Is it starting to rain?
Did the check bounce?
Are we out of coffee?
Is this going to hurt?
Could you lose your job?
Did the glass break?
These are the opening lines of “Afraid So”, a poem by Jeanne Marie Beaumont which simply lists questions about possible disasters big and small, ending with the question “Will it get any worse?”
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I used this poem as inspiration for five minute writing exercises in both my UCLA memoir class last week and the Wellness Community workshop on Saturday. In the memoir class, where everyone is looking toward publication, it was fascinating to see that their questions circled around what they were writing in their memoirs- which they didn’t realize at first. (But isn’t that why we write? To answer our own questions?) In the Wellness Community, where everyone is writing for therapy, some questions were heart wrenching, and some were very funny.
Try it. Five minutes: write a list of questions. Don’t think, just write.
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