by Amelia Loken | Jul 10, 2026 | Writing
Some weeks, writing feels like trying to light a match in a windstorm. Even if you get a spark, it’s extinguished before you can feel its warmth or transfer it to the waiting kindling. It can feel like an exercise in futility. Why even bother? But what happens, then?...
by Amelia Loken | Jun 25, 2026 | Hope
Hope is a discipline — a writing practice — a way of returning to the page even when the path ahead is foggy. For many writers, hope in writing becomes a form of creative resilience: a steadying force that keeps us imagining, shaping, and crafting stories even when...
by Amelia Loken | Jun 6, 2026 | Writing
Slow Productivity offers disabled writers a sustainable, disability‑justice–aligned way to build a writing life that actually lasts. In his book, titled Slow Productivity, Cal Newport writes: “Do fewer things. Work at a natural pace. Obsess over quality.” That line...
by Amelia Loken | Apr 28, 2026 | Creativity
Sixteen years ago, Chicago bullied me into reclaiming my creativity. Last week, it reminded me why I still need it. Back then, I had just weaned my fifth child and was clawing my way out of the gray world of postpartum depression. I arrived in Chicago wrung out,...
by Amelia Loken | Feb 28, 2026 | Hope
Good Intentions I wrote a short little essay on hope in January 2025. It wasn’t polished, but it was from the heart. I wasn’t sure how to wrap it up. I decided to let it sit and then I would figure it out. The weather channel was predicting a snowstorm that would shut...
