Join us as we hear from our BookSparks authors on where they write to find inspiration.
Introducing – Where I Write!

Where I Write – Carol E. Anderson

My writing space is a big comfy, reclining chair that looks out onto a garden of iris, tiger lilies, peonies, and an occasional blooming rose. Floor to ceiling windows reveal the exquisite beauty of the parading seasons and wildlife – a constant reminder of the temporary nature of all life – mine included.

This space is also filled with the life stories of coaching clients who have shared their personal struggles in work and family life over the past decade. Listening to hundreds of them has given me a profound respect for the complexity of each human experience and the courageous choices people make every day to rise beyond their real and perceived limitations. They inspire me to think more deeply about the meaning of life, my personal purpose, and the legacy I want to leave behind.

My writing space and these stories are gifts that command and nourish the practice of observing things closely and deeply, to see and feel what is here now, and to sense beyond – to the unspoken, the unknown, and the yet to be manifested. It ignites awe and appreciation in me for the beauty of everyday life — the raw will and determination of a disabled person struggling to cross the street with a walker, a child’s rapt state of wonder in watching water rushing down a sewer, the lone weed undaunted by sidewalk cement. All of this leads me to ponder the power and intelligence of nature held in a flower, a creature, and a human being, and this inspires my writing.

Carol E. Anderson

Carol E. Anderson is a life coach and former organizational consultant. She has traveled the world extensively for work and pleasure―most recently to Kenya on a photo safari and to the Democratic Republic of the Congo on a philanthropic mission. She holds a doctorate in spiritual studies, and master’s degrees in psychology, organizational development, and creative nonfiction. She is the founder of Rebellious Dreamers, an eighteen-year-strong non-profit organization that has helped women over thirty-five realize dreams they’d deferred and women of all ages come into their own. Anderson is the author of the essay “What is it about memoir,” published in Magic of Memoir, and coauthor of “Deeper Power,” published in Enlightened Power: How Women are Transforming the Practice of Leadership. This is her first memoir. She lives with the love of her life and their sassy pup in a nature sanctuary in Ann Arbor, MI.