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Rowan Mangan

Author. Explorer. #Looking for America.

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Blog also located at Substack!

31 March 2022 Leave a Comment

Have you discovered Substack yet? I’m obsessed with it and now primarily blog over there (though you can always find my free writing here too!)

Here’s the Wild Inventures blog/newsletter/community at Substack.

I hope you’ll come over and join me there.

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Words fail me. So I go back to the source. Words fail me. So I go back to the source.
Here’s our Fiction Friday GOAT QUOTE! This is fr Here’s our Fiction Friday GOAT QUOTE! This is from my yet-to-be-published novel, Goat Street. ✨📖✨⁠
For Throwback Thursday, I’m off down memory lane For Throwback Thursday, I’m off down memory lane for the writing of my first draft of Goat Street seven years ago. I took myself (and my mum!) on an intensive writing retreat and finished the draft in 30 days. (The rewrites took *just* a little longer.)⁠
⁠
Every night after finishing writing, I published a short post about the day’s happenings. These ended up becoming a fun record of the process. ⁠
👇 👇 👇 👇 👇 
Day 4
2794 words.
Thanks for your encouragement to continue this! You may live to regret it.
Today was: 
- baking brown bread (my first loaf!)
- islands of sunlight on the sea
- new four-legged friends
- trying to write about the magic and mayhem of a trad session at an Irish pub
Institutions are places where we get indoctrinated Institutions are places where we get indoctrinated and trained by the culture to perpetuate its norms. Like food processors for people, institutions digest all the bits of a person they can use—conformity, blind obedience—and excrete everything else as waste—your soul, your personality, your joy—because these things don’t help them run effectively. In this episode of Bewildered, Martha and Rowan discuss ways we can opt out of this institutional processing to embrace our freedom and connect with our true purpose. Be sure to listen!

You can listen to the full episode on our website, link in the bio, or on your favorite podcast app.

@rowan_mangan
@bewilderedpodcast

#bewildered #podcastinglifestyle #funnypodcasts #selfhelppodcast #spiritualpodcast #podcastshows #podcastoftheday #podcasterlife #funnypodcast #podcastersofig #podcastingtips #podcastofinstagram #podcastrecommendation #podcastlifestyle #newpodcastepisode #womenwhopodcast #instapodcast #newpodcastalert #podcastseries #podcastepisode #podcastcommunity #podcastmovement #podcastsofinstagram #podcastaddict #podcastinglife #writerofinstagram #podcasthost #newpodcast #podcastersofinstagram
Today’s Lesson From Little (which I’m applying Today’s Lesson From Little (which I’m applying to everything from professional tribulations to health).

Take the materials that are used to constrain you, and make them wings.

Also—any chance you get—sit in a puddle.*

*This one applies more neatly to my professional life than you might imagine.
Here’s your Fiction Friday GOAT QUOTE! This is f Here’s your Fiction Friday GOAT QUOTE! This is from my yet-to-be-published novel, Goat Street. ✨📖✨
Let’s throw it back! This is my weekly revisitin Let’s throw it back! This is my weekly revisiting of the writing of my first draft of Goat Street seven years ago. I took myself (and my mum!) on an intensive writing retreat and finished the draft in 30 days. (The rewrites took *just* a little longer.)⁠
⁠
Every night after finishing writing, I published a short blog post about the day’s happenings. These ended up becoming a fun record of the process. ⁠
⁠
Happy throwback Thursday! Take a ride to 2015 with me…⁠
⁠
*******************⁠
April 13, 2015⁠
DAY 3: Word count 3208⁠
⁠
Low cloud on Mount Eagle and wild weather. Yet still a few moments of dazzling sunshine. Just heading out to talk to April the Horsey and give her a carrot. Looking forward to a glass of wine and Paula’s famous peat fire tonight.
Every day children show us who they really are, an Every day children show us who they really are, and often it’s not what we could have predicted (or even wanted). It can be difficult to keep ourselves from mapping out our kids’ futures for them, but things will pop up to remind us that life may have different plans for them. In this episode of Bewildered, Martha and Ro talk about children’s individuality (including their own daughter’s unexpected athleticism) and how letting go of control can help us culture-proof our children—and ourselves. Be sure to listen!

@themarthabeck 
@bewilderedpodcast 
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#bewildered #podcastinglifestyle #funnypodcasts #selfhelppodcast #spiritualpodcast #podcastshows #podcastoftheday #podcasterlife #funnypodcast #podcastersofig #podcastingtips #podcastofinstagram #podcastrecommendation #podcastlifestyle #newpodcastepisode #womenwhopodcast #instapodcast #newpodcastalert #podcastseries #podcastepisode #podcastcommunity #podcastmovement #podcastsofinstagram #podcastaddict #podcastinglife #writerofinstagram #podcasthost #newpodcast #podcastersofinstagram
Here we go! New pen, shiny new manuscript, and (al Here we go! New pen, shiny new manuscript, and (almost a) new lease on life!

This is the first day since getting Covid that I’ve been able to contemplate more than dragging self and family through the day as best I could. But today I have a treat. My brilliant mother, @paulamkeogh has written a novel called GEORGIA SALAMANDER—and I get to read it! 

What could be a better way to begin what will hopefully be a short convalescence than to read this manuscript?

(By the way, Paula is also an acclaimed memoirist and takes on a few select clients for her Memoir Mentor services. DM me if you have a memoir in you and would like to get on Paula’s waiting list.)
Here’s our Fiction Friday GOAT QUOTE! This is fr Here’s our Fiction Friday GOAT QUOTE! This is from my yet-to-be-published novel, Goat Street. ✨📖✨
Let’s throw it back! This is my weekly revisitin Let’s throw it back! This is my weekly revisiting of the writing of my first draft of Goat Street seven years ago. I took myself (and my mum!) on an intensive writing retreat and finished the draft in 30 days. (The rewrites took *just* a little longer.)⁠
⁠
Every night after finishing writing, I published a short blog post about the day’s happenings. These ended up becoming a fun record of the process. ⁠
⁠
Happy throwback Thursday! Let’s take a ride to 2015 with me…⁠
⁠
*******************⁠
April 11, 2015⁠
DAY 2: Word count 3002⁠
⁠
Nice day for it, though, between hailstones and icy winds. Snow on the mountains. Fire in the heart.⁠
We got Covid. Sorry for all the unanswered emails! We got Covid. Sorry for all the unanswered emails! On yet another horrific, impossibly painful week to live in this country, we’re focusing on being close and healing.
Here’s a little share for Fiction Friday—a tas Here’s a little share for Fiction Friday—a taste of Goat Street, the novel I’ve been working on for three or four centuries and which is out on submission with editors right now. Please hurl some good publishing vibes and spells into the void for me, friends. ✨📖✨
Let’s throw it back! Seven years ago I wrote the Let’s throw it back! Seven years ago I wrote the first draft of my yet-to-be-published novel, Goat Street, in the wild west coast of Ireland. It took a month. I unwound at the end of each day of writing with a little blog post, which I published on Facebook. These started very short, but gradually grew longer as friends started getting involved with the happenings in “the westernmost house in Europe”—which is also a key location in the book.

For Throwback Thursday, I’m going to be posting these little blogs here over the next weeks. Let me know if you enjoy them! 

DAY 1: April 10, 2015
WORD COUNT 2675
YESTERDAY I BOUGHT PLANTS Now, seven new green co YESTERDAY I BOUGHT PLANTS

Now, seven new green companions are living in our city mouse house and I’m finally perfectly in love with the space. We’ve been moving into this apartment in slow motion since the beginning of the year, trekking back and forth from our country mouse house in Pennsylvania with suitcases. 

Here’s the thing: Without plants, a room has too many right angles. Without plants, I feel less human. These plants give meaning to the skyscrapers out the window. They are the rule that proves the city’s exception. They are my friends. 

Suddenly, this is a space where I can write.

Writers: what do you need in a space before you can go deep?
UNDOING THE DAY-CRAM A couple of days ago, I was UNDOING THE DAY-CRAM

A couple of days ago, I was reflecting on the need to build some more exercise into my week. Nothing extreme: just get this creaky old body moving around a bit.

This realization led to me pulling out my calendar to see when said exercise could happen. Everything must be scheduled—which is its own form of disempowerment—but that’s another rant for another day.

The point of THIS rant is the thought process which began unrolling in my mind as I looked at the neat rows of rectangles that represent hours in my days.

Immediately, I looked for things I was already planning to do, and began assessing which of these could be combined with exercise. Could I make that call while on the elliptical without my colleague thinking I was a heavy-breathing prank caller? Could I listen to that recording on the rower? Would it be weird if I showed up to that Zoom meeting on a treadmill?

It never occurred to me to look for time slots that weren’t already full and put exercise in there as an activity to be fully present for. Part of that is that there are very few such slots in my days. But another part of it is this insidious cultural pattern that says, “Optimize!” “Streamline!” “Synergize!”

So my wild inventure for this week is to stop the day-cram. To allow myself to follow my own instincts about what my body and heart and mind and soul need. To bring music back into my days and banish the ravenous productivity monster from my mind—at least for a week.

Who’s with me? Where in your life is this spacious inventure most needed?

** This is an excerpt of a longer essay that will be sent out to all my lovely Substack subscribers (along with lots of other goodies) next Tuesday. Subscribe via the link in my bio and join the wonderful Wild Inventures community. **

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