inspiration Archives - Charlotte Rains Dixon

Things Have Fallen By The Way Side (A Love Letter)

NOTE: I now write regularly (every Sunday and often more) on Substack. But I’m trying to keep this blog up to date as well, because it still gets a lot of traffic. So I’ll be copying and pasting my weekly love letters here. But if you want the full effect–over on Substack I also offer […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 2 weeks ago10/29/2025

inspiration Writing Process

Set Your Brain and Your Creativity Free

Being a writer is a tough gig, as previously noted. Hugely satisfying, and the only thing you can do if you are called to it, but it is a demanding task mistress and at all but the highest levels, the pay is low. So you might as well have fun while you are doing it. […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 7 years ago07/16/2018

inspiration

Open to the World

I once told a mentor that I’d had an epiphany–to be a writer, you needed to know a lot about the world. And I believe this is true. As writers, we need to understand character in order to create ones that leap off the page. We need to understand nuances of place, so that our […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 8 years ago02/25/2018

inspiration

On Writing and the Olympics

I’m ready. I’ve got two projects I want to finish, one knitted, one crocheted, on the needles, and I’ve warned my husband that we’ll be eating our dinners in front of the TV for the next couple weeks. Because: Olympics. Because: Winter Olympics. I love them. I love watching the Olympics, especially the Winter Olympics. […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 8 years ago

inspiration Mindset

On The Importance of Confidence in Yourself–and Your Writing

On my writing retreat last weekend, I reread my novel. Yeah, that’s right. The one I told everyone how terrible it was. How it needed major surgery. How it had plot holes so big you could drive a truck through them. How the characters were undeveloped. In re-reading it I found that all of the […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 9 years ago

inspiration Mindset Writing

The Glorious Avidity of the Beginner’s Mind

“In the beginning mind, there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few.” Suzuki Roshi I don’t know about you, but I consider myself an expert. Yep, I sure do. Because I’ve been writing novels for a gazillion years and teaching fiction writing for half that time. I’ve studied long enough to have […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 9 years ago06/14/2016

inspiration Uncategorized Words

My Three Words for 2016

Ha, you thought I’d forgotten, didn’t you? Because every year I choose three words to guide me. Except usually I do it in early December. Not this year, though. For some reason, most of December seemed like one big blur to me this year. But never mind. Here it is the last day of the […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 10 years ago01/22/2016

inspiration Travel

From Spark to Story Workshop Report

Scarritt Bennett Center I am back from Nashville, y'all. I went there to teach a workshop with my good writing friend Terry Price. We called it From Spark to Story, and planned it to be just that: a journey from gathering inspiration, to getting it onto the page, to shaping it into a story. […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 11 years ago

inspiration Writing Habits

Do the Most Important Thing First

I've not harrassed myself people about this for awhile, so as 2015 starts, it seems a good time. And, there's a hashtag going around on Twitter so its hard to avoid. (Of course now that I've gone to look for it, I can't find it.) And, most importantly, I truly, deeply, madly believe in this […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 11 years ago11/03/2015

inspiration

So Long, Farewell, Auf Weidersehen Goodnight to 2014

(In case you don't know–what, you've lived under a rock for the last umpteen years? Kidding, just kidding–my title is a take-off of a song from The Sound of Music, the best musical of ALL TIME, and no I'm not talking about the stupid rip-off live version with Carrie Underwood in it.) This is the […]

Charlotte Rains Dixon 11 years ago11/03/2015

Charlotte Rains Dixon

Category: inspiration

Things Have Fallen By The Way Side (A Love Letter)

Set Your Brain and Your Creativity Free

Open to the World

On Writing and the Olympics

On The Importance of Confidence in Yourself–and Your Writing

The Glorious Avidity of the Beginner’s Mind

My Three Words for 2016

From Spark to Story Workshop Report

Do the Most Important Thing First

So Long, Farewell, Auf Weidersehen Goodnight to 2014

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