Here’s a universal truth they don’t print in the Odyssey of the Mind handbook:Something will go wrong.Possibly everything. On competition day, glitter will fall off the set.A prop will snap in half like a breadstick.Someone will forget their line—or worse, forget their pants.A glue gun will rebel. The script will vanish. Someone will suddenly realize […]
If readers skip anything, it’s not dialogue. They’ll skim description. They’ll hop over internal monologue. But when characters speak, readers lean in. Why? Because dialogue is where fiction breathes. It’s where characters drop their masks—sometimes deliberately, sometimes despite themselves. It’s where the interior becomes exterior. And it’s where your story’s emotional voltage gets conducted, wire
If you’ve ever coached an Odyssey of the Mind team, you know the tension. You want to help. You see the answer, the shortcut, the perfect phrase, the stronger structure. And yet — you can’t touch it. You can’t say it. You can’t even raise an eyebrow in the wrong direction. Welcome to coaching without
I started my writing life as a proud pantser. Total discovery writer. I didn’t want to know what was going to happen in the story — that would have ruined the whole damn point. Writing was my way of finding out. The thrill was in the surprise, in chasing the glimmer of a moment or
A practical survival guide for the wide-eyed, slightly overwhelmed, brave soul who said “sure, I’ll coach” and then immediately wondered what they just signed up for. So, you volunteered to coach an Odyssey of the Mind team. Or maybe you were “voluntold” by your kid, your school, or the mysterious gravitational pull of glitter-covered chaos.
Coaching an Odyssey of the Mind team is a little like trying to direct a play, run a startup, and referee a glitter fight all at once. Now add in six or seven intensely imaginative, impulsive, distractible kids—some of whom may be neurodivergent—and it starts to feel more like herding cats on roller skates. But
First off, I am totally geeking out over John Vervaeke and Shawn Coyne’s collaboration, Mentoring the Machines. I’ve been a huge fan of Vervaeke’s Awakening from the Meaning Crisis and After Socrates lecture series and of course, Shawn Coyne’s Story Grid process. When they got together to look at the impact of artificial intelligence, I
In an age saturated with fragmented knowledge and shallow self-help, ancient Gnosticism offers an unusually cohesive path — not as a religious throwback, but as a framework for human development that integrates intellect, intuition, creativity, and transformation. The Four Pillars of Gnostic Practice provide a map not just for spiritual awakening, but for a richly
There comes a moment in the creative process where something strange happens. The words begin to flow with a rhythm you didn’t consciously choose. Characters argue with you. Images appear unbidden. You reread the page and wonder, “Where did that come from?” Congratulations. You’ve just had a brush with the divine. Creativity as a Mystical
Ever sat down to write, work, or just think and felt like your brain was tuned to the wrong station? Like you’re trying to get jazz but all you’re getting is static? That’s where binaural beats come in—nature’s sneaky neurological DJ. Brainwaves 101 (Because You Deserve to Know What’s Going On Upstairs) Your brain isn’t
