“You have to have a lot of patience,” says science writer Jennie Erin Smith about working on a long-term creative project. She adds, “You have to have a lot of patience with eccentric people.” In this bonus episode, we talk about patience, plus about sharing work with creative heroes, the importance of taking a good long break, the art of pushing through, what to do when the words aren’t coming, and why having a “breakthrough” isn’t a necessary part of the process. Jennie Erin Smith is the autho...
Jul 03, 2025•18 min
When a creative project lasts for many years, how do you create a cohesive story? How do you gather and organize that much research? At what point do you begin writing? How do you handle the changing of an editor? What happens when you don’t know the ending? And what if you hoped for a different ending? We cover all these questions with Jennie Erin Smith, author of Valley of Forgetting, a book ten years in the making, about a vast Columbian family and the Alzheimer’s researchers who studied them...
Jun 26, 2025•32 min
How can looking at the past help us understand what to do about a current crisis? “I’m a firm believer that history can help give us perspective here,” says science writer Lisa S. Gardiner. She’s speaking about her research with coral reefs, but it’s an apropos metaphor for how our past experiences with creative endeavors can help inform our current struggles. In this episode, we talk about the importance of the book proposal (and tips for getting one done), the art of weaving the self into a st...
Jun 12, 2025•31 min
What happens when the subject of your creative practice scares you? Not only that, but what if you’re scared, too, of what might happen when you put your work into the world? We speak with physicist and author Adam Becker about his new book, More Everything Forever: AI Overlords, Space Empires, and Silicon Valley's Crusade to Control the Fate of Humanity , in which he writes about the terrible plans tech billionaires have for the future and why they won’t work. Our conversation includes why doub...
May 29, 2025•32 min
Knowing your audience is everything for a storyteller, and sometimes that information comes in real time. “Within three minutes I am going to know if this is going to be terrible for all of us or great,” says storyteller Bil Lepp. In this bonus episode, we talk about how to respond on stage to an audience’s laughter, what to do if you find yourself with an audience of middle schoolers, how to handle a show that doesn’t go so well, and how he got started in storytelling. Bil Lepp is an award-winn...
May 22, 2025•13 min
Humor for the joy of it is reason enough, but in this episode we speak with storyteller Bil Lepp about how humor might also be a way to earn trust with an audience so that we might bring in difficult conversations. He offers techniques for how to craft toward a punchline and how to use a “Lego” approach to crafting multiple stories. We also touch on how storytelling builds community. Bil Lepp is an award-winning storyteller, author, and recording artist. He’s the host of the History Channel’s Ma...
May 15, 2025•27 min
“Practice teaches us to have faith in the process,” says Andrea Barrett, National Book Award winning author. In this episode of Emerging Form, we speak with her about her newest book, Dust and Light: On the Art of Fact in Fiction . It’s one of the most metaphor-rich, process-curious shows we’ve had yet. We explore the joys of rabbit holes, the importance of not knowing what we are looking for, the inevitability of false starts (and how to let go of the work we’ve done), why we shouldn’t worry ab...
May 01, 2025•32 min
“I turn to the poem, I turn to the page for a sense of hope, how to move through life, how to get through a day,” says Danusha Laméris. “I have come to a place where I trust the poem more than I trust myself.” In our second conversation with the award-winning poet, (We also interviewed her in Episode 29 on “the understory”), she shares from her newest collection, Blade by Blade , and we talk about how a writing practice grows us, how it allows us to “salvage time,” and how it helps us see how co...
Apr 17, 2025•32 min
“Doing this book took me out of my comfort zone, into new fields I wasn’t comfortable with,” says Alex Hutchinson, speaking of his newest book The Explorer's Gene: Why We Seek Big Challenges, New Flavors, and the Blank Spots on the Map. And so it is we speak with the expert on exploration about his own experiences of exploring in creative practice. Why are we drawn to what we don’t know? How do we know when enough is enough? When is it better to build on what we know than launch into new territo...
Apr 03, 2025•29 min
How do the stories we tell become intricately involved with our identities? And how do we change the stories that are not serving us? In this episode of Emerging Form, we speak with storyteller Kristin Pedemonti, founder of Steer Your Story, about Narrative Therapy Practices. We discuss unpeeling layers of stories, how to “thicken the threads” of a preferred narrative, the importance of play, and meeting “stuckness.” Founder of Steer Your Story , Kristin Pedemonti believes in the power of story ...
Mar 20, 2025•31 min
How can our creative practice extend to the way we treat other people? How might we build entire careers out of our creative dreams? These questions are at the heart of our conversation with Sherry Richert Belul. We also talk about creating a “seamless life” with no delineation between work and play and how to pay attention to (and act on) the creative ideas that “just drop in.” Sherry Richert Belul, founder of Simply Celebrate, helps people find creative, intentional, and impactful ways to cele...
Mar 06, 2025•30 min
Artificial Intelligence now permeates our daily lives. What conversations are we not having about AI? And how can creative projects help open these discussions about what is really at stake? In this episode of Emerging Form, journalist Evan Ratliff shares with us how he cloned his voice, connected it to a chat bot, and created a voice agent that took calls and made calls–both to strangers and friends–all in a voice that sounded as if it were him. He shares the project, his questions, his concern...
Feb 20, 2025•32 min
How does storytelling matter? Why might we bring in feelings about our children or a moment of being overcome with beauty into a book about, say, climate change? In this episode of Emerging Form, we speak with Auden Schendler about the power of story, about how we are drawn to tell the stories we most need to tell, and how and why it’s important to let humility be a part of our practice. Auden Schendler has spent almost thirty years working on sustainability and climate change in the corporate w...
Feb 06, 2025•30 min
There’s an art to deep listening and eliciting enlivening conversation, and in this episode we speak with celebrated interviewer Mitzi Rapkin, founder, host and producer of the literary podcast “First Draft: A Dialogue on Writing.” Join us in an exploration of how to draw out authenticity and invite conversations “with a life force of their own” that allow you to “go to a place you never thought you could go.” Mitzi Rapkin is the founder, host and producer of the literary podcast, “First Draft: ...
Jan 23, 2025•32 min
“If you are sitting around waiting to be inspired, you won’t get a lot of painting done,” says mixed-media artist Kellie Day. In this episode, we talk about finding inspiration, a practice of showing up, the difference between creating from the head vs. creating from the spirit, how “shadow careers” can be an attempt to get closer to our passion, the miracles that can come from mistakes, and working through self-judgment, and how to “open to greater creativity.” Kellie Day is mixed-media artist ...
Jan 09, 2025•30 min
It’s our annual end of the year episode, in which we review the year that was and assess how things went. We share our revelations and highlights and what we hope to do better in the coming year. We also pick new words for 2025 to help guide our process and look back on our words for 2024 and how they served us. And we have news! Starting this month, Emerging Form is also a radio show on KVNF radio . You can hear us every other Tuesday from 6:30pm to 7pm mountain time. Christie’s essay about liv...
Dec 26, 2024•45 min
How does the writing practice help us know what we most want to say? How do we translate an intimate, interactive personal style into a practical, how-to book? In this episode of Emerging Form, we interview Rebecca Mullen who has spent decades as a marriage counselor and recently translated her experience onto the page. “My process as coach is as question asker,” she says. “When you are writing a book, it’s not a conversation, it is one way. It’s still important to me to be the coach pausing to ...
Dec 12, 2024•30 min
How does creativity help us meet a difficult time? In this episode, co-hosts Christie Aschwanden and Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer talk about ways that creative practice can nourish us, how it can help us envision a way forward, how it helps us to widen the lens and see beyond the moment, how it helps us embrace paradox, opens us to connection, and more. We hear from previous guests poet Jack Ridl and astrologer/filmmaker/novelist/musician Holiday Mathis, plus from listeners in our Facebook group, t...
Nov 28, 2024•30 min
When we asked prolific novelist Laura Pritchett to speak with us about writing fiction, little did we realize that not only would she offer us a host of practical advice about character, revision and ambition, she would also teach us about meeting our art with great self-compassion. We speak about her two new novels out this year, Playing with Wildfire (Torrey House Press) and Three Keys (Random House Books), writing without a plot outline, and much more, including why joy must be a part of a fi...
Nov 14, 2024•26 min
When is lack of knowledge a writer’s best friend? New York Times bestselling author and Guggenheim winner Richard Panek has found that starting from a place of relative ignorance allows him to research and then write about complicated subjects in a way that allows the average reader to find their own way in. We speak with Richard on the book birthday of his newest title, Pillars of Creation: How the James Webb Space Telescope Unlocked the Secrets of the Cosmos . He discusses how he found the for...
Oct 31, 2024•31 min
“I believe that telling our story, even the story of a moment, the story of an emotion, is one of the most healing things we can do,” says James Crews, poet, teacher and speaker. His new book, Unlocking the Heart: Writing for Courage, Mindfulness and Self-Compassion blends poetry, essays and writing prompts to help readers tell their own stories. We speak about this unusual blending of genres, writing as a healing practice, and how to write titles and first lines that draw people in. James Crews...
Oct 17, 2024•36 min
One of the most thrilling stories of creative inspiration is that of Rainer Maria Rilke writing Sonnets to Orpheus and the Duino Elegies following a time of great international and personal upheaval. Translator and poet Mark S. Burrows shares Rilke’s story with us and talks with us about the art of translation–full of creative conundrums and choices and impossible invitations. It’s a heart-opening, deeply compelling episode about how we are all translators, “listening to the deepest voice” and h...
Oct 03, 2024•36 min
This week, Christie interviews Rosemerry about her new book, The Unfolding , out on October 1st. Do her a big favor and pre-order it now at this link . Rosemerry explains how the poems came together, how she structured the book and why the cover is pink. It’s a wonderful conversation we know you’ll love. Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer is a poet, teacher, speaker and writing facilitator. Her daily audio series, The Poetic Path , is on the Ritual app. Her poems have appeared on A Prairie Home Companion...
Sep 19, 2024•31 min
“It took me years to reclaim my creative life as not other than my spiritual life but the very place my spirit flowers,” says Mirabai Starr award-winning author, internationally acclaimed speaker and a leading teacher of interspiritual dialogue. In this episode, we speak with Mirabai about how she created an intimate, welcoming tone in her most recent book, Ordinary Mysticism: Your Life as Sacred Ground . We speak, too, about the intersections of creative practice and spiritual practice, the imp...
Sep 05, 2024•31 min
How can trying a new art form vitalize and fuel your creative practice? Christie and Rosemerry travel to Nashville to meet in person with their most frequent guest, Holiday Mathis, and converse about her experiences with learning about writing and performing stand-up comedy. The laughter-filled episode explores developing your creative voice, the benefits of a creative community, meeting your fears and showing up vulnerable in your creative practice, and much more. Holiday Mathis writes the dail...
Aug 22, 2024•28 min
What happens when a project grows way beyond its original scope? We talk with Nicola Twilley about her new book Frostbite: How Refrigeration Changed Our Food, Our Planet and Ourselves , originally envisioned as an article. In this episode we cover being fluid with our plans, research, rewriting, the differences between writing alone and with a partner, and how what looks like bad luck can turn into a blessing. Nicola Twilley is the coauthor of Until Proven Safe: The History and Future of Quarant...
Aug 08, 2024•32 min
Ambition. Perspective. Competition. Kindness. These themes are at the heart of our conversation with essayist and cartoonist Tim Kreider. Drawing from his essay, “ The Ones Who Turned Back ” we talk about mid-life changes in creative practice, plus thoughts on the tension between doing what you want and doing what you are rewarded for (or what people expect of you) and why you want to stay not only young at heart, but young at mind. Tim Kreider is the author of the essay collections We Learn Not...
Jul 25, 2024•32 min
“I had built up a lot of don’ts in my head about writing,” says bestselling author Paolo Bacigalupi. In this episode, we speak with the speculative fiction novelist about how he went from wondering if he would ever write again to publishing his new book, NAVOLA. We cover daily habits, discipline, pleasure, and meeting the negative voices in your head. Paolo Bacigalupi is an internationally bestselling author of speculative fiction. He has won the Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, John W. Campbell and...
Jul 11, 2024•34 min
What is our relationship with our bodies? Our past? The planet? The rest of humanity? We speak with Nadia Colburn about how she weaves together a yoga practice, mindfulness, writing, and activism to explore these questions. “Our writing, our living, our experiencing is deeper when we can come from a bigger perspective and bring all the awarenesses,” she says. We speak about common obstacles to creative practice, ways to include the body, how teaching affects her writing practice and how she came...
Jun 27, 2024•32 min
What if we dropped our expectations and preconceived ideas about our creative practice? In this episode, we speak with elite runner, author Katie Arnold about how her Zen practice of “coming to whatever you do in your life with a fresh and open mind” has influenced her creative work. We explore the story behind her new book, Brief Flashings in the Phenomenal World: Zen and the Art of Running Free , which tells the story of a traumatic wilderness accident and her path to healing. Plus, we discuss...
Jun 13, 2024•32 min
