Reinventing Yourself Through Writing

When I attended More Magazine’s Reinvention Convention in Chicago, I hoped for some reinvention inspiration as I approach my 60^th birthday. I was surprised that the day was almost like attending a writing convention. Almost every woman who spoke had published a book.  Of course,  it helps getting published if you are a woman in the public eye as most of the convention speakers were.

I highly recommend attending a future More Reinvention Convention. My biggest challenge of the day was choosing the interactive breakout sessions to attend and which speakers to miss. Having the opportunity to hear so many incredible women in one day filled my head with inspiration and encouragement that anything is possible as women age. I learned that sometimes women are forced into reinvention by circumstances we would not choose.

Lee Woodruff  set the tone for the day when she said she had responded to her husband-newsman Bob Woodruff’s traumatic brain injury with writing—because writing is therapy. Later she turned her writing into two books. (I’m on a committee to bring Lee Woodruff  to Phoenix in the fall so watch for updates.)

Next Dara Torres, the 41-year-old swimmer who won Olympic Silver, told about her comeback using hard work and an attitude that “age worked to my advantage.” She also admitted to being very competitive, especially when people asked, “Aren’t you too old for this?” The five-time Olympic competitor has turned her experience into an inspirational memoir.

Being a Richard Carlson Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff fan, I was anxious to hear his widow Kristine Carlson speak about how she coped with his sudden  death. Kris shared from her heart and told us how she turned her 80,000-word journal into her new book.  Another example of writing as therapy. I highly recommend her book Heart-Broken Open because it shows how to thrive no matter what happens. She writes, “I had to get up. The rest of my life was waiting. This was something I could choose. It was all up to me.”

Dana Delaney, our luncheon keynote, hasn’t written a book because she’s busy acting on Desperate Housewives, starring in a new series and supporting a large number of causes. She’s a very wise woman so I’d love hearing more of her story if she ever slows down to write it—or have it ghost written.

Jenny Sandford, the wife of the governor who took off to Argentina with his mistress, didn’t think she had anything to say in a book. But friends encouraged her and she overcame her tendency to be a private person, using her story to heal herself and help other women rather than hurt her ex-husband. The writer in me wondered if the book was ghost written so I asked during the Q&A how she managed to write it so quickly while caring for her four boys. She wrote every day after her boys left for school and a “woman in San Francisco” helped put the book together in record time, two months after she signed the publishing contract. (I think her divorce took longer than the writing and publishing phase.)

The final speaker was Ambassador Nancy Brinker whose promise to her sister, Susan G. Komen, has led to incredible advances in breast cancer awareness and treatment. Nancy, whose memoir about Susan is due out in September, closed the convention with a very powerful example that one woman can change the world.

I have long agreed with Lee Woodruff—that writing is therapy, but before I attended the convention, I wouldn’t have considered writing as a reinvention tool, a tool for self-care. Certainly Lee Woodruff, Kris Carlson and Jenny Sandford used writing to move forward.  And writing can be an altruistic gesture: use the bad things that happen to you to help others, or in Dara Torres’ case use writing to encourage and show that dreams can come true.

Most of all, the day was confirmation that wise women write.

MORE Magazine – Reinvention Convention 2010

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Tagged as: Dara Torres, Lee Woodruff, Memoir, Perfectly Imperfect, Writing