Looking at the world through a new lens

| MAY NEWSLETTER | writing prompts, inspiration & news, what happened when I went offline and off wine for a week

May 25, 2024

Dear writer friend,

I hope your month of May has been good. This is the last weekend of the month, and the writing prompts below might come in handy if you need a catch up with yourself. For me it’s been another hectic month, both exciting and exhausting. There were many highlights, including meeting my Affirm Press stable mates and fellow debut authors (pictured below). Cycling all over Melbourne on crisp, sunny autumn days, signing books, giving interviews. Catching up with old friends, former colleagues and students at my alma mater, Melbourne University.

In the middle of all the busyness, I took myself on a 7-day retreat, where I had to surrender my phone, laptop, Kindle, books. The aim was to be fully present.

It’s something I’ve often taught, but I’m not always good at. Especially not during a book promotion tour. And not the day before the Mother’s Day weekend, when my book has just been included in the Good Weekend’s Mother’s Day Reading List!

Like everybody else, I was both anxious and relieved to finally hand over my devices. Surrendering the twitchy part of myself that craves to be busy, hungry for distractions — the part of me that knows that checking my Instagram feed more than twice a day is poison, whilst I continue to scroll, lately even at the traffic lights — surrendering that part of myself, felt supremely liberating.

For one week I went off-line and deep inside myself. I attended the Hoffman Process at Sangsurya, in Byron Bay. It was deep and transformative, like two years of psychotherapy in one week. I am not joking. I’d heard about the Hoffman Process over the years from people I respect. I finally gifted it to myself as a reward for all the hard work that went into my memoir.

Once I’ve processed what I learned, I’ll share more. For now, I am thrilled to share that I’ve booked glorious Sangsurya in Byron Bay for a writing retreat in early November 2025. Details soon!

What did a week without wifi do for me?

I didn’t miss my phone during the week (thought I did miss my Kindle) and I definitely became more present. My mind felt peaceful and spacious. It was a liberating experience. But as the last hour of the retreat approached, I became increasingly nervous about what I might find when I opened my inbox.

I was surprised to find that nothing had changed. The world hadn’t collapsed, all my loved ones were still alive, and nobody had missed me on Instagram. It was I who had changed.

My take away: don’t be a slave to your phone. Be strict about when you turn it on, how often you look at it. Use apps to force it into silent mode, and always remember that every time you scroll, you lose your focus, and yourself. Stay present.

Not that I didn’t know any of that already, but it was good to experience a week without distractions. It shifted my perspective, and it made me see the world through the lens of a beginner’s mind.

Which brings me to do today’s writing prompts.

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“In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities; in the expert's mind there are few.”
–Shunryu Suzuki-Rroshi

We’ve talked about the Buddhist concept of ‘beginner’s mind’ on here before, but it’s a good one to return to. Coming out of a week-long retreat, I felt like I was seeing the world through a new lens, like I had fresh eyes.

Cultivating Beginner’s Mind

Inevitably, as we return to our everyday lives after a retreat, the freshness of mind starts to fade quickly, so I always like to keep my journal close.

When we bring the attitude of beginner's mind to our reflective writing practice, we become open to the possibility of not knowing and we learn to see things, including ourselves, from a fresh perspective.

Silencing the Inner Critic

Cultivating the attitude of beginner's mind trains us to silence the inner critic by returning to the child’s playful and inquisitive mindset.

Research demonstrates that children can see infinite potential in everything. As adults our world shrinks, and we see fewer possibilities. We get stuck on autopilot, slaves to old, never-changing storylines and belief patterns. We loose the ability to look at things in new ways.

Divergent thinking is the ability to see many possible answers to a question. It’s a way of cultivating awe and wonder in a hectic world.

It’s also an excellent mindset to cultivate as a writer. We’re always looking for the story, for new angles, and novel ways of expressing things.

Here's a guided meditation

Use these writing prompts to help you approach the world through the lens of a beginner’s mind:

🌼 Creativity kick-starter:

Write down the first thing you held in your hand today, whether it was your toothbrush, your phone, or a tea cup… Don’t overthink it, just write.

Set your timer for 5 MINUTES.

Now explore how many ways you could use that object. List as many ways as possible. Enjoy the process of letting your creativity flow uninhibited.

Spread the longer prompts below out over a few days.

Set your timer for 10 MINUTES for each prompt and write without stopping or editing.

🌼 Make a list of the things you are an expert in.

Think broadly about this. You may be an expert at making poached eggs, tidying the house, fixing a bicycle, or masking your emotions. Now pick one and write a paragraph. Just let it flow.

🌼 In which area of your life can you let go of being an expert?

Can you move over and let somebody else make the poached eggs or the tidying for once? Or maybe it's time to look at yourself in the mirror without your mask on?

🌼 What I don’t know…

This is a great prompt to return to the curiosity of your inner child. Asking yourself what you don’t know is the beginning of true wisdom. It brings an open-mindedness that is profoundly different from our ego-driven expert mind.

🌼 How does being an expert limit you from seeing fresh possibilities?

Reflect on what you’re not seeing, what you’re missing, which parts of yourself you are not living.

🌼 What would change if beginner's mind was in charge?

Be creative, go wild, dig deep!

After each prompt, take a moment to read over what you have written.

Set your timer for another 5 MINUTES and explore what writing about your expert mind has taught you about yourself.

Be honest, peel away the layers. Let your pen lead the way.

Has writing your memoir been healing for you?

It’s the question I get asked most often.

The short answer is, yes, writing things down, venting on the page, letting my emotions spill out through the pen, was crucial in getting me through.

The long answer is, the actual healing took place in my journals. No publisher, and certainly no reader, could possibly be interested in those journals. They contain my raw, messy emotions on repeat. To make sense of what didn’t, I felt compelled to tell my story over and over, to myself and to anybody who would listen, which after a while left only my journal. It became my best friend, my life saver, a therapist in my pocket.

Journaling allowed me to dump the same shit over and over until something shifted, and I was able to change my narrative. Journaling allows us to turn a page and write a new story arc.

Catching up with fellow debut & Affirm Press authors & staff; from left Chris (Affirm sales rep), Liz Foster, Kyra Geddes, Laura Keegan, Priscilla (Affirm publicist), Jane Tara, Anna Downes

As my story was unfolding, I immediately had a sense that I would eventually turn it into a memoir. But I only seriously began writing my book when the global pandemic made it impossible for me to return to Vietnam. During the solitude of lockdown, my old journals unexpectedly became my close friends again as I mined them for my memoir.

By then it was nine years after Gianni’s death. I’d established a new career running international writing retreats, and I’d made Hoi An in Vietnam my new home. I’d become someone new and I no longer felt the pain and the sadness I describe in my book.

Closed borders forced me to stay home and amid the chaos of the pandemic, I settled into my creative flow. Slowly, from the story fragments in my journals, I shaped a work of art.

A memoir is a work of art

Let’s be clear about that.

Writing memoir is the art of crafting a coherent story from tangled emotions; making beauty from sorrow and meaning from what is incomprehensible and painful. It is sifting through the darkness for the hidden gems that make our personal stories both unique and universal.

In that sense, writing my memoir has been deeply healing. It has allowed me to surrender to the creative process, make art, speak my truth and share what I’ve learned with those who need to hear it.

Shaping the raw materials of my memory and my journals into a narrative that has an arc and a three act story, set my story free.

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In the Media:

I never expected to end up in front of the camera with a participant of I am a Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here for the wildely popluar Life Uncut Podcast. Apparently it was the title of my book that stirred their interest.
Brittany Hockley, the celebrity, and Laura Byrne, a celebrity in her own right, made feel instantly at ease. They’re total pros and after the initial shock at the cameras (I’d expected only a microphone), their chatty tone made me relax. Listening back, I am relieved to say I don’t hate it!
You can listen to the interview on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts (search for ‘life uncut’).
Being interviewed by Hilary Harper for Life Matters on ABC Radio National was a career highlight. Sitting on my own in the tardis at the ABC studios on a crisp Wednesday morning was a little intimidating, but Hilary was a wonderful interviewer and I relaxed. You can listen to it here.
Interview with Hilary Harper for Life Matters

ABC journalist Anna Kelsey-Sugg, wrote a beautiful follow-up piece. You can read it on the ABC website here.
I was chuffed to be included in the Mother’s Day Reading List of the Good Weekend Magazine, another career highlight!
If you’re in Melbourne, tune in to the ABC breakfast show on Thursday (May 30), and hear me speak at 6:15 am about my experience caring for a terminally ill spouse at home.
After so much delightful busyness, I am ready to go home, but there’s more to come. Quick stops at the Goldcoast and Brisbane where I am a guest at the Brisbane Writers Festival on Friday May 31st @7pm.