How I Write My Top 10 Writing Lessons from 2025
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Dec 3, 2025 
Dana Gioia, a celebrated poet and critic, passionately discusses poetry as an active experience. He emphasizes the importance of performance, memorization, and the personal engagement with poems, rather than just analytical study. Gioia and David Whyte explore how memorizing poems serves as emotional support in challenging times. Their conversation highlights writing as more than mere words—it's a practice of attention and authenticity that enriches our understanding of life.
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Protect Your Sense Of Wonder
- Wonder is an essential survival skill that makes you stop and feel the miracle of the world.
- Robert Macfarlane urges writers to capture their felt sense of nature rather than literal scientific detail.
Memory As A Key To Identity
- Jayne Anne Phillips opens with the line "It's strange what we don't forget" to show how early memories define us.
- She writes to inhabit the material so readers feel inside the persona, not outside observing it.
Dare To Be Great
- Aim higher by studying the masters and daring to write toward excellence rather than settling for mediocrity.
- Paul Harding tells writers to develop a personal canon and shoot for the books that inspired them.
