Checking in from week 4 of the Artist’s Way. I hate it.
I mean, I’m supposed to hate it, or at least feel uncomfortable with this week’s main assignment, which requires me to go on a reading diet.
When I told my husband, he laughed in my face. “Do you do anything else?” Well, maybe. Sometimes?
The whole point of the assignment is to see what opens up, what creative things your brain will create if it’s not constantly being fed written media.
I have not been successful at cutting reading out entirely. I have work to do with deadlines, so I have to read a bit for those articles. I also have read to go to sleep since I can’t remember when, so I have cheated in that capacity. That’s about where the reasonable accommodations end. Beyond that has been a struggle that has also resulted in some revenge doom-scrolling and even a whole afternoon of binge reading.
Take that Julia Cameron.
Let’s count the successes, because this newsletter is about love and light, dammit.
I took my sketchbook with me on a couple of appointments and sketched instead of reading or social media.
I spent an evening waiting for my daughter to go to sleep listening to music instead of podcasts/Instagram. I realized during this time that I have a strange affinity for songs with intense tambourine parts.
I’ve been listening to music in the car instead of podcasts. Had my yearly reconnection with Counting Crows and drove through the neighborhood singing “Murder of One” at full volume. Highly recommend.
Spent mornings line editing chapters from my book instead of doomscrolling (this might be the greatest win).
Managed to avoid reading most of the newsletters in my inbox this week, limiting myself to work/kid related email. Recommended, although please continue to read my newsletter. I’m important! I swear!
Had a breakthrough about fear holding me back from some pretty intense work/writing changes that everything in the world is telling me to lean into but I kept getting in my own way.
When I tally up those successes, I do feel like I’ve made some progress. Thanks, Julia Cameron. You may actually be onto something with this whole Creative Recovery thing.

I’m only on week 4 of the 12-week program. I’m pretty sure that the 17 times I have attempted the AW, I have quit during this week. Not reading just feels like such an imposition. In the past, I’ve felt like a failure because I just couldn’t put the books down.
This time, I decided to be gentler with myself, writing about why I slipped up rather than castigating myself until I abandoned the project. Not this time, brain! I’m going to deprive you of reading and succeed. At least for a little while.
Recommended Reading
links in this section are affiliate links for Bookshop.org.
Of course, this week’s recommendation is The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. If you didn’t know who she was from context clues before, now you get those jokes above. Ha. Isn’t it always funnier when someone tells you the punchline?
The Artist’s Way is not just for writers, although many of those I’ve given my copy away to in the past have been writers. It’s for musicians, painters, dancers, potters, lawyers, engineers, and anyone else who wants to create or open their brain to more creativity. I give this book away every time I buy it, because I know what the morning pages have done for my own mental health, goal setting, manifestation, and just general stability.
You’ll love it. And hate it because it pushes you and makes you take a hard look at yourself and figure out what you want and what’s holding you back. But that’s why so many people love it.