Between Jest and Earnest

A couple of Sunday mornings ago, I closed my laptop and felt pretty good about myself. I had a draft. A completed draft. Don't get me wrong, it's a flaming pile of mess. But it's my flaming pile of mess. It was two years ago when I started an exercise in self-discipline wherein I committed to writing a minimum of 30 minutes a day for 30 days . It was a success, insofar as I was able to stick to this commitment. But it also succeeded in helping me to develop a new habit. In the coming months, I continued writing for at least 30 minutes on most days. Have there been lapses? Yep. Plenty of them. But with a little bit of effort, I've been able to recommit. Ever since closing my laptop on that day, though, I've let the metaphorical dust gather around the manuscript. Most days, I wake up thinking that this will be the day where I turn it around. But then the day finishes, and I'm telling myself "Tomorrow you'll do it. Just wait until tomorrow." B

Writing Alone, Writing Together

Say it out loud. To people. Live humans, not just digital ones, who will help keep you accountable (but not in a judgy way). This was my Michael Pollan-ish advice to a group of colleagues for maintaining a steady writing schedule during the semester. As a group, we all face similar challenges when it comes to writing. While summer and Christmas break might give us blocks of time, it's far more difficult to keep the scholarly fires burning during the term with classes, committees, and everything else. My particular advice stemmed from my own experience of committing to write 30 minutes a day for 30 days. When I announced it to friends, family, and Twitter, my internal commitment went "out there." Suddenly, I had that necessary nudge on days when finding those 30 minutes was the last thing I wanted to do. Because writing is hard. But writing can be rewarding. Never once did I finished my 30 minutes and regret it. In this way, it's quite like running. There

A Personal Best, Re-Defined

Somewhere at around 22 miles at this year’s Toronto Waterfront Marathon, I joked with my friend Andrew that the race ought to have a 1-kidney division. “You’d definitely win that!” He chuckled and, perhaps temporarily, forgot the muscle spasms rippling through his legs. Then it was back to walking, stretching, and shuffling. “We’ll get there,” I assured, as the crowds of runners passed us by. Truth be told, I was beyond impressed to see Andrew running in this moment. It was a little less than a year ago that he donated a kidney to his son , who had struggled with health issues ever since birth. Soon after Andrew recovered from his surgery, he set his sights on running a marathon as a way of celebrating the health and wellbeing of his son. He also asked me to run with him, and I immediately said yes—even though I had considered myself a retired marathoner. After Andrew and I ran together in college, I was determined to conquer the marathon distance. In my formative run

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