Elizabeth was interviewed by Lisa Rizzo

I met Elizabeth during the Mind Stretch on the power of collaborating with other writers or artists led by Tania Pryputniewicz.  We happened to be sitting next to each other, so when Tania had us brainstorm and share lists of writers who had inspired us, Elizabeth and I paired up.  The first thing that struck me was how different we were.  While I characterize myself as someone firmly rooted in the physical here and now, in fact as someone who has an  uneasy relationship with the very idea of spirituality, Elizabeth focuses primarily on spirituality in her work.  However, we had a wonderful conversation. As so often happened during the AROHO retreat, I found myself moved just from talking to a woman so different and yet so similar to myself.  At the end of the Mind Stretch when Tania said she hoped that perhaps this exercise might be the beginning of a new collaboration between those who were paired by circumstances, I was sure that no such thing would result between Elizabeth and myself.  How wrong I was! When our interview team created our lists of future interviewees, I had to smile when I saw Elizabeth’s name on mine.  As I read her answers to my questions, I found myself connecting with so much of what she said even while others of her comments challenged me to think in new ways.  And that is the true spirit of AROHO.

Is there one specific moment or event at the retreat that sparked an insight or shift in how you perceive either your work or yourself as a writer?

When I first gathered with my small group—Writing as a Spiritual Practice—and we each introduced our interest in the topic, I felt huge relief:  I’m not alone!  I work with a lot of beginning writers who write, usually in a journal, as a way to grow personally.  But I rarely encounter writers who are serious about the craft and who already have established writing practices who still admit to this.  I suspect most writers wouldn’t write if the craft didn’t challenge them to learn and grow.  But for some reason (perhaps the extreme atheism of academia?) few writers talk openly about what happens to their inner being as they write.

The week at Ghost Ranch helped me know what I’d previously suspected:  That there are other writers in the country, especially women writers, who are interested in exploring the spiritual dimensions of writing.  When Darlene welcomed us that first morning and warned, “Expect to be changed by this retreat,” I thought, yeah, right.  But in fact I was very moved by the silence we shared, by Mind Stretch speakers’ invitations to listen to our bodies, by the ritual of making our words into flags and tying them up for the wind… The way the organizers orchestrated the week showed great respect for how the well-being of the writer and the quality of the writing are intertwined.  I came away reassured that, at least at AROHO, I will find soul mates who see continuity between their inner lives and the very public art we practice.

What’s the best advice you’ve received about writing?

When I was working on my memoir, I made a huge lifestyle change:  I quit my job teaching seventh grade, downsized, and moved into an intentional Christian community.  My first night living at the retreat center, a fire ripped through the barn and destroyed all my remaining possessions, including a lifetime of writing.  I was devastated.  Other than journal entries, I couldn’t write.  Finally Larry Sutin, my mentor in the Hamline University MFA program, took me by the shoulders and said, “You have material, woman.”  In other words, there’s no such thing as bad experiences for writers, only good material. 

This idea has really been formative—we humans can transform bad experiences by making them into art.  Writing is redemptive for me.  I get to participate in shaping my experience.  I get to make choices about how I understand myself and my story.  I love how writers create both text and their own lives.

Can you describe for us what you’re currently working on?

A bit ago I finished a novel that I’d been working on for six years.  While it’s seeking a publisher, I’m writing short personal essays about mothering my adopted daughter and churning out a book about revision.  I know, that sounds deadly!  But revision gets a bad rap.  Creativity just begins with a rough draft; it can get more playful, more insightful, and more powerful the more we revisit our work.  So I’m on a mission to teach people a lively, fun relationship with revision.  Carol Bly wrote that the holy work of making literature is in revision.  I believe this, too.  Revision is really deep, prolonged listening.  So I have a dual interest here—I want to read books with spiritual depth, so I figure I then have to help writers achieve this in their work.  And I firmly believe that we can use every stage of the writing process as a spiritual practice, if we approach the work with open hearts. 

Elizabeth Jarrett Andrew:

I use story to map the terrain of the human spirit, in both my writing and teaching.  I teach creative nonfiction at The Loft Literary Center, coach writers through book-length works, support individuals who write as a spiritual practice, and I offer spiritual direction.  I am the author of Swinging on the Garden Gate (Skinner House Books), Writing the Sacred Journey:  The Art and Practice of Spiritual Memoir (Skinner House Books), and On the Threshold (Westview Press).  www.spiritualmemoir.com