If you’ve been around me and Life Writers for more than a minute, you’ve heard me talk about my mentor and now dear friend, Dr. Lezlie Laws. She disagrees, but I credit her with inspiring me to pursue writing and teaching as a career.
Fortunately, in 1992, when I dipped my toe back into writing after fifteen years of giving up putting words to paper, Lezlie was my brilliant professor who met me where I was, helped me believe I could write, and gave me the confidence to try again. She is who I try to emulate whenever I teach.
The poems and prose of Lezlie’s recent book, Perfectly Still, were destined for the trashcan. But author Lezlie Laws says, “a slim folder of poems just kept hovering like a shy kitten on the periphery of the stacks of paper headed for the trash.”
Out went class materials, student papers, course curricula, but that folder lingered, and thank God it did.
Listen to Lezlie read the title poem at her recent book launch.
Lezlie is also a life-long practitioner of meditation and yoga and is a certified instructor who teaches at Orlando Insight Meditation Group.
Lezlie talked about her process of using paint, scraps of paper, pencil, and other media as a form of brainstorming. For her, she says, “This idea of moving from words to images to color to design is really important in the creative process. What I’m doing, intellectually and emotionally, is trying to make a shift from the words to the feelings.” She shared some of her visual ideas with us.
She has also taught two previous master classes for Life Writers. You can watch the replays of Focus and Creativity Meditation and Meditation to Enhance Creativity.
I’ve had the pleasure of publishing a couple of other books for her–Twelve Doors: Writing for Pleasure, Self-Expression, and Insight and the TIA Journal (Thank-Intend-Ask) that are definitely worth a look.