“Whenever I have knocked, a door opened. Wherever I have wandered, a path has appeared. I have been helped, supported, encouraged, and nurtured by people of all races, creeds, colors, and dreams.”
Alice Walker

An amazing fact: A redwood tree 400 feet tall may have roots only twelve feet deep. How can a massive redwood be supported by roots so relatively shallow? First, its root system spreads wide and far. And second, redwoods grow very close together. Their wide root systems intertwine; together, the trees in a redwood forest support each other and help sustain each other’s tremendous height.

I learned about this amazing natural support system on a recent call to a free hotline called “Power Thoughts”  created by motivational speaker Ed Agresta (609.660.8156), who’s a fount of wisdom and inspiration. At the end of his recorded call, Ed asked, “Who’ll be there for you when the strong winds come?”

As Ed suggested in his mini pep talk, we all need a “personal forest” of people growing with us — people who surround and stand close to us, people we can be supported by and offer support to, people who’ll shelter us from the storms we’re bound to encounter.

If we’re lucky, we have family members and cherished friends nurturing and cheering us on. But these close supporters, stalwart as they may be, probably provide only a small cluster of trees in our forest.

To weather the ups and downs of the writing life, we need to spread our roots wider and farther afield — and reach out to fellow writers as well. There are so many ways we can do this: by joining critique groups, for example or by teaming up with another writer in our genre and exchanging pages. We can step outside the four walls of our writing spaces and go to readings and mingle with other word lovers. And we can connect with writers we admire in person or on line for inspiration and advice.

Entrepreneurs are in business for themselves, but are rarely in business by themselves. In the same way, we may come to the page alone, but like Alice Walker, we don’t have to walk the writing path alone. We can nurture ourselves by finding company and support.

Who’s in your personal forest? Whose roots are entwined with yours? Something
to ponder as we all write on.