All posts by Emmeline Chang

Celebrate Your Way to Success (part 1)

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It’s harvest time!

At the end of each growing season, our agricultural ancestors brought in yams or rice, sheaves of wheat and baskets of apples, ears of corn or tomatoes off the vine.

Today, for those of us who don’t farm, the idea of harvest can seem meaningless. And yet, it’s a key to success. Because here’s what harvesting is really about: taking the time to savor, celebrate, and enjoy what you’ve accomplished.

I used to think celebration was a waste of time. Believing it was the best way to improve myself, I almost always focused on what was wrong—and rarely celebrated what was right. Also, as soon as I achieved something, I was on the next step. I thought this was a virtue. “I’m a hard worker, and I have high standards. I’m too good to celebrate that little stuff—I’ll celebrate when I do something that’s really impressive.”

What I didn’t realize was that by failing to celebrate, I was actually holding myself back.

By not celebrating my small accomplishments—and immediately focusing on the next thing to do, I created a life of never feeling satisfied with myself. Of always being short of the goal.

The result? Despite getting into great schools, publishing articles and stories, and creating a life where I could work for half the year and spend the rest of my time writing fiction, staying at artists’ colonies, and traveling to research for my stories… none of my accomplishments ever felt good enough.

This made it hard to stay motivated. I constantly procrastinated to avoid the risk of failure. I often felt dejected, which kept me from going all out for my dreams.

But, in recent years I’ve learned the value of taking time to “enjoy the harvest”—to acknowledge all that I’ve done well and to celebrate all the blessings in my life.

Here’s what I’ve learned:

  • When I take the time to notice and celebrate all that’s good, I’m often surprised at how much I’ve forgotten to give myself credit for.
  • Celebrating the good moments gives me the “joy reserve” to get through the tough periods.
  • Remembering what I’ve accomplished gives me the courage to keep moving forward.
  • Allowing myself to truly and deeply harvest—to feel the celebration at every level of my body and mind, heart and soul—stops the negative soundtrack in my head and lets me trust that all will be well.

Time travel and self-sabotage

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Here’s a question: Do you let yourself read for fun? What I mean is, are you reading things that give you pure joy and pleasure?

One day years ago, I looked at my bookshelves and realized that even though my walls were covered with books, I had only a few books that were actually fun to read. All the other books were “serious,” “good” books with high literary, intellectual, or political merit–books I was “supposed” to read. Now, I did get enjoyment from many of those books–working hard and delving into multiple layers of meaning and story can be deeply satisfying for me. But would I say my books were fun? Well…. no.

Since then, I’ve made a conscious effort to read for fun. I’ve dedicated whole days to disappearing into a novel. Reexperienced the joy of childhood favorites like Watership Down. Thrown myself into the world of Harry Potter. I even read fanfiction–something that my old high-minded literary self would have been much too embarrassed to admit.

So, in honor of summer and pure fun, here’s what I’ve been reading.

 Time travel

The discovery of Richard III’s body this past spring launched me onto an “other times, other places” kick.

* Daughter of Time by Jacqueline Tey (1951)

A classic among Richard III revisionist novels. Featuring a bedridden Scotland Yard investigator who takes it upon himself to solve the “mystery” of the Princes in the Tower. Unfolds with the style and pace of a well-written mystery.

* The Sunne in Spendour by Sharon K Penman

Another Richard III novel. Not as well written (fairly clichéd language) but interesting and multidimensional in the way it reveals a well-known story through different character perspectives.

* Blackout, All Clear, Firewatch and The Doomsday Book by Connie Willis

After reality-based historical fiction, my next step was time-traveling historians who grapple with everything from the World War II blitzkrieg on London to the Black Death. The Doomsday Book (set in Medieval England) is the best of these, but the other three are filled with great details about life in World War II Britain.

* Replay by Ken Grimwood

A man dies–only to find himself back in his life at age 18. Through the course of the book, he dies and reexperiences his life multiple times, learning and growing along the way. A fairly compelling plot and some moving emotional moments.

* The North Remembers by SilverRavenStar (fanfiction)

If you like “time traveling” to medieval worlds–and are missing your Game of Thrones fix these days, this fanfiction might be the answer. It’s a long, substantial Game of Thrones fanfiction with much better writing than you’ll find in most fanfiction. (Spoiler alert: This fanfic picks up where A Dance With Dragons left off, so if your GoT exposure ends where Season 3 of the TV series left off and you don’t want to be “spoiled,” skip this one!) I haven’t finished it, but the first half is filled with fascinating plot and character developments. It incorporates many of the popular Game of Thrones fan theories in an organic and dynamic way. (Note: This fanfiction is not finished yet, but she seems to be posting at a steady rate–and there are 96 chapters (!) so far, so there’s plenty to read…)

Beyond self-sabotage

Not everything I’m reading is “fun.” The Big Leap by Gaye Hendricks really changed the way I look at my life. I’ve thought about limiting beliefs before, but this book took me to a whole new level. If you want a deep and unexpected understanding of why you sometimes sabotage yourself (and how to stop!), I highly recommend this book. It also talks about how to make the leap into living joyfully in your “Zone of Genius.”

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Fear and sitting

Coach, , , , ,

I’ve been deep in the middle of work on my “tea stories” and my coaching business. It’s incredibly exciting and energizing. And, at the same time, I’ll be honest–a lot of fear comes up: the fierce fear of failure that comes up when I go for my dreams.

Along with looking fear in the face, I’m watching my baby grow–and out of this mix come certain thoughts. Here are a few from the period (a few months ago) when William was learning to sit.

Sitting

My baby is learning to sit. At first he sat precariously posed like a little frog–his arms and hands splayed out to keep from toppling over. He wobbled there for a moment, and then, in slow motion, tipped over.

Sometimes, after toppling to the floor, he cries. At other times he tumbles over without complaint, only to find himself on his stomach–and then begins to cry.

Feeling

Each time he cries, I remember a lesson I’ve learned over the years: how important it is to feel my feelings. Whenever I try to stifle fear, frustration, or other “negative” feelings, they go underground, where they sabotage me in other ways: Instead of writing or working on my business, I fritter away time on administrative tasks. I hyperfocus on some minor issue until it drains my emotional energy, read articles on the web for hours, get sidetracked by Facebook, or spend the day “researching” with a barely-relevant historical novel. But when I actually let myself feel my feelings, they run through me. I’m borne along in their intensity, drenched in the storm. And then, when the storm passes, I feel a deep, clean calm.

This is what I see in William. When he’s upset, he cries. He doesn’t suppress his feelings. He doesn’t stew. He lets his feelings out, and then he moves on.

Failure

He keeps trying, keeps failing, and keeps learning. As he learns, I learn too. There’s the obvious lesson: he’s learning because he’s willing to fail again and again. There’s another lesson: even though every attempt to sit ends in failure (he always topples over eventually), in the overall scheme of things, he is succeeding. As time passes, he sits for longer and longer without wobbling–longer and longer before he tumbles to the floor. Day by day, he’s transforming from a baby who can’t sit to one who can.

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Why play? How one workaholic became a convert

Coach, Lover of life, , ,

Over the years, I’ve realized that to feel fully alive, I need to play.

I wasn’t always someone who thought about play. For years my life had centered on work. College at Princeton, grad school at Columbia, building a writing career and a comfortable life as a freelance writer… I’d pursued my goals with a fierce, unbending work ethic.

Then came the winter of 2007. I had just ended a five-year relationship. It was December, and the days were dark. Except for long overtime hours at a freelance job, I was holed up in my apartment. In every spare moment, I was clearing out clutter, assembling new furniture, reading books on how to recover from a break-up—working obsessively, as it were, to heal and move on.

I couldn’t bring myself to spend time with my friends: the last thing I wanted was a deep talk about my feelings or my life. All I wanted was to hibernate until the pain had passed.

Then, one day in January, I got an e-mail. It was from a meetup for Harry Potter fans, a group I’d joined during the hoopla around the seventh book release—and later forgotten.

“Ice Skating in Bryant Park: Put on your best themed fineries or character costume, wrap that striped scarf around your neck, and join us at The Pond!”

Somehow, that appealed. Quirky. Fun. No strings attached.

There’d be no need to talk about heavy topics with a group of total strangers, and if I didn’t like them, I never had to see them again.

But, I did like them. They were friendly, down-to-earth, and not afraid to have fun. Nothing like the social maladjusts I’d imagined each time I saw those robed, witch-hatted adults outside bookstores, lined up for the midnight release of the latest Harry Potter book.

Over the next weeks and months, I fell in love. Not with a person, but with the fun I was having. We followed a screening of Sweeney Todd with an excursion to a Lower East Side meat pie shop. We commemorated Harry’s disastrous Valentine’s Day date by taking high tea in elegant dress. We played Quidditch, sliding through mud and tackling each other to catch the Golden Snitch.

And one afternoon in March, I realized I was happy. Not just going through the motions of recovery or managing to forget my misery for one afternoon or evening… but genuinely, fully happy. Standing in my kitchen, alone, with the clear spring light coming through the windows of my apartment, I loved my life.

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Write or Die

Writer, ,

Sometimes, as writers, we need a little structure to keep us going. And some lighthearted humor doesn’t hurt either.

Write or Die is a great website that provides both. You open a text box and type into it. As long as you keep writing, all is well. But stop for too long, and the consequences begin: annoying sounds, grating music… or something even more dire.

Personally, I find it really helpful on those days when it’s hard to get going–or keep going. As Dr. Wicked (the mastermind behind the idea) would say, Write or Die helps “put the ‘prod’ in productivity.”