Hey Story Lovers,
Last week, while heading to a tennis tournament I complained to my mom about how nervous I was. First, she said, “Andrea, none of this matters.” True. But being reminded we’re all going to die anyway and no one gives a shit if I win or lose did nothing to calm me. Next, she said, “When you get nervous, put an image of Zeus is your mind.”
I was down in my final match. I was tense and rushing. All my shots went out. Then I put my dog’s Zeus’s face in my mind. I thought about his pink nose and freckles. I focused on his goofy smile. I stopped getting mad when I missed. I stopped worrying about the score. Instead, I just played.
Miracles happen when you can trick your brain. I came back to win!
Miracles can happen in writing too.
I just picked up Writing the Hard Stuff by Nicole Walker. This is a genius guide to tricking your brain in writing. The book teaches how to tackle the hard stuff by using craft techniques that create distance.
I always thought a writer needed time to get distance to understand their subject and write well about it. What I learned from Nicole Walker is that time is not the only way to create distance. There are other brain tricks to employ like using research, page breaks, writing in a specific form (like a poem that uses iambic pentameter), creating metaphors, and braids.
Nicole says restraint frees up the mind. What? How is that possible?
First of all, it’s hard to write about things that are hard. No one enjoys crying all over again about something that happened in the past. So, first, a restraint tricks your brain into writing at all, and then the restraint tricks your brain into seeing connections that make your story worth reading.
Four years ago, I met Nicole Walker because she’s the writer-in-residence at the Center for Ecosystem Science and Society at Northern Arizona University, where Allison Langer and I help scientists personalize their science stories. In our class together, Nicole wrote a braided essay, which I’d never of heard of before, and involves joining two seemingly unrelated ideas. She wrote one paragraph about a personal cancer scare and the next paragraph about pinyon pines, which were drying out. She went back and forth between cancer and pinyon pines until the two subjects came together and told one story about survival. I thought it was the coolest thing ever and so I tried it.
In my story, I brought together jumping rope and the increase in numbers of hurricanes hitting Florida. Here is the other coolest thing ever: Nicole Walker edited my story, “A Numbers Game,” and she broke it down paragraph by paragraph in Chapter 5 of Writing the Hard Stuff.
You gotta get this book! It teaches you how to just play.
The truth is, I’m not always good at tricking my brain. My brain tricks me much of the time, because this takes practice. Come practice tricking your brain with me at the Tips Clinic.
TIPS CLINIC
SATURDAY, February 11, 2026
12 to 1:30 p.m. ET
Zoom
Tips Clinic is $50.
If money is an object, please use this FREE Tips Clinic Zoom link.
All Patreon members, please use the free link.
As always, we have two First Draft weekly writing groups where you write to a prompt and share if you want.
Click here to join Allison Langer Tuesdays 12-1 ET.
Click here to join Margery Berger on Mondays 12-1 ET. The first session is always FREE.
Thanks for reading.
Love,
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