Comfort zones

Why You Should Do Things Badly

September 16, 2013

When I started writing this post, I had just gotten back from riding my bike for the first time in…years. My kind husband recently cleaned out the garage, brought my bike down from the ceiling where it had been suspended, pumped up my flat tire, lubed the chain and adjusted the seat so it’s just right. I finally wheeled it out onto the nature trail, and while I hadn’t exactly forgotten how to ride a bike, let’s just say that I didn’t look very graceful doing it. There was some irrational weaving and one or two interesting experiments with gears and braking, but soon I was pedaling happily down the trail. I wasn’t very skilled, but at least I didn’t hit a tree.

The Great Bike Ride was, I hope, the first of many rides, each one getting a little smoother. I admit that on this first ride, I felt kind of silly. I *should* be able to ride a bike, right? I learned long (long) ago. But right now, I do it kind of badly. And that’s OK. Doing things badly is important, and you should be doing things badly, too. Want to know why?

If you never try anything you’re not already good at, you’ll never learn anything new.

Maybe you’d like to learn to sketch, try salsa dancing, or bake the perfect pie. If you’ve never tried it before, it’s likely that you won’t be good. It’s the rare person who is good at something the very first time he/she tries it (and you have my permission to hate those people). If you never step outside your comfort zone and risk doing things badly, you’ll never know if you even like to samba or how creative your sketches can be. (And if your goal is the perfect pie, please call me—I’m willing to taste your experiments.)

Once you’ve tried something for the first time and you decide you like it, guess what: you might still do it badly for awhile. Many, many worthwhile and satisfying things take time to master. The point is, if you’re not willing to do something badly, at least for a little while, you’ll never know just how good you can be.

For me, horseback riding has been a prime example of doing things badly. I recently saw a video of my first ride on Tank, and frankly I was appalled (and I felt sorry for Tank). In the years I’ve had him, I’ve taken many riding lessons and spent hours practicing, and I know I’m a much better rider than I was then. Thankfully, I didn’t give up when I found that good riding is much harder than it appears.

When you try your new things (and I write this to myself as much as to you), be patient and don’t be embarrassed or self-conscious about doing things badly. Realize you’re learning and expanding your horizons. Be proud of your badness for badness, eventually, leads to goodness.

What would you like to do badly?

Still practicing... (Photo by Holly Bryan)

Authors

A Jane Austen Project

September 13, 2013


When I hear that someone has never read Jane Austen, I somehow manage not to drag him or her to the library or bookstore and load them up with Miss Austen’s body of work. She’s one of my favorite authors, and I’ve read all her novels, some of them several times. Pride and Prejudice is my favorite (possibly because of the marvelous British mini-series with Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy and Jennifer Ehle as Elizabeth Bennett), with Emma a close second.

In addition to her six novels, the Austen fan can find multiple movies made from her books, as well as sequels, spoofs and take-offs, including the intriguingly-titled, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and the movies Clueless (Emma) and Bridget Jones’s Diary (Pride and Prejudice).

I bring this up now because there’s a slew of new books about Miss Austen and her work, this flurry of interest likely related to this year’s 200th anniversary of the publication of Pride & Prejudice. I spent most of August happily engrossed in my own little Jane Austen project.

Why has her work remained so popular when on the surface it appears that the stories are all about young women finding love and getting married? I already knew I enjoyed her sly wit, language usage, and characterization. I learned to respect her even more after reading the books below, each of which has its own take on why she remains popular. So without further ado, if you want to begin an excursion into Austenland, here are some books to make your trip more enjoyable:

If you’re interested in Miss Austen herself, the Penguin Lives biography, Jane Austen, by Carol Shields is a great place to start. It’s an easy-to-read, compact (185 pages) overview of her life. An excerpt:

“The young often read Austen’s novels as love stories. Later, more knowing readers respond to their intricate structures, their narrative drive, their quiet insistence that we keep turning over the page even though we know the ending, which is invariably one of reconciliation and a projection of future happiness in the form of marriage….Marriage reached beyond its moment of rhetoric and gestured, eloquently and also innocently, toward the only pledge a young woman was capable of giving. She had one chance in her life to say ‘I do,’ and these words rhyme psychologically with the phrase: I am, I exist.”

One of the interesting points Shields brought out was that Miss Austen wrote during a time that the novel form was still in its infancy.  “Her novels were conceived and composed in isolation. She invented their characters, their scenes and scenery, and their moral framework. The novelistic architecture may have been borrowed from the eighteenth-century novelists, but she made it new, clean, and rational, just as though she’d taken a broom to the old fussiness of plot and action. She did all this alone.”

The Bedside, Bathtub & Armchair Companion to Jane Austen, by Carol Adams, Douglas Buchanan and Kelly Gesch. I enjoyed dipping into this lighthearted book. Austen newcomers can learn a little bit about the author and her novels, and dedicated Janeites can delve deeper or test their knowledge of all things Austen.

One of the features in the Armchair Companion is an interview with Joan Klingel Ray, author of Jane Austen for Dummies. When asked about the current fascination with Austen, part of her reply made sense to me: “Austen is unique in that while she is a classic novelist who is studied by academics and taught in universities, she also appeals to what we might call the ‘common reader’—the ordinary person who picks up her novels simply for the pleasure of reading them.”

Ray encourages new readers not to see the films or TV versions of Austen’s work before reading the novels, and suggests they be read in the following order: Pride and Prejudice, Persuasion, Emma, Northanger Abbey, Mansfield Park, and Sense and Sensibility. “I think this order eases the reader into Austen’s language and syntax…. Also I think this order draws readers into Austen’s canon by the nature of the ‘stories.’ Readers should also be aware that Austen is a satirist and uses irony, readers need to be able to hear the narrator’s voice for what it is.”

All Roads Lead to Austen, by Amy Elizabeth Smith. Smith spent a year traveling through Latin America, organizing and meeting with small groups to discuss Jane Austen’s books. Smith sums up her year this way: “I hadn’t realized how my trip would really be a road test of values and beliefs I thought I had already absorbed from Austen: Don’t judge too hastily; not everyone wants the same things out of life; people’s circumstances color how they respond to everything; we’re not all speaking the same language, even when we’re speaking the same language.”

A Jane Austen Education, by William Deresiewicz. I loved Deresiewicz’s deeply thoughtful, honest, and interesting account of the life lessons he received from studying each one of Jane Austen’s novels. For example, he learned the importance of everyday things from Emma: “Austen, I realized, had not been writing about everyday things because she couldn’t think of anything else to talk about. She had been writing about them because she wanted to show how important they really are. All that trivia hadn’t been making time until she got to the point. It was the point. Austen wasn’t silly and superficial; she was much, much smarter—and much wiser—than I ever could have imagined.”

Deresiewicz continued later in the chapter, “Austen taught me a new kind of moral seriousness—taught me what moral seriousness really means. It means taking responsibility for the little world, not the big one. It means taking responsibility for yourself.”

After finishing these books, I’ve barely scratched the surface. The list of additional Jane Austen-related books I haven’t been able to get my hands on yet, includes:

Celebrating Pride & Prejudice: 200 Years of Pride and Prejudice, Susannah Fullerton. From Amazon: Austen scholar Fullerton “…delves into what makes Pride and Prejudice such a groundbreaking masterpiece, including the story behind its creation (the first version may have been an epistolary novel written when Austen was only twenty), its reception upon publication, and its tremendous legacy….”

The Real Jane Austen: A Life in Small Things, Paula Byrne.  Byrne looks at the small things, such as a shawl, a notebook and a card of lace, which held significance in Jane Austen’s life, using them to paint a fuller portrait of the author.

Jane Austen’s England, Roy and Lesley Adkins. Written by husband-and-wife historians, this book “explores the customs and culture of the real England” of Jane Austen’s everyday life.   

Among the Janeites: A Journey Through the World of Jane Austen Fandom, Deborah Yaffe. Instead of Austen herself, Yaffe takes a look at Austen’s obsessed and devoted fans. According to Amazon, Among the Janeites is “Part chronicle of a vibrant literary community, part memoir of a lifelong love…a funny, touching meditation on the nature of fandom.” 

In the Garden With Jane, Kim Wilson. Jane Austen loved a garden, and this book takes us to the types of gardens she would have known, including the one that still exists at Jane Austen’s House Museum in Chawton, England. The book is full of photos, drawings, social history and novel excerpts.  

The List Lover’s Guide to Jane Austen, Joan Strasbaugh. What books did Jane Austen have in her library? Who were her royal ancestors? A compact reference for Austen lovers.

Jane Austen Game Theorist, Michael Suk-Young Chwe. One of the more intriguing new releases, “Jane Austen, Game Theorist shows how this beloved writer theorized choice and preferences, prized strategic thinking, argued that jointly strategizing with a partner is the surest foundation for intimacy, and analyzed why superiors are often strategically clueless about inferiors,” according to Amazon.com.  

A Truth Universally Acknowledged: 33 Great Writers on Why We Read Jane Austen, edited by Susannah Carson. Essayists include Eudora Welty, Anna Quindlin, Amy Bloom, Virginia Woolf, Harold Bloom, and many others, and topics include everything from “insights into the timelessness of her moral truths” to how her writing might have changed if she had lived another 20 years. There’s even a piece by Amy Heckerling about how she turned the characters of Emma into 1990s-era Beverly Hills residents in the movie Clueless.

I haven’t read Pride & Prejudice  recently, and I think maybe it’s time to have a leisurely reread of all Miss Austen’s work, preferably with a cup of tea and a scone in hand. If you’re an Austen fan, which of her books is your favorite? Which book would you suggest that an Austen newbie read first? And just for fun, which Jane Austen heroine are you? Take the quiz here. (I am Elinor Dashwood.) 

Note: For more information on Jane Austen and her work, visit:
http://www.janeausten.org/
http://www.janeausten.co.uk/
http://www.jasna.org/

9/11

Celebrating Life*

September 11, 2013


Writing poetry, reading poetry, we are invited to join with others in celebrating life, even the ordinary, daily pleasures. Here the Seattle poet and physician, Peter Pereira, offer us a simple meal. [Introduction by Ted Kooser.]

A Pot of Red Lentils 

simmers on the kitchen stove.
All afternoon dense kernels
surrender to the fertile
juices, their tender bellies
swelling with delight.

In the yard we plant
rhubarb, cauliflower, and artichokes,
cupping wet earth over tubers,
our labor the germ
of later sustenance and renewal.

Across the field the sound of a baby crying
as we carry in the last carrots,
whorls of butter lettuce,
a basket of red potatoes.

I want to remember us this way—
late September sun streaming through
the window, bread loaves and golden
bunches of grapes on the table,
spoonfuls of hot soup rising
to our lips, filling us
with what endures.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Reprinted from Saying the World, 2003, by permission of Copper Canyon Press. Copyright © 2003 by Peter Pereira. Introduction copyright © 2013 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. 

*I think there’s no better way to move ahead in life than to appreciate the simplest of daily pleasures. On the anniversary of 9/11, I’m grateful for these continued simple pleasures and I wish for you a life full of celebrations of all kinds.

Baby steps

September Is the New January

September 09, 2013

Photo courtesy Candace Penney

Is it just me, or does September feel like a new beginning? Most of my life I’ve treated September the way most people treat January: as a new year. Even before I had a child going back to school or lived in Florida where the promise of the occasional cooler, drier day bumps up my energy, I reevaluated my life in the fall. My birthday is in September, so I think that adds to the “new start” feeling since like most of us I become more introspective around birthdays.

I’ve thought about starting my own Happiness Project, like Gretchen Rubin has written about in the book of the same name, and its follow-up Happier at Home (where the title of this blog post came from). I even began listing areas I’d like to focus on, but decided I’m not ready to attack things I want to change or enhance in quite that fashion. Planning all those months in advance felt too overwhelming to me. Instead, I decided to take baby steps and do some very simple things to get my new year off to a good start:

First, I’m keeping a time log this week to see where I’m spending my time. (I’m using this one.) From there, I hope to come up with a flexible schedule so I can get the important things done while still having time to play.

My weight has become a concern again, so I’m tweaking my eating and fitness routines to combat those creeping pounds.

I’m making plans for fun by figuring out the details of our postponed anniversary trip and scheduling some upcoming Field Trip Fridays.

I’m purging—the freezer, my closet, my file cabinet. I’m always battling stuff!

Even though it’s still blazingly hot here and it doesn’t feel like fall yet, I’m starting to feel more energetic, more likely to make some changes and explore new avenues. I’m ready to savor simple pleasures and take part in everyday adventures. Even though the calendar says September and not January, I’m ready for a new year!

Do you make any special plans in September? Are there any other times of year you evaluate life, set goals or take up challenges?

Happiness

The Return of Link Love

September 06, 2013

When I’m supposed to be writing/cleaning/exercising/being a productive human being, I am often playing on the internet. I have no excuse, other than I usually start out doing legitimate research or tending to my blog, and *somehow* find myself two hours later, fingers cramping, legs asleep and eyeballs begging for mercy, staring at a blog post with a name like “10 Ways to Decorate Your Home Using Only Pine Cones and Bubble Wrap,” wondering how I came to waste my life in this manner, and if it’s possible to burn a crayon for 30 minutes in an emergency (the answer, according to the Pintester: it will burn, but not for 30 minutes—whether it’s an emergency or not).

Even though I spend far too much time fooling around, I do often find some pretty cool stuff, and that stuff I herewith share with you in the fourth installment of Link Love. Yes, friends, I do it all for you.

You’ve probably heard of The Bloggess—Jenny Lawson, author of Let’s Pretend This Never Happened. Her blog is laugh-out-loud funny, if you’re not offended by a quirky sense of humor and strong language. This post, “Rules for Life,” is one of my favorites. Read the comments that follow if you have the time—they’re pretty awesome.

If you want to have more fun, be more childlike: “Remember. Fun is an attitude. Fun is an option. Fun is a decision.”

I’m a big fan of Gretchen Rubin’s books The Happiness Project and Happier at Home, and I regularly read her blog. This post discusses some of the contradictions of happiness.

This article lists patterns of negative thinking that harm our happiness. I especially like number three and number 10.

Did you know there’s an entire website devoted to disapproving rabbits?  Check out Bruce “Disapproval in front, party in back.”

Laura Vanderkam’s “Journey Through the Checkout Racks” compares women’s magazines then and now, for a snapshot of how women’s lives in America have changed.

And finally, I just love these two. Watching this video makes my day every time.



You’re welcome.

Eric Hoffer

Feeling Hurried

September 04, 2013


“The feeling of being hurried is not usually the result of living a full life and having no time. It is on the contrary born of a vague fear that we are wasting our life. When we do not do the one thing we ought to do, we have no time for anything else.”
—Eric Hoffer

Armchair travel

Where I Went This Summer (Reader’s Edition)

September 02, 2013


I used Grammarly to grammar check this post because it never hurts to have another set of eyes proofread your work, even if they’re automated!*

Well, it’s Labor Day today in the U.S., and that marks the unofficial end to summer. I’m sad to say that I didn’t literally get to go on vacation. So far in 2013, my travel has been limited to family visits. I haven’t explored any place new or exciting…so it’s a good thing my reading has taken me all over the world! While my passport languishes and my suitcases gather dust, here are a few places my bookshelves and library card have taken me:

The island of Crete, courtesy of Mary Stewart’s The Moon-Spinners.

Roqueville, on the Cote d’Azur, via Spinsters in Jeopardy (Ngaio Marsh).

Toronto, Ontario and Prince Edward Island, because of L. M. Montgomery’s published journals (I read the third volume of The Selected Journals of L.M. Montgomery—it was the only one my library had). Montgomery was the author of the Anne of Green Gables series, and had already created in me a burning desire to visit Prince Edward Island someday.

Eudora Welty’s Mississippi, where I attended a Delta Wedding.

Kishinev (now called Chisinau), Moldavia via the letters in From Newbury With Love (incredibly touching book and one of my favorite reads all year).

Guatemala, Mexico, Ecuador, Chile, Paraguay and Argentina, with Amy Elizabeth Smith’s All Roads Lead to Austen. (More about this book in an upcoming post.)

France and England, where I swashbuckled all over the place with The Three Musketeers (Alexandre Dumas).

I actually spent quite a lot of time in the United Kingdom this year—making stops in Crampton Hodnet (in the book of the same name by Barbara Pym), Edgecomb St. Mary (Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand), Newbury (see above), London and Cornwall (Jacqueline Winspear’s Messenger of Truth), among other fictional and real destinations.

So you see, when time and/or finances don’t permit me to explore the world firsthand, I turn to books to satisfy my craving for travel. And now, as I finish this post, I’ll be returning to rural Appalachia with Barbara Kingsolver’s Flight Behavior.

Where has your reading taken you this summer?

*This post sponsored by Grammarly, an online grammar checker and proofreading system.