We were never meant to go it alone and yet somehow the bad myth of the lone wolf artist persists. It shows up in the isolated anxiety attacks of writers preparing for their pitch slams at a massive conference, in the loneliness of presentations, in the alienation of large group lectures, and in the all-business-no-play postures of most of our industry-centric debates.
What if we changed all of that?
What if instead of teaching skillset, we treated community and co-learning as its own skillset? What if we actually fostered a culture in which the hive mind worked for writers? Where the greatest ideas in the group rise to the top because everyone is in progress, everyone is on this journey together and everyone wants to grow and improve?
It would look like UnCon 2016: Author in Progress.
Therese Walsh, the mother of Writer Unboxed, started Uncon two years ago and it is unlike any conference I have attended or helped facilitate. In the words of Keith Cronin, “I don’t think I’ve received this many hugs or heard the words I love you so often in any group of this size.” In some ways, it reminds me of something like boy scout or church camp: an intimate group of colleagues working to improve themselves together and setting aside arrogance and ego in order to make that happen.
I’ve collected a few dozen new mothers and aunts and sisters through this thing, let me tell you. I might even write up some posts on the mothers I have found. And Sean Walsh, Therese’s husband, has added a depth of longing to my musical and theatrical side that I haven’t had for years. Not only did I learn about How Write a Scene, Writing True Characters, Spotlighting Techniques, Story Genius, Secondary Characters and Flashbacks, Character Layers, The Story You’re Not Telling, Streamlined Revision Processes, and the Unboxed Story, I also learned all of this in-between stuff from bestselling authors who were not presenting, but just there to learn alongside one another like “apply your imagination first to your structure and the goals and misbeliefs of your character and then you can turn it loose” and “narrow, narrow, narrow it down to specifics” and “incarnate every thought: leave nothing in the abstract” and “write it all: fear no lawsuit because fiction is legally fake and not defamation” which was as encouraging as hearing some compliments from people that know what they’re talking about — after a rough year, I needed those to keep me going.
I’ll be sharing my notes this week, God willing, on Donald Maass’s and Lisa Cron’s sessions — they will be particularly helpful to you guys who are just starting out, but all of us at all stages in the journey soaked this stuff up.
We explored parts of the House of Seven Gables that were… roped off.
Sean and I listened to the mastheads clink like towering windchimes out over the waters of the bay.
A David Bowie Dance Party ensued.
We talked about muses and moral law, the difference between types of talent agents and the difference between international and domestic adoption, about listening and learning and loving well.
And at the end, we all signed one another’s copy of Author in Progress, which worked like this year’s yearbook. I was humbled to get a chance to contribute:
The night of the election, we were down in the basement doing an open mic night for flash fiction, zentangles, and Sean and I lead some Irish drinking songs. Somewhere in there, I felt prompted to play Leonard Cohen’s Democracy. Then the news came of the election.
Two days later, Cohen died. I have to share this because of the emotion in my heart:
You could probably summarize the emotions of the week with the headline:
TRUMP RISES
COHEN DIES
BOWIE LIVES ON
VIA DANCING AUTHORS
Uncon 2016 did something to writers that you won’t find elsewhere. It’s a conference of about 120 introverts (with few exceptions) coming together to posture themselves as co-learners and co-laborers on this quest to change the world with the written word. And we already have once. And we will again.
They are my family in many ways, my kith and kin, my tribe if you’re a Godin fan, my blood brothers and blood sisters in the craft. I will miss them for another two years and will be doing my best to write them letters and interact on Writer Unboxed, looking ever forward to the next one. You won’t want to miss it.
It’s the least I can do after they dressed me up like Harry Dresden and gave me free family photos with fellow authors:
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