Have you read the story Ming Lo Moves a Mountain by Arnold Lobel? The story goes like this… 

Ming Lo and his wife live in a shack right next to a mountain. The roof has holes from falling rocks from the mountain, vegetables don’t grow because the mountain is always blocking the sun. One day his wife has finally had enough, and she tells Ming Lo to go to a wise man and ask him how to move the mountain. The wise man tells Ming Lo and his wife to try all kinds of things, like ramming a tree into the side of the mountain, banging pots and pans to scare it, and finally bringing cakes up to the spirit who lives on the top of the mountain. Nothing works. 

So finally, after Ming Lo has tried to push the mountain, scare the mountain, and ask/bribe the mountain to move, the wise man tells Ming Lo to do the special mountain dance. Pack up your house stick by stick, and all your possessions, the wise man says, and then close your eyes and then put one foot forward, and then take two steps back. Do this for many hours without opening your eyes. 

Ming Lo and his wife immediately pack up their shack and follow the special mountain dance for many hours. When they open their eyes, they are in a beautiful valley with warm sunshine. The mountain is far, far away.

What are the mountains in your writing life? The things that no matter what you throw at them, they will never ever move? 

The Stoic philosophers understood mountains to be anything outside of our inner lives. The things that happen in the external world and therefore completely out of our control.

Oftentimes, the mountain in the writing life is the validation we seek from other people...

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