Eric W's Response to "What Christians Believe"

Response by Eric Wolford:

Even before reading the section in my textbook, my heart leaped when I heard that the section was written by C.S. Lewis! Although I wouldn't consider myself much of a reader on my spare time, I do remember some of the few books that I had actually read for the sake of reading were often by C.S. Lewis. The reason was actually from my environment I grew up in as a child. Although my family weren't (and still aren't) members of the LDS church, my father was a huge fan of anything that was written by C.S. Lewis, so much so that the first book that he gave me to read on my spare time as us two were waiting for the paint to dry on my Pinewood Derby car was The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. Later on, I bought the whole series of The Chronicles of Narnia and also read one of his science fiction novels.

Anyways, as I had began to read the section, my eyes stopped at the sentence, “If you are a Christian you do not have to believe that all the other religions are wrong all through.” The reason why my eyes stopped there really came to the fact that, throughout my life as a member in a myriad of other Christian churches, this description of Christianity was often unfamiliar in some of the churches I had attended and many of the televangelists I saw on the small screen as a kid. Heck, the ignorance of this sentence was so extreme that, as I grew, the idea wasn't that only other religions were completely and totally wrong, but so-called “cults”, including the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, were horridly wrong. Consequentially, I began to realize how wrong this way of thinking as soon as I moved from Phoenix, AZ to the small farming city of Palmer, AK. There, I began to befriend many members of the church, and realized that they were just as Christian as I was, although I had some differing beliefs on account of the apostasy.

While the conditions in my family seemed to be fine at first, I had began to grow into a way of believing as what Lewis would call Christianity-and-water. While I still understood such things as sin, hell, and evil, my mind had began to be so complacent to the point in which those things began to appear to become harder to distinguish, partly due to my poor scripture study habits and how perfect my life had begun to be. However, just like many things in life, I received a wake-up call through the tragic experience of my parents splitting up and eventually divorcing. Suddenly, not only was my life not perfect, but I was center of my parents' arguments while my only hope and prayer was for them to stop so my family could be “perfect” again, realizing that the perfection I thought never really existed. At this point, I began to see how Lewis described the universe as being “cruel and unfair”, but unlike him, this tragedy sparked in me a greater endeavor for searching the truth, knowing that Heavenly Father is real and that He loves me.

The search started with the spirit's presence nudging me to ask about Brigham Young University and my curiosity of why the spirit would nudge me of doing so, with previous ideas in my head about how the LDS church was “not Christian”. Seeking to find some truth, I heeded to it's voice and I called my family friend who happened to be an alumni from BYU's Law School. While I wasn't able to talk to him personally on the phone, I left him a message concerning a letter of recommendation to BYU and prayed for the best. A few weeks later, two elders who were serving in what would soon be my home ward called me, knowing about my call to my family friend about BYU. I originally thought it would be them just talking about the university, but it turned out to be the first of my many sessions with them. While the first session introduced me to the apostasy and of Joseph Smith's Prayer, I still was not ready to let go of the Christianity-in-water that I was comfortable with.

By June of that year, I had finally been baptized to the church, but not without my father's slight objections. By this point, I saw something different with my father... while he still separated the LDS church with “Christianity”, he was ready to believe that the church was not wrong all the way. It was a start, but I was still left with a haunting question, “What is Christianity truly?” I knew and still know that the church is Christian, but for so many other Christians who aren't members of the LDS church throughout the world, there is still that idea of us being members of a “cult” or at least a bunch of confused Christians who need to get their “beliefs straight”. For this, I believe Lewis sheds some light on the issue with this article.

As stated before, people who proclaim themselves to be Christian should, as Lewis states in the beginning of the article, “...not have to believe that all the other religions are wrong all through.” For those individuals in my life who don't seem to agree with Lewis in this matter, Lewis would probably suggest them to take a look in their Bibles again. Also, Christians should not be like the pantheists, who believe that God is beyond good and evil and that, essentially, everything in the universe is a part of God. Then, Christianity should not be a simple religion. As stated previously in my response, I was even a sucker at one point for beginning to believe in the type of Christianity Lewis calls “Christianity-in-water”. However, especially since I became a member of the church, I now understand that God, nor Christianity in general, is simple. There are many doctrines throughout Church History that are still barely known to us, either because it is too complicated for us to comprehend in this life or because of the mere sacredness of the doctrine. One great example is of Heavenly Mother. We know she exists due to all the references of her in important talks, hymns, and scriptural works like “A Proclamation to the World”, however, that is all that we know. We also know through the article that evil is nothing more than a rebellion from good, even dating back to the per-existence when Satan wanted to get all the glory and honor for himself so he could be higher than God. He then used this with Adam and Eve, with Lewis stating Satan's comment about them “being as God” if they partook of the forbidden fruit. Now what does that mean for us, coming from the LDS perspective knowing about the doctrine of exaltation in which we all have the potential to be as God? Looking back on what Lewis talks of concerning the fall, “... they could “be like gods” - could set up on their own as if they had created themselves – be their own masters.” In this, Lewis is not objecting about the belief of exaltation, in which comes from a dependance on God, but rather the foolish notion of being masters of our own lives without the need of God. Finally, Lewis states that Christians must all believe that Jesus is who He states He is... the Son of God. He cannot be just a great “religious teacher” because, with all the claims He made in His mortal ministry, either He would have been a lunatic with delusions of grandeur or a demon trying to make Himself to be greater than God.

So, to conclude this response, are people who belong to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints Christian? Well, according to C.S. Lewis, we are. We aren't pantheistic, we don't believe in an over-simplified version of Christianity, we understand about how evil came to be, and, most importantly, we believe Jesus Christ to be the Son of God who suffered for our sins so that we may come back to Heavenly Father's presence. That means, the only other reasons why other Christians might not consider us Christian are for reasons not presented in this article. For some, the reason comes to the idea that Revelation 22:18-19 supposedly states that there shouldn't be any more scriptures besides those in the bible. While this might be a noble reason, this is historically inaccurate due to the fact the Bible came into existence centuries after the completion of the last book of the Bible and because of the neglected books that were a part of the original Bible. Others might complain because of our belief in modern-day prophets and/or temples, but again, the reasons are trivial due to conflicting readings of scripture. However, despite all of these reasons for why the LDS church is or is not Christian, according to Lewis and his arguments in the article, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is, without any doubt, Christian.

Mykell A's Response to "What Christians Believe"

So, I must start out by saying that I found the paragraph above the start of the section to be very entertaining.  I always think of those who convert to Christians as people who are suddenly a lot happier about life, but I guess it’s possible for someone to finally have to reluctantly “give in” and become a Christian after failing over and over to prove there is no god. 

And so I begin my response to the reading assignment I was given, “What Christians Believe”.   I must admit that I was surprised to see that C.S. Lewis had written a section in our text book, and I was pretty excited to read it.  From what I gathered, Lewis had spent a lot more time thinking about how to logically prove that there is a god than I had throughout my life.  I guess I’ve just always known, and so there wasn’t as much to think about, but this article helped me to see the logic in Christianity.

I found it amusing that he pointed out that you can’t just have things be simple in life, and therefore it makes no sense that people would claim that things are the way they are just because that’s the way God made them to be and other such excuses for what they don’t know.  At the same time, he mentions that there are people who say that the closer you come to being wise, the more you realize that things aren’t just black and white, and that even good deeds contain a bit of evil in them and vice versa.  I couldn’t help but think that this wasn’t true, since if it’s something you know that God wants you to do no matter what, you should do it!  None of this shades-of-grey stuff! 

One point that I really liked about this article was the distinction between Satan being a fallen angel as opposed to him just having come into existence as an evil being who thought his ways were best.  It reminded me of a discussion a friend of mine from high school had with me.  She was convinced that Satan had just come into existence all on his own and that he was pure evil from the very beginning and had never had an ounce of godliness in him at all.  I tried to explain to her what those who are LDS believe, but she refused to even let me speak, saying that I was just speaking blasphemy and should keep quiet.  (Her mom had told her that she could join any church she wanted but the one I went to, since we “worshiped Satan”.  The funny thing is, I had told her pretty much all of the basic church doctrine before her mom told her this, showing all this evidence to her that LDS people are Christians, and yet she believed her mom over me, and she had known me for six years.  Yet just like that she accepted that her mom was right and that I was a follower of Satan.  She told me once that she prayed every day that I would convert to her religion.  This was approximately two days after she had just told me that she didn’t believe she had found the true church or if there even was one.  So why was she trying to convert me to her not-true religion?  Strange… ) 

Lewis provided a great argument, though.  He basically said that if God is stronger than Satan (which no Christian can deny, I’d hope), then why doesn’t He just put an end to Satan’s rule over the earth?  Well, that’s because he must respect freedom of will, which explains why He allows us humans to do what we want, even though He doesn’t always like what we choose to do with our freedom.  Still, it must be worth it to Him for us to have our agency, since He’s allowed us to have it. 

I really liked this article, and it was fun to read it from the LDS perspective, especially since Lewis’ arguments were so in line with what we believe.  It was really quite amazing, and got me to think a lot more about the logical arguments in favor of Christianity as opposed to the largely spiritual ones that I’ve relied on throughout my life (not that those are bad at all, and they’re even more powerful than logic, in my opinion).       

Jourden D's response to "What Christians Believe"

I have always loved reading C.S. Lewis. Every time I open one of his books a new idea hits me in the face and gives me something to think about for a while. This reading was no different. Many times I have gone over the logical reasons for what we believe, but I have never come even close to the reasoning he showed. I usually go over the typical reasons: the Book of Mormon is obviously true and therefore our Church is true. Sometimes I think about other things like how many members there are worldwide and how many of them were converted in just a few hundred years. I think about how perfectly organized the Church is, with all of its different groups and meetings and systems. I sometimes relate it to personal experience and how the things I have witnessed prove, to me, that I have a heavenly father that loves me. I think about these things not necessarily because of doubt, but because I find it interesting to see reason support things that can't be proven with anything but my own convictions.

     I found the part about evil stemming from good fascinating. I always knew that you couldn't have one without the other, that there must be opposition in all things, and all the typical things like how you can't really appreciate joy until you have felt pain. The way he talked about it though brought in a whole new aspect: that evil is brought about by people who want things that are not evil but through selfishness, or whatever it is that drives them, they get it in an evil way.

    I also loved where he talks about Christ and that there is no possible way he could be a man who was just a good man. The logical approach to that one is something I would never have thought of, and it made sense. At first I wondered if it was correct but it is true, none of us have the power to forgive others sins and if we tried we would for sure be lunatics. Only Christ and our Heavenly Father can do that.
   
My favorite part was reading it from an LDS perspective. We know that Heavenly Father was once like us and that one day we can become like him. I thought about that a lot while I read because I felt that it needed to fit in somewhere. That belief is an essential part of our gospel and it was strange to read a paper that was so uplifting and not have it in there. Besides this, Lewis so completely described so many things that we believe. He talked about agency, the way bad things happen to good people, right and wrong, and the eternal perspective. Every time I read Lewis I'm astonished to find how in-sync most of what he says is with what we believe. He might be missing some parts, but that guy knows a lot about what is going on.

Claire W's response to "What Christians Believe"

Okay. So first off let me just say that I love C.S. Lewis. He is the most insightful guy ever.

I used to believe very firmly that God was real and always there and always had been. Then in eighth grade my grandmother died and I began to question. It wasn’t that all of a sudden I was in doubt. It happened slowly over time. I began to wonder if there really was an afterlife and if there really was a God. Then last year in my ward there was a foreign exchange student from China who had never been introduced to Christianity in any form. At first she was stiff at church and didn’t really participate, but by the end she was praying and said she felt something warm inside. And I thought, if this girl who knew nothing of God can come from a country where talk of religion in general is discouraged and feel something, there must really be something there. I started to think about that and how there must be a God because if there wasn’t no one would have ever thought that there was. People all through history have come to believe in a higher power, and why would they if there was nothing there?

C.S. Lewis said that when he was an atheist he insisted there was no God because the world was too unjust. But then he asked himself where he had gotten the idea of just and unjust and what was he comparing it to if the world had simply happened by chance. He told himself it was his own idea, “But if [he] did that, then [his] argument against God collapsed too-for that argument depended on saying that the world really was unjust…Thus in the very act of trying to prove that God did not exist- in other words that the whole of reality was senseless-[he] found [he] was forced to assume that one part of reality-namely [his] sense of justice- was full of sense.” It’s crazy, but just before reading this I was reading in Second Nephi when Lehi is preaching to his son Jacob, and amazingly C.S. Lewis and Lehi make similar points. Lehi tells Jacob that if there was no law, there would be no sin, and if there was no sin, there would be no righteousness, and if there was no righteousness there would be no God. Or in other words because there is a sense of right and wrong there is a God.

If we had just happened to be we would have no use for laws. We would have no sense of right and wrong. If we really came from an amoeba I doubt we would even be able to think logically at all. We would be like dumb animals, running around naked eating whatever and whoever. We would have no reason to feel an awful guilty feeling if we ran around as prostitutes. Why would we? There would be no one to answer to and so there would be no remorse or feelings of guilt.

We feel that someone is there watching us because there is someone watching us. That’s all there is to it.

Spencer B's Response to "What Christians Believe"

After just a few paragraphs into “What Christians Believe”  I was simply amazed with C. S. Lewis.  I’ve believed in God and in the Church for as long as I can remember, but until now I’d never thought of the reasoning behind what I believe. That’s what Lewis does in this article. He goes beyond the typical statements of faith and explains using simple logic as a basis for why Christianity must be true. I’m not saying that those statements of faith are useless or trivial. I know that they are very powerful and that simple faith is the aspect that is probably the most important behind what we believe rather than clever reasoning. However, the way C.S. Lewis presents Christianity in general makes so much sense and helps reinforce what I already know by backing it with logic. 

He makes some profound statements in the article that are outstanding. For example he talks about how being a Christian doesn’t mean that we believe that every other religion is absolutely wrong in every aspect in which they are different from Christianity, but rather that every religion may have some right and some wrong within their doctrine, and some are closer to the actual truth than others. He continues by examining certain basic points of Christian doctrine, such as the existence and nature of God, the Devil and his role, and some aspects of agency.

His concluding section talks specifically about Jesus Christ’s divine heritage, whether he’s the Son of God or not. He says that it is foolish to say things like “I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.” He replies by saying “A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg – or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense, about His being a great human teacher. “ Jesus is the Son of God and He did die to save each one of us.

Miranda S's Response to "What Christians Believe"

C. S. Lewis has the most amazing view on Christianity that I have ever read.  He approaches it from a very realistic point of view and dissects Christianity with the precision of a surgeon.  If I was going to respond to him, I would like to title my response, “What Mormons Believe” and go from there. 

First, We believe that God is out Father, Jesus is his son and our Savior (the man who, according to C. S. Lewis forgave all of our sins and we accepted that) and there is a separated being called the Holy Ghost.  This “Ghost” (he’s really more of a spirit that can dwell in every man) helps us choose between right and wrong.  This is the fundamental difference between our sect of Christianity and the others.  The belief in the Trinity dominates the Christian doctrine that moves throughout the world.   These beings are separate and tangible (God and Jesus) beings that communicate with man on this earth. 

Second, We are not held accountable for Adam’s transgression but for our own foibles.  We are responsible for ourselves and the choices that we make.  It is our free will and belief in agency that make us different from those who believe in fate and prophecies. 

Third, we are saved by grace after all we can do and because of Christ’s atonement, we have the opportunities to make it to heaven, IF we do all that is required of us (which isn’t much at all if you think about it.  Mostly just following the simple commandments and believing in Christ). 

Fourth, there are principles of the Gospel and no one can gain authority unless they have been ordained by the laying on of hands.  We follow the organization of the ancient church and believe that men can speak in tongues, see visions, prophesy (it’s different than centering your life around the idea that someone is determining your destiny), interpret languages, and heal.  We believe that the Bible is correct, so far as it was translated correctly and that the Book of Mormon is the word of God (that statement made me some very unfriendly associations in high school). 

Fifth, we believe that God does not halt revelation.  Revelation is constant and has continued since the world began.  We believe that there will be a gathering of Israel when all men will be separated into their tribes and the Earth will receive it’s paradisiacal glory (the Earth is a living being, by the way). 

Sixth, while we claim to worship God without any interference, but we also extend that courtesy to others.  We believe that we are the subjects to our temporal leaders as well as our spiritual leaders.  This makes us subservient (in a gospel way) to the dictates of the government.  We believe in honesty, chastity, benevolent, doing good to all men, enduring to the end, virtue, loveliness, and praiseworthy things. 

I know that this list is not unique and if you recognize it, then I did my job.  C. S. Lewis wrote his declaration of what he believed and I have now written mine. 

Jessica A's Response to "Getting Launched"

In my English 251 class, which is Fundamental Literary Analysis, we talked about the reasons that each individual reads. Some people read to be informed, some people read to critique things, but I think most of us read just to have fun. I know I do. We also talked about how people read. Some are speedy-quick, some chew them thoughtfully and digest them, and some tear them apart. This is what “Getting Launched” was about, just on the other end of the spectrum: writing.

I don’t think I’m the only one that groaned when I started reading. “Oh, no!” I thought to myself, “This is another of those articles that’s going to try and tell me how to be creative.” I hate it when puffed-up, pompous people who’ve spent decades of studying the psychological processes of writing try to tell me that the way I do things isn’t the best way to do them. I’m an adult (I’ll admit, a young adult and still probably one of the most naïve people on the planet…), but I’m also a writer. I’ve been doing this a while, and I’m thinking I probably know the best way for me to write.

Then the second paragraph: “Given our quirky methods of composition, I’m leery of recommending any one way as effective, for the question always becomes, ‘Effective for whom?’”

That was the part where I stopped feeling like a caged animal. (Assigned readings can be hideously excruciating. We all know this.) You see, people, I knew this to begin with: there is no set of universal rules that can tell us how to write, because they will work for some people, but not for everybody. I was very relieved to find my opinions echoed in this article.

So, he first gives that disclaimer, and then he gives a few suggestions for people who need assistance with their strategies. Here are a few points that I thought were helpful:

“Pick a subject that means something to you.” This was probably my favorite section. Trimble is right. Are we going to do a good job if we honestly do not care about what we are writing about? I’m writing about the causes of claustrophobia for my Wiki paper (not easy to find. Been spending hours on it. Too bad those extra hours don’t count towards our Coursework Log.) because I have always had issues with small spaces and crowds and clothing that comes close to my neck… and on and on and on… Anyway, it was especially bad when I went to Europe this summer. I tried to climb to the cupola of St. Peter’s in the Vatican. I made it, but not without a near panic attack and the shedding of many tears. It was EMBARRASSING! There were tons of people, no breathing space whatsoever, no way to go forward or back, and the slanting roof of the dome started closing in… and I don’t like stairs.

But this was the first time that I’d ever come close to having a panic attack. I wanted to know why it was so bad all of a sudden since I was on VACATION and I was supposed to be having FUN. (Don’t we hate irrational fears?) So, this is very much a subject I cared about… if you couldn’t tell. Trimble’s point is that we need to put our feelings into our writing to make it matter.

Next, Trimble talks about what we had to do with our papers: narrowing the topic. I’m almost thinking mine is TOO narrow because I haven’t been able to get my hands on anything concrete yet. I may have to consign myself to actually spending time in the WINDOWLESS basement of the library (I’m a claustrophobe, remember, so… this is not good). Going on… we’ve all done this narrowing of the topic, I hope. Trimble also talks about writing being a process where we find things out, and only after we’re done do we know what we are talking about. This is kind of confusing, but it just means that we’re learning along the way. That’s another way to stay interested, folks: learning.

Other suggestions he had were overloading on data (Useful, because then you don’t have to make your sentences wordy and a paragraph long to fill up the required white space. Anyone else guilty of that at any time? Consequently, I’ve only really done it for the last ten-page paper I had to write. Can I insert a smiley here? :P), asking yourself questions and answering them using your sources, getting a thesis (the point of the work, but not the subject… he says to treat your writing like a story even when it isn’t), creating your own audience, and working through several crap drafts. The crap drafts thing might be helpful for those of us who’ve procrastinated that first draft that’s due on Wednesday. It’s mental puke, guys, but it helps you to get your ideas on paper so you can organize them. I think this is what SWILUA was talking about when she said to give ourselves permission to suck. You can build off the ‘suckiness’ and you don’t get attached to it. It’s easier to change it when you’re not attached. Believe me, I know this from personal experience.

All in all, I thought that this article was very helpful and I will be using those tips to try and catch up with my impossible Wiki paper. Maybe I will get one of the librarians to brave the depths of the basement of the library and get me the huge stack of books I need so I can stay in places where there are windows and I can’t sense the huge weight of the ground above my head. (Yes. Genuine claustrophobe.)

In conclusion, I wish to rant about irrational fears. I know that if I go in the basement of the HBLL it won’t kill me. I knew that when I climbed the twenty-thousand stairs to the cupola of St. Peter’s that there would be a wonderful view at the top. I knew that when I took the elevator to the top of the Eiffel Tower that I wasn’t going to die. I know that I can get out of my walk-in closet when the door is shut. I know that large crowds of people are not scary… EXCEPT THAT THEY ARE! Hindsight is 20/20. I look back and laugh because it is so idiotic. I don’t understand where this fear came from. The sources I have so far tell me it is from some traumatic experience that I had as a child, except that, as far as I know, I NEVER had this experience. I am excited to get my Wiki paper done so I can know the reasons for these things… (Rant done.)

The strategies in this paper are very useful, so use them. My favorite is the first one because it gives me permission to do what I want to do in the way that I want to do it. Yay. I also recommend the crap draft strategy. Especially with the Wiki paper, we need to be objective and so if it sucks, we can treat it like it came from another person and we can draw and quarter it. Yay again. After writing ten pages, we’ll all want to torture something. Have fun everybody.

Audrey L's response to "Getting Launched"

I feel so much better about my writing after reading “Getting Launched.”  All through high school I would dread writing papers because I always felt like I was going through the writing process wrong.  My teachers seemed to have one set process of how everyone should write essays, and everyone had to conform to that process.  I, however, never felt that whatever process they recommended worked for me.  I couldn’t just sit down the day I was told to write a paper and write something without thinking about it for a time beforehand, but I always felt like I was procrastinating when I didn’t actually write anything down on paper until a few days after I got the assignment.  It wasn’t that I was avoiding the paper, usually; I just felt like I would write better if I thought about it for a while, turned it over in my mind, observed it from every aspect, and wrote it out in my mind, before actually writing it out on paper.  Then, once I felt I had considered it as much as was necessary, I would sit down, and write the whole paper in one sitting.  I will admit that I probably didn’t ever revise a paper as much as I should have.  I don’t have any excuse for that, it just didn’t happen. 

My other problem with my high school English classes was that I never had to try hard to get a good grade, so I usually wouldn’t.  I would do just enough work for the A, but I very rarely went the extra mile.  I could write a rough draft, read through it once to correct all of the grammar mistakes and typos and turn it in.  I might lose a point here or a point there for small mistakes, but I still got A’s so I never changed the way I wrote.  If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.  Reading what Trimble said about writing a “zero draft” and revising multiple times intimidated me.  It feels so overwhelming to have to write and rewrite a paper over and over again.  It is a new concept for me, but I can definitely understand how it would be useful, and, now that I am at college, necessary. 

I also enjoyed the advice that Trimble gave about answering questions on 5x8 inch slips of paper as part of the brainstorming process.  It seems like a really good way to organize thoughts, and it will help determine which direction the paper is going.  Instead of just having one main topic and millions of jumbled thoughts running through my brain, these cards can show me what is important, what questions need to be answered, and how to answer them.  I will definitely need to try this exercise with my next paper. 

I can’t believe I am saying this, but I am actually not dreading the next paper that I will have to write.  I don’t know that I am looking forward to it, but it does not seem quite so overwhelming or intimidating if I just follow the steps the Trimble suggests.  I feel good about a few of them, that they will really help my writing to become easier and better.  But I also need to remember that I need to find whatever works for me, and perfect that process.  Writing is an individual process.  No two people will write the same thing, so no two people should write the same way.  I wish I had learned that a long time ago. 

Brandon B's Response to "Getting Launched"

One key topic mentioned in this article of Readings for Intensive Writers was the practice of letting your madman out.  This idea allows the thoughts of our unconscious creative mind to flow onto paper without the interruption of our critical thoughts.  Each of us will likely run into a block while writing our papers.  John R. Timble says that to get around this block, take a small sheet of paper and just write whatever comes to your mind.  Do not let the flow of ideas be stopped.  Don’t take more than a second or two to think of what write, but also set a time limit on yourself of about twenty minutes.  If you feel like you have run out of ideas, then write that you have run out of ideas.  Write that this is the hardest thing you have ever done if that is how you feel.  Once you get thoughts to flow onto your paper, there is bound to be a few keepers that you can expound upon and help you in the writing process. 

                  I have never been much of a writer, although my mom always said I would be wonderful.  I have always felt that have no idea where to start, or do not care about the subject.  Timble mentions a process by which we can overcome both problems.

                  He says that when you have the option to pick a topic to write about, pick one of which you feel very strongly.  Pick a topic that allows you to really express your feelings.  When you do not have that option, create your own feelings about the subject.  He says, “It’s impossible to write electric prose… without strong emotion to energize your thinking.” 

                  Luckily, with the Wikipedia research paper, we all had the opportunity to pick a topic.  I picked tarantulas, and I still am greatly disturbed by pictures I find while researching.  Hopefully I can put a little of that emotion into my writing while doing my best to be unbiased and thorough.

                 

Rachel D's Response to "Getting Launched"

Regretfully I have never really been much of a writer, but when it does happen, every blue moon, I tend to think my writing skills could beat Shakespeare’s. But I rarely make rough drafts, or any drafts for that matter, and my outcome is usually something to laugh at or cry over, which is perhaps the reason for the lack of writing in my life. However I do enjoy writing and I believe reading this article could really help me write more during my life and in a more efficient way. The main aspect in this article that really hit me was how much he stressed thinking, and drafting, even if it’s on small cards. I usually do my thinking last second. And even then it can hardly be called thinking, I am guilty of playing Tetris as a thought motivator, among other things, like listening to hard rock and punk music, the whole time thinking how much I do not want to do what I am about to do, and usually my paper will end up with a frowny face or a note to come see the teacher after class, which hopefully will not happen to me. I just read that this didn’t need to be long and I apologize for my ranting. I did read it though.

I'm going to be posting some of your responses to "Getting Launched" now

Remember, you only need to leave a comment on one of them. And you don't need to comment on this post. I waive the "you must comment on all SWILUA's posts" rule. :)

SWILUA's Response to "Short Assignments"

So, it’s Friday night and my house is a mess. And when I say mess, I mean apocalyptic. (There’s a reason we call our kids F-4 and F-5.)

There’s a baby bottle of was-milk-now-cheese under the couch, a shredded pile of what I think was a book, ground toothpaste in the carpet, a few (used?) pull-ups, wrappers from... something, some dirty laundry, a few DVD cases without DVDs, a couple of unopened cartons of yogurt, broken toys (quantity: 47), and oh my lanta I could go on.

I call the kids to me.

“Sam,” I say. “Lily. Look. What do you see.”

Sam (F-4): “It’s a mess.”

Lily (F-5): “A really BIG mess.”

Me: “And this is just the living room.”

Moment of silence.

Then, an epiphany. Well, more of just a remembering followed by a maternal sigh.

“We’re going to have to do this bird by bird,” I say.

Sam: “There’s a dead bird, too?!”

Me: “Maybe. That’s not the point.”

Lily: “You KILLED A BIRD?”

Me: “No. Close your eyes.”

Sam: "Can we get a bird?"

Me: "No. Close your eyes."

Sam: “Why?”

Me: “Just do it.”

Lily: “I don’t want to close my eyes.”

“Obey me the first time I tell you to do something.” (Too bad it’s already like the fourth, right?)

F-4 and F-5 close their eyes.

“Now,” I say. “Point.”

They point. (Miracles happen.)

“Okay. Open your eyes. What are you pointing to?”

Sam: “I’m pointing to a wad of gum.”

Lily: “I’m pointing to a ninja tutu.”

Me: “Okay. Don’t think about this whole big mess. Don’t think about how it’s so overwhelming. Just pick up that one thing.”

They stare at me.

“Sam, if you don’t hurry, Lily’s going to beat you.”

They scramble. Fast. (There might be some fingernails driven into kidneys.)(My kidneys, of course. Never mind the laws of physics, the one who gets hurt is always me.)

321 birds later, I get out my Roomba and I watch him circle.

Annie Lamott may have some seriously non-Honor-Code approved blonde dreadlocks, but she also has some serious sense.

We could have sat in my apocalyptic living room for days, staring at the massive mounds of crap everywhere, but then it would be days later and I’d—-let’s be honest, the kids would have ditched me by then—-still be sitting there all panicked and freaked out about the fact that my.life.has.come.to.this.

The problem with big projects is that they’re always so... BIG. They make the panic part of our brain go into overdrive and we get so freaked out that we just end up finding excuses to procrastinate. Which only makes the project BIGGER.

Save yourself a headache: go bird by bird.

(Not dead birds.)

(Gross.)

The Bibliography Challenge!

When I was an undergraduate, one of my classes had this super evil library scavenger hunt. It was full of psychotic questions like, “The following quote [insert random bizarre quote] is a line from a book. Find it.”

This was before the internet (yes, I'm that old) and there were 100 questions like this.

Me and my group were working, like, 8 hours a day every day for two weeks. We were so mad about that stupid assignment and the awfulness, etc. And we were having trouble. So we started to get desperate. To try desperate things. For example, we narrowed one question down to four books. But we couldn’t find the answer in any of them.

So we called the authors.

All stalker-like, we got their phone numbers and friggin called them at home and read them the quote and asked them if they wrote the book that had the quote and if so, which book was it?

We did a lot of other things, too. We talked to professors. We broke into email accounts. We pretended to be research assistants for professors that didn’t exist and got librarians to find stuff for us. We were like Veronica Mars, but with more rage.

Well, I wrote nasty things about that horribly hard assignment on the course evaluations. It was the worst assignment EVER, I concluded. And all I learned was how to be MAD.

And then, years later, I was in grad school, doing a research project. Everyone in the class was having trouble finding stuff, but I wasn’t. They all asked me how I was finding stuff. So I told them.

They looked at me like I was crazy.

And it hit me: everything I knew about doing research, I learned from that awful assignment. Everything.

You don't need to call any authors today, but I thought you might enjoy practicing one of our techniques: the technique of the bibliography.

See, one of the things I learned during that assignment is that bibliographies are the most fantastic ways to find sources. Instead of pouring over databases, grab books on topics slightly larger than your topic and turn directly to the bibliography. Don’t even read the book. Just read the bibliographies. You’ll be amazed how much easier it is when someone else has done the research for you. Something I (still!) commonly do is to go to the library, find 20 books, pile them on a table and pour through the bibliographies. (Let someone else put the books away.) So useful.

So, here are the rules of the challenge:

1) Work in your peer review groups

2) You have only the class period. Fifty minutes. After that, time is up.

3) Start with one person’s topic and then work your way through everyone else’s topic. Get through as many people as you can, but don’t exceed the time limit. Rock paper scissors to see who goes in what order.

4) For each topic, find 20 books written on a broader topic. Don’t open the books yet.

5) Once you have ALL 20 books, put them on a table and flip to the bibliographies.

6)Write down peer-reviewed articles that apply to each smaller topic from each bibliography.

7)When you’ve gotten through the 20 bibliographies, it’s time to move to the next person in the group.

8)Repeat for each person until the time limit is up.

9)Bring your lists of applicable peer-reviewed articles to next class. The group with the most articles wins a prize.

Warning: A Response to "Bird by Bird" (post edit: what I meant was "Short Assignments" which is a chapter FROM Bird by Bird) is coming Tomorrow

So you should get out your RFIW today and read the article.