Mary Ann Hogan
Chips Quinn Writing Coach
Dear Coach,
Do you know where my muse went? Will it come back before this project is done? — Alone in Albuquerque
Dear Alone,
Could Muse be offended because you referred to her as an it? Perhaps. More likely: You’ve been working on your project too hard for too long. The stress has squeezed the creative juice out of your brain. Do some other mind-focusing activity — sports, chess, gardening, cooking, whatever — or pump out a few daily stories to give Muse a chance to return. There’s nothing like relaxing, mindless competence to get the muses stirred.
Mary Ann Hogan’s Ask The Coach columns, first written for the Chips Quinn Scholars program, are republished with permission from the Freedom Forum Institute, 2019.