Dear Friend, You Can Read 187 Pages

22 Sept 2023
Dear Friend,

I hit a milestone yesterday. I can officially hand you a stack of a 187 pages that you can read start to finish. Although there may be some little flaws and strings that need to be tightened, it will make sense as a story. You won’t be completely confused or lost. You will come with me on a little journey and be able to tell me what happened start to finish. This is a major victory for a woman who six and a half months ago only had dream of writing a book. And I have been writing a book since then so it is no longer just a dream. I have 900 pages of words. The whole bunch is a mess of pretty beads strung together on a weak and fraying string. It’s shoved together in chunks and parts could disappear or destroy the others. So my mission this month was the clean up the first part. The first 100-200 pages needed to be completed as a stand alone book. Part one or book one of a longer saga. I needed to simplify and give myself limits for my own sanity and to make actual progress towards finishing something. I could easily have kept writing until I drowned in an ocean of almost attached puzzle pieces. I was wise enough to realize I needed to choose something simple and doable to focus on. The first part of the book felt the least exciting to me. It gets juicier and more wild in the my imagination as the story unfolds. I also felt the first part of the book was more pin-down-able. It was more from my real life facts. I felt I could follow a trail of memories and just write them down. This is how I held my own hand through the process of learning how to write a book. Unsure where to start, I started with what I understood and what I could see clearly in front of me. My memories were showing themselves to me loud and clear. So I just wrote them down. Done. 187 pages of my memories with minimal embellishment. This is what happened, as I’ve told it before and as I would keep on telling it for generations…


Until today… 

I saved a copy of the original memory and I opened up a new document. My test today was to see if I could translate the original memory into a brand new fantasy. The written memory is the template for the story. Now I actually have a cohesive start to finish story and I can get wild with the details and the telling of it. I can’t even begin to tell you how uncomfortable it was for me to exist for months writing a book without knowing what story I was telling. I was just a well of water pouring and gushing with no sense of where the ocean was. I had to drain the words out with faith that they would go somewhere, find their own way. Some words, the first group of them, have successfully made it to the estuary! Before we send them out to sea, it’s time for me to polish them up into something I actually want to push out into the world. 

As an artist, this is a very enjoyable moment. I get to be on the edge of my seat with curiosity and discovery. I am watching something brand spanking new be born to life before my eyes today. With the pressure of figuring out the story lifted from my shoulders, now I get to play with words and just take this story and make it as fun as I possibly can. To translate this for my fellow musicians…

The song is written. We know the lyrics and the basic melody. We’ve chosen the key and the BPM. We have our core instruments ready to hold down the fort. Now, let’s play! What else can we add in to spice it up? What little trills and doodles can we toss around to liven it up. What if we swapped a word or two or changed the key mid-song. Now….now it’s getting really interesting. 

Love & Rainbows,
Cha Wilde

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Dear Friend, I'm Sprinkling in Mermaid Clues

9.21.2023
Amed, Bali

Dear Friend,

I love writing. I’m having so much fun working on this book now. I’ve gone through some dark spells, you know. It was a rough start and a deep gully to survive through in the first “semester” or quarter or however we are measuring. I’d like to think I’m at the half way mark now. I’m flying down hill with daily practice. My eye watches the clock 7-10am is the designated writing time, followed by the writing of this letter of reflection, preceded by hours of tea-sipping, walking, meditation, stretching on a lacrosse ball, and waiting for the sun to show up so I can see the paper clearly enough to write on it. My last candle extinguished its own life this morning. I sat in darkness as the stars bowed out one by one.



I’m still listening to Persian instrumental music as I type this story. Today, I’m referring to the ever humorous poetry of Hafiz (see his book “The Gift” for my little droplets of inspiration). I’ve also been reading Inner Engineering by Sadhguru and Secrets of Divine Love by A. Helwa; both are keeping me inline with my spiritual practices as I delve into my imagination. Can I write from a place of deep wisdom? How much of my writing is purely ego? How many parts of myself are taking over to write this book? How Self led am I…actually? How Self led do I actually need to be in a project like this? As much as I want I suppose. The book becomes a blend of wonderfully ridiculous wordplay, joyfully sculpted highbrow communication of my philosophies, and raw expression for the purpose of healing what needs to be touched by the light. Oh look at me go…haha. What a simple joy to play with words. I can build an entire universe, construct an entirely new identify, and then destroy it all and build something new again. It’s madness on paper. This must be the feeling of God. Delightful. 


My heart was sparkling with joy as I leaned over the edge of the sailboat and peered into this turquoise water in Komodo National Park in Indonesia. — Sept 2023



The more I write, the more each letter becomes a color and each words takes on a shape. The sentences are movement and paragraphs are dances with many limbs. The whole book is an amalgamation of many art forms wrestling to have their way with me. 

Today was big. I reached the end of part 1. I now have a complete, almost complete, journey from start to the end of the first section of the story. Now my fun task for the rest of the day is to go through each sub-section and sprinkle in little clues. I have core themes that I needed to weave through the whole story so my strategy is to leave a trail of breadcrumbs, one little hint in each section.

Since I’m writing about mermaids, one of my themes is legs, feet, tails and fins. Can I somehow drop a mention of feet or fins on each page, subtle and artistic…little Easter eggs everywhere? This type of embellishing work is some of the most fun I have inside this writing project. I have no idea how it will translate to the reader or how effective it will be…maybe I’m walking down the wrong path and my feet are leading me astray (hehe)…well, at least I’m having a good time while I learn through my own mistakes. 


Love & Rainbows,
Cha Wilde

Dear Friend, Do I Have the Guts to Change My Own Story?

9.9.23
Amed, Bali

Dear Reader,

I am trying to give myself permission to change. To take what I have written and twist into a new shape, a story I didn’t actually live that feels more fun than the reality. My reality was fun for me so this challenge scares me. To tell the story in a way that changes everything into something completely new. I feel so attached to my story and the way it came through for me originally. I remember though that we have creative memories. I don’t remember what actually happened accurately anyway. I’ve written down what I’ve recited to myself secretly for years. Why not change it now for the dramatic effect, for the play of imagination.

Do I have the guts to change my own story? Do I have the courage to let go of my own memories? I feel the rush of excitement thinking of this. My stomach is tight and my heart beats louder. I gulp in the throat and my mind buzzes with possibilities. I reminds me of sex. I know how to surrender into a puddle of pleasure. Where do I reach inside myself to find the commanding power to take the reins and steer the situation with my own will? I am the captain. I am the one who decides and determines what happens next. I have ultimate power. I am god before the blank page. I am the sculptor with a chisel in my hand, staring into a piece of marble that is 900 pages thick. What do I need to let go of so this can become what it needs to be? I am scared to act and I must act. 

Ask me, what is my book about?
What will be my answer today? If I let you read through my draft you would drown in chaos.


A woman who is seduced by a man who helps her break free from her inhibitions.
The man betrays her and she is heartbroken.
She runs away to the ocean, longing to be healed by a mystical adventure.
The woman drowns in the ocean and is rescued by a ship full of magical women who teach her how to love again.


I also have the ship loaded with anti-man boobytraps. I have wild beasts flying out of a pit in the desert. Stars hold onto people’s wishes and the final wish that weighs them down too much is the cause for falling stars which land in the ocean and become mermaids. This is all legend and lore, original stories tangled with imagined futures, and  embellished memories that feel like raw truths. 


I sit in the cafe today for hours and hours. I’m editing and cleaning up the writing. Great progress today. I’m feeling more willing to just keep going. Friends file in and sit around me at the big table. I’m finally blending into the community in Amed. Headphones come off and the book sits patiently on the table while we dive into deep conversations. We’re all freediving, yogis, interested in living a peaceful intentional life. We share honestly and laugh loudly. When the coffee is gone, everyone grabs their fins and waves goodbye. I’ll see them later this afternoon at the gym and then again tonight for the cheesecake tasting. This small town life feels like the best kind of summer camp; friends and food and fun activities all day long, everyday, forever…until the volcano explodes or Amed turns into a big city or we all move away or die. Such is life. Right now I’m in a season of wonderful. 

Love & Rainbows,
Cha Wilde


Dear Friend, Cringing at How I Used to Be

9.10.2023
Amed, Bali
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Dear Friend,

Three hours of writing each morning this week and I’m sweeping through the early pages of the novel with a broom and a needle, cleaning it up and tying loose ends together. I cringe a lot when I’m reading what I wrote so many months ago. I write differently now, better. My mindset has drastically improved. My outlook on my relationships has dramatically evolved….dramatically, through the act of writing drama I have somehow, miraculously though not surprisingly, moved through my own drama and trauma.


When I wrote these pages earlier this year I was so charged with violent emotions, parts of me demanding my attention, whining, screaming, distracting, avoiding. I longed to tell this story. I needed to get it off my chest. I needed to get it out of me and out there into the world. I wanted to be seen and understood and over it already.


When I read them now, I feel like I’m reading an old diary from a younger woman. I am I suppose. A younger version of me wrote a story that an even younger version of me lived. Reading it, I feel so intimate and personal, vulnerable and real and yet it’s also distant, foreign and almost silly to me now. I can measure my own growth and evolution on the pages I’ve filled over time.


As I edit I try not to think about my family reading this book. A writer friend told me to pretend my parents are dead…when I’m at the writing desk. If I try to protect people or hide from them, the truth can’t come out into the page and the truth needs to be touched by the light. We can edit it thoughtfully later.


The pages I’m reviewing this week are recounting the way I met and fell in love with my second husband. It’s a scandalous escapade wrought with anxiety, insecurity, lust, and break throughs. The summer of 2015 was a turning point in my life. I decided to taste life as a bad girl. I took off my clothes, swam naked, kissed strangers, sang on stage, told lies, broke hearts, turned my back on my family, found a new one, and flew head first into a wild fantasy.


I’m chomping at the bit to write the stories of my most recently lived experiences, stories inspired by sailboats and Balinese culture, stories of my life in Asia and stories about my relationship with art as it is now, more healthy and peaceful. I am writing down these new stories and someday all the stories old and new will weave together neatly…somehow. I’ll find a way to tie what happened before to what is happening now and what I am imagining is happening in a different realm.

My playtime is writing from imagination. My discipline is writing down these old stories that feel the weight of reality. I’m excited to play with words in clever ways that lighten the burdens of reality and ground the fantasy in truth.


My heart still sings and new songs are eager to burst to life through me. I’m writing my songs into the novel as I write my way back to the stage. I’ve grown accustomed to writing pages and pages of fiction everyday that now writing a simple song seems challenging again. I remember when I began this novel project that it was easier to write a song than a long format story. The tables have turned.


Love & Rainbows,
Cha Wilde

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Dear Friend, Have I Written Too Much?

9.7.2023
Amed, Bali

Dear Friend,

I have reached a moment of stalled reflection.


I’ve invented a world. I have many characters and their individual plot lines. I have multiple realms side by side and I’m wondering if they are meant to be separate or intertwined. I’m slowly reading through one page at a time, patience patience patience. I am eager to write more words on fresh pages and my discipline now is to sit with one page and study it. Why did I write these words? Can I delete them? Do I still need them to exist in the word? What has this story become along the way? Can I remember why I started telling this story and do I have the courage to surrender to wherever it’s going now? I feel like a passenger on this creative journey and I am also the captain. 

I’ve written the story in many different voices from different perspectives. Reading back now I observe which personas, which narrators make me pay attention and feel. Which words do I skim through and which do I savor? Which feel most vulnerable and which are most beautiful? Do I feel proud to publish these words or do I cringe? This is where I am now. 

Sunset on sailboat beside Sotonda Island in the West Nusa Tenggara province of Indonesia. It is off the north coast of Sumbawa island.


This month of September 2023 is dedicated to reviewing the writing I’ve created in the past six months and my mission is to clean it up into a draft I can actually hand over, rough but somewhat complete. A rough draft of a story I can read from start to finish on the airplane to America. Exciting announcement…I’m traveling to America for the month of October.

I’m traveling across the world because I need access to my library of personal journals from which I will draw direct quotes for the novel. I will back them up as well for future reference and digital versions I can take with me anywhere I travel. Also backing them up in the event a disaster destroys the paper copies. I’m also visiting my writing coach, my book doula, my therapist and friend who helped me begin this project and now I desire to sit with her in person as the project turns past the half way point. I am also going to attend the IFS conference in Denver to refresh my connection with this therapy model, this lens through which I’ve viewed life, this approach to the inner world that I’m using as a main tool in the writing of this book. 

The book has been a creative exploration of my many parts, turning different parts of myself into characters in a story. This is IFS in practice. I’m looking forward to being with the IFS community in person and attending workshops that will deepen my understanding of the theory and practice behind the method I’m applying to my own life and art forms. 

Love & Rainbows,
Cha Wilde

Dear Friend, My Book is a Puzzle

8/9/2023
Amed. Bali

Dear Friend,

I’ve taken to writing on the cliffs. I sip jasmine tea and admire the shades of blue stretching out to the horizon. Thousands of palm leaves shake along the hillside and I feel the same breeze soft on my skin. The pages in my journal flip back and forth. I’m writing this novel by hand. I’m also typing it. It depends on my mood. Sometimes, I can’t bare to look at the laptop screen. Curse digital words! Hand me an inky pen! 


There is no such thing as writers block in my life. If one door won’t open, I go find another way in. If words won’t be typed then they will be scribbled. If paper is unappetizing too then I will make notes on my phone. I’ve learned that typing with only my thumbs is a completely different flavor of experience than typing with all ten fingers. Thumbs, hands and pens, big screens, small screens and paper. Some characters feel safer showing up on paper. Their voices sound different when poured out in ink. Editing is fun on the laptop, tedious on the phone and nearly impossible on in the paper notebook. 

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When I write the story by hand, I am committing to flowing forward. Whatever idea comes to me next, I roll with it and the story has to shape around one idea at a time, each one building on the one before. On the laptop, pieces the puzzle can move around, copying and pasting their way into sense. On the paper, I see plot holes and contradictions open up before my eyes and there’s nothing I can do about it apart from fit the next idea in. On paper, it’s like improvisational theater. Just go with it. Say YES and keep going. We’ll end up with something interesting in the end.


One day, I will be typing up these words that were handwritten. For now, the handwriting is my way into this fantasy realm when I’m tired of working and in the mood to just create without the pressure to be perfect. Strange, isn’t it? It’s more pressure to write by hand because I cannot easily revise. I must commit to what I just wrote and move forward with it. This pressure to commit actually gives me freedom to keep going. I don’t get stuck in indecision or the overwhelm of endless possibilities. Make a choice and go. This pressure squeezes me and then I pop through with a light heart. I want to create with this lightheart, never taking myself or my work seriously while always being very seriously devoted to the process of creating. I’m seriously devoted to not being serious. 

And so today, I watch a large sailboat drifting in the bay and I write a scene about a dragon who is changing colors while a little girl throws a tantrum and a man falls asleep. I re-read words I wrote months ago and I’m laughing to myself to feel that they were written by another woman…a woman I used to be. Writing this book is a transformational process because it’s exposing me to a new way of experiencing life; it is a daily norm for me to exist under heavy pressure while also giggling with playful imagination. It is the classic metaphor of the diamond. It’s an intense process to sparkle so vibrantly. Totally worth it in these moments when I pause to reflect. Totally a pain in the ass and a simple pleasure the rest of the time.

Love & Rainbows,
Cha Wilde

PS: This book is a puzzle with a hundred thousand pieces. I’ve never enjoyed puzzles. This is the most complex puzzle I’ve ever faced and the first one I’m truly devoted to completing. I review everything I’ve written and at first I’m nervous to see how many different versions of the character I’ve written about…and then I wonder…is this just the character’s arch? I’ve written about her in so many ways, in so many places and times because she has moved through all of that from where she started to where she is now. Her story is a journey and I’m actually seeing the journey laid out before me. It’s a lot of to take in and tie together seamlessly. Right now, this book is just piles of puzzle pieces grouped by color. 

Whose story am I telling?

7/29/2023
Amed, Bali

Dear Reader,

Again I’ll try to explain this novel I’m writing, this story I’m telling. Who’s story? Not clear to me. It’s blurry but I see a hazy shape. Am I telling the story of a wild sunflower who loved a pirate. Can her heart shatter into a million rainbows? There is a siren, a Waterman, a sisterhood of mermaids. There is a mystical ship that hates men. Voices are trapped in throats. Silence is endured. There is starving and seduction. I can tell you the story of how fiercely a woman can fight to survive. I can introduce you to a bloodthirsty huntress. I can take you into a world that delights in mischief. Together we can live for pleasure. Let’s float on the waves of whimsy and poison our lovers. Whose story am I telling? My world is expanding with so many parts and characters I can hardly keep track. Let’s keep going and pray it starts to make sense.

Love & Rainbows,
Cha Wilde