The Fourth Rule of the Artist’s Journey is:

The Third Rule of the Artist’s Journey is:

The Second Rule of Artist’s Journey is this:

The First Rule of Artist’s Journey is this: However hard you think it will be, the reality is ten times harder.

When we embark on the artist’s journey, we take control of our lives.

Why are so many gay people artists? Because their sexual orientation (within the context of the fears and prejudices of contemporary mainstream society) has forced them to come to grips with an identity that clashes head-on with the norm.

The individual on the threshold of the artist’s journey is like the protagonist in an amnesiac story. I love these. Total Recall, The Bourne Identity and its sequels, and my fave of a couple of years ago, The Hangover.

Here’s Philip Roth on the subject of beginning a novel:

Power comes from authenticity. When we hear an artist or a politician, a warrior or an advocate speak from her true center, we feel her power. Even Lady Gaga, whose public persona is as artificially contrived as it is possible to be, is authentic in her artificiality.  

Finally, the details have been settled. The one-day Writing Retreat will take place on September 7, a Saturday, at the Zuma Orchid Ranch in Malibu, California.