comments

Continuing the extracts from Free Your Pen: Mind Training for Writers. Last time we looked at the how the ego and its shadow causes most of your problems as a writer. Here we explore the solution in this final extract from chapter one: The Courage to Write Writing is a leap of faith. You never… Continue reading Free Your Pen: Finding the Courage to Write

Free Your Pen · Writing

Free Your Pen: The Real Cause of All Your Problems

09/03/201720/02/2018 Jessica Davidson13 Comments

Continuing the extracts from Free Your Pen: Mind Training for Writers. Last time we looked at why mastering your mind is so important. In this post we’ll have a closer look at the real cause of the problem with another extract from chapter one: Meet Your Mind Although everybody writes for different reasons, the fears… Continue reading Free Your Pen: The Real Cause of All Your Problems

Free Your Pen · Writing

Free Your Pen: The Importance of Mind Training for Writers

06/03/201720/02/2018 Jessica Davidson1 Comment

Last time I introduced my book on mind training for writers, Free Your Pen. In this post, we’ll delve deeper into why mastering your mind is so important with an extract from chapter one: Why Train the Mind? Have you ever sat down to write and found that your mind has gone totally blank? Or… Continue reading Free Your Pen: The Importance of Mind Training for Writers

Free Your Pen · Writing

How to Free your Pen: Mind Training for Writers

03/03/201709/08/2025 Jessica Davidson1 Comment

What does it take to be a writer? The one thing that all writers have in common is very simple: they write. But more than that, a writer writes – no matter what. It seems obvious, but it’s the ‘no matter what’ that causes all the problems. To be a writer it helps if you… Continue reading How to Free your Pen: Mind Training for Writers

Buddhism · Free Your Pen · Writing

Abandon Hope and other crazy advice

27/02/201720/02/2018 Jessica Davidson6 Comments

Today I’m celebrating the release of my latest book, Free Your Pen: Mind Training for Writers. It’s been a long and convoluted journey, and for a while I thought this day would never arrive. I wanted to write the book for years. Life had other ideas, as life usually does. But the book is here,… Continue reading Abandon Hope and other crazy advice

Awakening

2017: The Year of Writing Better Stories

02/01/201707/02/2018 Jessica Davidson3 Comments

I kept trying to write this post but didn’t know what to say. How do you follow a year like 2016? What a mess! This upheaval has been a long time coming – there’s nothing strange or unexpected about it. If you understand how reality works, it all makes perfect sense. (Honest!) People are freaking… Continue reading 2017: The Year of Writing Better Stories

Writing

Resources and Advice for Writers

05/12/201627/02/2021 Jessica DavidsonLink9 Comments

This is a collection of links to some of the sites I’ve found most useful in my writing over the years. You’ll find helpful articles, advice and inspiration to help you write and publish your work. This post has now moved to my writing blog: https://jesdavidson.wordpress.com/2021/02/27/resources-and-advice-for-writers/

Apocalypse

Hold Your Own – Kate Tempest – a bodhisattva in action

03/10/201626/06/2020 Jessica Davidson2 Comments

I don’t know if Kate Tempest would describe herself as a bodhisattva, but to me she’s the perfect embodiment of what that would look like in the form of a performance poet. Here she is at Glastonbury in 2015, more than holding her own (full set here): “Know the wolves that hunt you, in time,… Continue reading Hold Your Own – Kate Tempest – a bodhisattva in action

Buddhism

The Eightfold Path: Right Speech

19/09/201611/12/2016 Jessica DavidsonLeave a comment

Right Speech is the first practice in Ethical Conduct on the Eightfold Path and is about communicating with compassion and in a straightforward way. It follows from Right Thinking and Right Understanding, so you see reality as it is and then express that truth directly. It includes communication through speech and all forms of writing:… Continue reading The Eightfold Path: Right Speech