Walking in this World: The Practical Art of Creativity (Paperback)

~ (Author) "This week initiates your creative pilgrimage..." (more)
Key Phrases: ing more clarity, many days this week, believing mirror, Great Creator, Morning Pages, Artist's Dates (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Touted as the long-awaited sequel to The Artist's Way, Cameron's latest is so similar in look and format to the original that they could be sold in a boxed set. Previous follow-ups, including The Vein of Gold and The Right to Write and a slew of little spin-offs, here give way to a 12-week course of encouragement and exercises promoted as an intermediate level of The Artist's Way (inviting us to anticipate an advanced volume). At first and for a long way into the book, we encounter the wheel-greasing exercises that worked magic for millions, helping people discover their innate creativity by devising gentle ways around the myriad obstacles that block us (e.g., listing things we would secretly love to do.) Cameron re-introduces the basic tools the daily morning exercise of hand-writing three free-flowing pages and the weekly solitary "artist's date," designed to help us romance our inner artists and she adds the ancient practice of walking as a means of getting in touch with our deeper feelings and truer thoughts (hence the title). "When I can, I walk with friends, noting how companionable our silences become, how effortlessly deep our conversations," Cameron writes. Cameron does indeed capture the feeling of strolling and talking with an old and trusted guide. Her core insights are the same as in earlier volumes, yet her words seem to have grown wiser. She writes about the distractions of success, and about the long solitary stretches "climbing the glass mountain" it takes to bring a large-scale creative project to completion. Her latest book reveals how reaching higher also means going deeper. 10-city author tour.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Library Journal

Cameron had an international best seller with The Artist's Way, which outlined a program that encouraged the reader's innate creativity. Here she extends her discussion of the topic. Aimed at practicing artists-and she considers everyone from full-time pianists to part-time pie makers to be such-Cameron explains how creating a work, whether it's a novel or a nosegay, puts people deeply in touch with the Great Creator. Then, in the form of a 12-week program, she outlines steps and exercises to nourish the "artist within." Some of these ideas, such as the pages she recommends writing every morning, will be familiar to readers of her previous work. Others, which are meant to help readers discover traits such as dignity, authenticity, and discernment, are new. Given Cameron's obvious familiarity with, and fondness for, the artistic temperament, this book is essential for public libraries serving "arty" communities. Most other public libraries will want a copy as well, since Cameron's broad definition of creativity will resonate with many patrons.
Pam Matthews, MLS, Olmsted Falls, OH
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Jeremy P. Tarcher / Penquin (September 29, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1585422614
• ISBN-13: 978-1585422616
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 7.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #35,823 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

67 of 68 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Required Reading for Arts Professionals, February 24, 2003

By	Kay Porterfield - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Walking in this World (Hardcover)

As a professional writer and workshop leader who has lived by her words and her wit for twenty-five years, I approached this book with some degree of skepticism. (In the past, I found Cameron's books interesting, but not relevant to my concerns.)

Walking in this World, not only touched my spirit, it sparked my desire to write again after winning a book award left me termporarily burned out and off kilter.

Cameron's sections on how to overcome the internal and outside perils of success are sensitive and practical. I especially liked how she drew on examples from her own life and the lives of professional writers, musicians and artists to illustrate her points.

The most important thing I carried away from this book was the confirmation that there's nothing wrong with being versatile and multi-talented. Building a career, making a name in one genre or art form isn't the only option. If I'm called to write a novel or take up visual art, I can choose to do it and I'm not a quitter or crazy no matter what my upbringing or my agent say. I needed to hear that.

Art, music and writing schools don't teach this material. They should.

38 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars THIS BOOK IS EXACTLY WHAT I NEEDED, April 26, 2006

By	Katherine D. Aimone - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Get this book if you are STUCK. Or even if you just need something new to inspire you in the wee hours... For me, it was like a tonic after a long period of not feeling very creative. After reading only the first few chapters, I realized that I WAS feeling creative, but I had definitely stifled my impulses. I read The Artist's Way years ago and loved it, but "poo-poohed" the morning pages (oh no! more work! who needs that! yuk...). Then, after reading the first chapter of Cameron's sequel, I got up one morning and sat, practically pouting in my pajamas with pen in hand. "Ha!" I thought, "I still won't have anything to say!" And then the stuff started pouring out in my scrawls. Then, toward the end of my three pages, I was using ALL CAPS to express repressed wishes and hopes. That same day I began to take action out of the energy and innate confidence, and believe it or not, things began to "happen." I continue to find the book very motivating in this very way...it makes me want to get on with things and stop hesitating. There is a bit of magic in doing what she proposes that is something that you won't be able to explain. And, this book is not only for artists--it is for anyone who wants to move forward. She emphasizes what we all know but may have forgotten...that the big begins with the small.

36 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Goddess of Creativity, March 30, 2003

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Walking in this World (Hardcover)

For those who are new to the creative life or who need to get unblocked pronto, The Artist's Way is still the ultimate companion and guide. For those entrenched in the creative life, this mature sequel is excellent. Even those of us who seem to have creative careers can easily start spinning our wheels, getting stale, etc. That's where I was at when I started this book. I did the Artist's Way a couple of times and it was very helpful. The first sequel, The Vein of Gold, was fun to read but I didn't resonate with the exercises and examples. In Walking in this World, I feel that every chapter is a refreshing wake-up call of a different sort. Julia Cameron truly understands every nuance of the creative life. The tasks are simple, fun, but very revealing. I am mid-way through the course and already have found a renewed sense of energy and optimism, a very welcome respite during this horrible war with Iraq. The arts are and always will be important, for they define a culture. Without the arts and creative expression, we have no civilization. Thank you, Julia, for helping so many of us make this a more positive world through the creative arts.