The Write Focus

MORE: Easter / Spy Wednesday and Creativity 4 / 7:04

Holy Wednesday is often called Spy Wednesday.

Spy Wednesday sounds like a cool name with more going on than simply Holy Wednesday.

Holy Wednesday is given the name Spy to remind us of the horrible conspiracy that began on this day: Judas Iscariot and the high priests negotiated a deal in which Judas would betray Christ Jesus, who would then be brought before the Sanhedrin Court, an assembly of rabbis.

That means SPY Wednesday is not cool.

In our writing segment, our focus is seeking the other arts to Refresh our Creativity.

TIMINGS

00:00 Welcome

00:40 Introduction

00:50 Spy Wednesday

08:06 Refresh # 4

13:00 Closing

Total Run Time = 13:59

 

 

LINKS

Who Can Be Called Rabbi? - Torah Musings https://www.torahmusings.com/2012/05/who-can-be-called-rabbi/

Website https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2026/01/more-easter-spy-wednesday-704.html 

 

Licensed Music with the Easter segment is entitled “Soft Beautiful Hope Piano” from the creator Nehliudoff on Audio Jungle while that with the Writing segment, with the same title, is from the creator Little Victory, also on Audio Jungle. Music for the opening and closing segments are in the narration.

MORE: Easter / Holy Tuesday and Creativity 3/ 7:03 episode

In this episode for Holy Tuesday, The Write Focus looks at the More we need to do for God.

I think most of us live a minimalist lifestyle with God. He’s in a neat little corner, tucked away, with a bit of brightness, brought out only when we need him. There He is, over there. See Him?  He’s for Sunday.

No. No, no, no. He’s for every day.

For writers, Refresh 3 offers a way to sink into Flow while drowning out unnatural noises.

TIMINGS

00:00 Welcome

00:44 Holy Tuesday

04:48 Refresh 3

09:42 Closing

Total Run Time = 10:41

 

LINK

Website https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2026/01/more-easter-holy-tuesday-703.html

 

Licensed Music with the Easter segment is entitled “Soft Beautiful Hope Piano” from the creator Nehliudoff on Audio Jungle while that with the Writing segment, with the same title, is from the creator Little Victory, also on Audio Jungle. Music for the opening and closing segments are in the narration.

All short videos with the video are from Pexels.com, a site that offers free short videos, some with sound.

MORE: Easter ~ Holy Monday with Creativity Refresh for Writers 2 / 7:02

On Holy Monday, many churches observe the anointing of Christ with oil at Bethany. The scourging of the money-lenders from the churches may also have occurred on this date.

Most modern paintings and captions on old artwork say “cleansing” rather than “scourging”, which requires anger. Christ became angry at the people who turned the church into a money-making scheme. People could not reach God unless they passed the money-lenders.

Here’s the question for this episode: What often stands between us and Christ?

For writers, Refresh 2 offers a whole-body experience to spark the mind.

TIMINGS

00:00 Welcome

00:42 Holy Monday

05:50 Refresh 2

10:14 Closing

Total Run Time = 11:13

 

LINK

Website https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2026/01/more-easter-holy-monday.html

 

Licensed Music with the Easter segment is entitled “Soft Beautiful Hope Piano” from the creator Nehliudoff on Audio Jungle while that with the Writing segment, with the same title, is from the creator Little Victory, also on Audio Jungle. Music for the opening and closing segments are in the narration.

All short videos with the video are from Pexels.com, a site that offers free short videos, some with sound.

MORE: Easter ~ Palm Sunday with Creativity Refresh for Writers 1/ 7:01

Changing churches will change your life, especially if you are Wanting More.

I grew up in one of those stripped-down Protestant churches that barely, barely noticed the church year. We had Easter—which was usually a competition to see who brought the most family members. (Yes, I know. I thought that promotion inappropriate, too.)  I wanted More.

Join The Write Focus throughout the 15 days of the Easter season, called Holy and Bright Weeks, when I share my journey and findings as a Christian.

Each episode concludes with an appropriate writing focus for Spring, Refresh that Creativity. Our first writing focus offers 3 solutions to that tricky problem of starting a new project from total blankness.

TIMINGS

00:00 Welcome

00:42 Intro and Palm Sunday

07:50 Refresh 1

14:32 Closing

Total Run Time = 15:32

 

LINKS

Hosanna (Praise is Rising) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMBDWG9tseU

Website https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2026/01/more-easter-palm-sunday.html

 

Licensed Music with the Easter segment is entitled “Soft Beautiful Hope Piano” from the creator Nehliudoff on Audio Jungle while that with the Writing segment, with the same title, is from the creator Little Victory, also on Audio Jungle. Music with opening and closing is provided in the audio.

All short videos with the video are from Pexels.com, a site that offers free short videos, some with sound.

MORE: Advent week 4 with Writing Connection

The fourth candle for the last Advent Sunday stands for Love. What Christ has done for us, what He is doing, and what He will do—all reveal His love for us.

The greatest gift in the world? That is giving what is most dear. Sacrificing what we want to provide what others need.

The dearest thing in the world? Our own lives.

What would cause us to sacrifice ourselves for others? Great love.

So, we ask again ~ what is the greatest gift in the world? Christ, who sacrificed His mortal life to grant redemption for us all.

In today’s episode of The Write Focus, we discuss Christian Love and review our last seven Chrismons.

The Writing Connection discusses crafting stories with flow and breaking the flow, positive and negative, order and chaos, appropriate at this transition time, Old Year becoming New Year.

TIMINGS

00:00 Intro

00:40 Advent ~ the Week of Love

02:30 Chrismons ~ last 7

06:21 Twelve Days of Christmas

09:35 For Writers

12:30 Closing

Total Run Time = 13:33

LINK

Website  https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2025/12/more-advent-week-4.html

MORE: Advent week 3 with Writing Connection

Look around. Even with the sun radiantly bright, our world is dark.

Humans can argue about raising a family, budgeting for expenses, politics, politicians, climate change, whether the change is cyclical or anthropogenic, diet, exercise, sleep deprivation, big Pharma, vaccines, green spaces, carbon footprints, and more and more and more and more.

That list barely grazes the debatable differences we have with each other. Shadows upon shadows create a darkening world.

Then we remember cancer and other diseases, the bad health suffer from our own causes and the poisoning that the modern industrial world causes. Drug abuse and depression and other psychical injuries can destroy our interest in the world, damaging us as much as disease does. And I haven’t even touched upon digital addictions.

Count all of these shadows, and our world is dark.

What gives us light? What gives us Joy?

Hope. Promise. Unconditional love. Peace. All embodied in Christ our Savior, the Light of the World.

Christ’s all-powerful light casts the darkness away.

That gives us JOY, the theme of the third week of Advent.

In this episode, we discuss the spectrum of crosses that reveal all aspects of Christ, then in the Writing Connection, we reveal the uses a writer can make of spectrum as well as how to use spectrum, with an example story discussed.

 

TIMINGS

00:00 Opening

00:40 Content

03:37 Chrismons

05:42 For Writers

08:48 Closing

Total Run Time = 9:48

LINK

Website  https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2025/12/more-advent-week-3.html

More on Advent / Week 2 with Writing Connection

As the first week is Hope, the second week is preparing the way for Christ. That knowledge—of what Christ has done, is doing, and will do—gives us PEACE, for we know that He directs our lives.

Many people become caught up in the questions: Who and What? Why and How? Christ is a mystery that we can’t answer. Should we try to understand Him? Yes, but the factual details only reveal bits and pieces. We have historical evidence of His life. Yet we also have Truth, and Truth is eternal. Christ is Truth, at one with God the Father, the great Atoner. Everything He does and says reveals to us the Kingdom of Heaven. When we believe on Him, we have our entry to Heaven.

This is the heavenly Peace, when everyone is dealt with equally, when the innocent are protected and the violent are judged.

The Chrismons for this week all contain symbolic imagery, a picture or icon. Each presents an essay of meaning through the image.

The Lighted Candle / the Burning Bush / Manger / Lyre / Alpha & Omega / Crossed Keys / the Lamb with a Flag

The Writing Connection of More: 

This time let’s look at motifs, metaphorical imagery that return several times during the course of a story. Chrismons are metaphorical imagery, images that carry meanings. Motifs occur several times for stories as long as novellas and longer, at 30,000 words and more. For shorter than novellas, think of repeating the motifs about one per 4,000 to 5,000 words. More than that becomes too repetitive and obvious.

TIMINGS

00:00 Welcome

00:40 Content

02:36 Chrismons

07:23 Writing Connection

10:58 Closing

Total Run Time = 11:56

Website Link: https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2025/12/more-advent-week-2.html 

MORE: Advent wk 1

More: Advent, Chrismons, & Writing ~ 1^st Week

Welcome to More and a celebration of the Advent season.

The denomination of my formative Christian years didn’t celebrate the church year. We had Easter and Christmas, but those two Sundays were the only ones devoted to special events of the church: Sunrise Service and Gift-Giving for the Poor. All the other Sundays were a ceaseless progression of one sermon to the next.

My soul was unhappy. I didn’t know that I needed more, and that part of that more was discovering the church year as a constant reminder of God’s relationship with people.

Gradually, I encountered elements of the church year. Lent was mentioned because my high school French class celebrated Mardi Gras. All Hallow’s Eve was followed by All Hallow’s Day on an almanac calendar. Epiphany and Pentecost were Christian words; while I knew them, I didn’t understand their importance.

Advent is upon us, and I’ve learned to celebrate More. Join me as I share a bit of More with you as well as relate each Advent with More on Writing.

 

TIMINGS

00:00 Intro

1:15 Opening

1:55 Advent ~ the Week of Hope

4:10 Chrismons ~ 1^st 7

7:12 For Writers

10:00 Closing

Total Run Time = 11:00

LINKS

Website https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2025/11/more-advent-week-1.html

 

6:43 / On Hiatus / The Write Focus

Well, this has never happened. Changes disrupt ~ but do bring progress. Listen to learn while The Write Focus is on hiatus.

6:42 / Fall into Poetry with Poets / Nancy Brewka-Clark

Nancy Brewka-Clark is our guest poet for this episode of The Write Focus. With clever one-liners, Nancy shares how poetry affects writing and life.

Her collection Beautiful Corpus published just as Covid struck, and the intended splash of a new publication became lost in the lock-down world and had lost all shiny newness when society re-opened its doors. Yet Nancy continued, for—as with any true writer—we are happiest when we are creating.

BIO: Winner of the 2019 Amy Lowell Poetry Prize and the 2024 Maria Faust Sonnet Laureate Prize, Nancy Brewka-Clark is the author of the 2020 poetry collection Beautiful Corpus. Her short mysteries have been anthologized in the U.S. by Malice Domestic and Crime Spell Books, in the U.K. by Flame Tree and Midnight Street Press, in Australia by Black Hare Press and in South Africa by Sentinel Creatives. She's a member of the Short Mystery Fiction Society and lives in Beverly, MA.

 TIMINGS

• 00:40 Welcome and Introduction
• 1:19 Interview with Nancy Brewka-Clark
• 34:54 Last Words and Closing

Total Run Time = 36:33

LINKS

Website  https://thewritefocus.blogspot.com/2025/10/642-fall-into-poetry-with-poets-nancy.html

 

Thanks for listening to The Write Focus. We focus on productivity, process, craft, and tools.

Our current focus is Fall into Poetry, 12 episodes of writers sharing how poetry improves their fiction. These 12 episodes will broadcast this autumn, September to December. Here is a link to the playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXi3M_aM-d7K1x02UAlihWKKom_5keJrg Select the most recent episode through the URL after the TIMINGS.

Support the podcast with a cup of coffee at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/winkbooksr

• You can find workbooks and templates at Buy Me a Coffee. Available is the Enter the Writing Business Workbook and templates from the Discovering Characters
• Available Now: worksheet templates and a video trailer script for Discovering Your Author Brand.

For more links and resources, visit www.thewritefocus.blogspot.com  .

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