by Jonathan Odell

In life, you can either live out of your imagination,

or you can live out of your history. ~Stephen Covey

That’s what we adults do with much of our lives. We live out of our history, doing the things that have worked once upon a time. We obey the rules. We avoid the things that didn’t work while stubbornly refusing to imagine a new story for ourselves.

One of my favorite quotes about childhood is from Graham Greene: “There is always one moment in a child’s life when the door opens and lets the future in.”

by Emily Brisse

Early on in my life, I knew what I wanted to be: worldly.

experienced; knowing; sophisticated: as in the benefits of her worldly wisdom

I was the child who read Jane Eyre at ten (or tried to, anyway), convinced it would open up some corner of the universe. I was the teenager who read Jane Eyre again (this time actually) while nested between two branches of a tree, feeling that this was what people in love with the world did. At 21—after many more books, many more secret trysts with vocabulary words and foreign-language dictionaries, many more far-off yearnings, after finally a study-abroad term in Paris—I went east, to Maryland, my desire for worldliness a warmed stone in my hand.

Interview by Dara Syrkin

During her 1999 Bush Fellowship for midcareer physicians, Maggie O’Connor dedicated 10 percent of her time to learning how to write. “I had terrible writer’s anxiety. I chose my college classes based on which ones required the fewest essays. English 101 gave me stomach cramps. I decided I had grown up. The time had come to deal with my anxiety about writing.”

Fear or no, Maggie embraced the newness of writing. “My dad started weaving when he retired. So when I set out for the Loft with my guts quaking, I had the reassurance that old people can learn. I sat in classes and introduced myself as a science and math jock who wanted to learn how to write. One of the wonderful things about being a beginner is that you are free to ask any question.

by Emily Brisse

When I was a sophomore in college, I took a course called Ethnic American Literature. Being that I was (1) an English major, (2) from an ethnically homogeneous small town, and (3) desperate for “culture,” I was incredulous when the reading list my professor passed out that first day had no Ralph Ellison, Leslie Marmon Silko, Maxine Hong Kingston, or Toni Morrison, but instead was full of, as he called them, “regional writers,” a mix of poets, novelists, and essayists from my home state that I’d never heard of and was sure had absolutely no relevance to my life. After all, I was going to teach, and how was I supposed to do that if I wasn’t introduced to the writers who’d been anthologized?

I went to another professor and complained (and, Minnesotan that I am, this practically killed me) until she loaded up my arms with every Toni Morrison book she owned. Walking back to my dorm room, clickety-clack, holding these canonical texts close to my chest, I felt fortified. Soothed. I would teach myself, then! And for the rest of the semester I gave those regional authors only bitter, cursory glances. I never took another class with that professor.

by Eugénie de Rosier

It was a grand task to take up the humanitarian challenge of Peace Corps work for 27 months in Southeast Asia. Whew! It was great to come home in May 2008, but not so fine to be faced with the chore of a job search in our slumped economy. Nonetheless, I started a disciplined and organized effort in June.

Seventeen months later, in December 2009, I was still without full-time employment and had been wrestling with writing fiction full time. I’d made a commitment to writing twice and did so for two weeks each time. Downbeat newspaper articles or national labor statistics affected me and I returned to networking. Not seeking paid employment was scary.

by Caryl Yvonne Hunter

All writing, even fiction, contains some truth. Characters are usually based, at least in part, on someone we’ve met in our lives. Our perceptions, beliefs, and experiences can’t help but come through in our stories.

But when writing memoir, the author can’t hide behind a character. And no matter how much you might try to avoid telling a story, it will eventually have to be written or you just can’t move on with your life. I read somewhere that author Kathryn Harrison had to write about her incestuous relationship with her father, something that had been running in her head for years. When she finally wrote it out, she was no longer blocked. Said Harrison, “One of the solaces that art can offer you is the chance to make something out of what’s hurt you. You can objectify an experience, put it on paper, craft it, and shape it. There’s perhaps an illusionary control over it. But it is significant.”

by Michael Fedo

After more than 40 years of toiling at the writer’s trade with only middling success, I’ve learned that the absence of anything resembling a bestseller on my résumé may be due to my lack of idiosyncrasies. Caprices seem to be inherent with people who have attained artistic, literary, scientific, or entrepreneurial eminence. According to David Weeks and Jamie James in their book Eccentrics: A Study of Sanity and Strangeness, eccentrics are more creative, productive, and happy than those of us with no discernible quiddities.

by Cheri Register

As I get older, I grow wearier of the political fray that used to engage me so. The cynicism and polarization of American public life send me scrambling for refuge. I seek out places where people regard each other as worthy human beings and can talk about common pursuits without first having to choose sides and name their enemies. The Loft, of course, is reliably civil. Another place I go might seem an unlikely choice:  On a Saturday afternoon each month I drive to the Minnesota Women’s Correctional Facility, commonly known as Shakopee prison, to teach a two-hour class on writing prose. We began in October 2009 with ten writers and by our May meeting had “lost” four, who were released from incarceration to make new efforts to thrive on their own terms.

by Alexandra Franzen

CEO of You, Inc.

Whether you’re a freelance journalist, a contracted copywriter, an aspiring novelist, or the editor of a post-punk graphic art zine, you are a brand.

That’s right—a brand. Just like Sony, Nike, Apple, and Wells Fargo. Do your grieving and get over it. It’s time to take your rightful position as CEO of You, Inc.