Creating Magical Places in Your Writing
Every morning I wake and look at a gorgeous photograph of the Grand Tetons hanging next to my bed. I smile, remember what it feels like, looks like, and smells like to be there in my soul place. I roll out of bed and start my day with a mindset as grand as those mountains.
I fell in love with the Tetons when I was sixteen on a weeklong school trip to the Teton Science School—in the dead of winter. My memories of snowshoeing, building ice sculptures, painting and journaling about all the wildlife and winter wonderland still bubble up in me today when I look at that photograph. Perhaps it was the stark contrast to the desert landscape in my hometown of Scottsdale, Arizona that made me love the Tetons so. Or perhaps it was the powerful emotions they evoked every time I gazed up at them.
Being there and discovering this new landscape, solid and sublime, at a time when everything in my life felt changeable on a daily basis had a profound impact on my psyche. Connecting with a small group of my peers in such an extreme environment made for incredibly intimate talks, massive creativity and close bonds. Being in that wild setting revealed parts of me to myself I had never known existed.
That is the magic of place. Because of that first trip over twenty-five years ago, I have since returned to the Tetons numerous times to camp, attend a writers’ conference and meet up with friends at wellness retreats. Every time I drive up, seeing the mountains approaching, tears well up in my eyes and a smile spreads across my face. There is a magnetic pull to places that have formed the heartstrings of your soul.
When we write—be it fiction or nonfiction—the setting we choose matters. How we describe it and the language we use can transport our readers to another place. What is magical about the place your characters, or your clients, are exploring? If you are writing marketing copy for your business, how can you whisk your customers away into a world so enticing they do not want to leave?
In his book, The Sea We Swim In: How Stories Work in a Data-Driven World, Frank Rose writes about immersing readers in not just a setting, but in a world:
“The storyteller has to build a world—an immersive ‘story world,’ real or invented, that we can imaginatively inhabit alongside the story’s characters. The more deeply we inhabit it, the more immersed we become, and the more persuasive the story is likely to be.” p.114
It is imperative in today’s digital world where there is constant competition for attention that you create worlds that mesmerize and draw your readers in. When they buy into the world you create, they will buy more from you—be it products, services, memberships, or future books—because they are invested in the reality you’ve created and see themselves as part of it.
Below are several questions to help you create mesmerizing and magical places in your writing:
Questions / Journal Prompts for Creating Magical Places in Your Writing
What photograph, memory, or actual place inspires you?
How does that place tie in with your story or your business now?
If you were to take someone with you to that magical place, what would you show them?
Which five words best describe this magical place?
How could being immersed in this magical place transform your readers / customers?
The last question is possibly the most critical because it touches on the concept of transformation. In business, as in life, there are typically two kinds of relationships: transactional and transformational.
If you are like me, you are in the business of transformational relationships. This means everything you create—products, services, connections, content, communities—starts from a foundational desire to offer transformation to the people you serve. While there will always be transactions in business, it does not have to be the foundation or modus operandi of your business. In fact, if it is, customers can often smell it a mile away. And they typically won’t want to do business with you for the long run if this is the case.
There are simply too many other amazing businesses and authors offering transformational experiences and content to settle for one that’s merely transactional. This is why the world you write about makes a difference. If you are simply using a setting for a transactional purpose, it will not transport your readers to another world or dimension where they are more likely to buy in and want to stay. However, if you create a setting they want to immerse themselves in and visit over and over, you will naturally attract repeat customers and readers.
Speaking of immersive worlds, over the summer, I had the great opportunity to visit Meow Wolf in Denver. It is an immersive and interactive art experience like no other. Walking in, I wondered if I was in the right place. The environment was so different from anything else I’d experienced that I felt temporarily confused. But once I kept going, taking chances, pushing buttons, finding my way, I was captivated. Nothing else mattered. I was one hundred percent present.
Each Meow Wolf location is created by selected artists who collaborate to take you on a journey based on a particular theme. The Denver location is their largest one, called “Convergence Station.” They describe it as “the first multiversal transit station.” What does that mean? You’ll just have to go to find out…
What I can tell you is that when I was there, experimenting with levers, crawling through portals, and playing instruments I’d never seen or heard before, I didn’t want to be anywhere else. I got repeated chills up my spine, inspired over and over by the creativity, connections and massive amount of work that went into creating such an immersive environment.
While there were words used throughout the exhibits, most of what was communicated was visual and tactile. This made the words that were chosen even more significant. I specifically remember “The Shrine of Clean,” a philosophical laundromat that used phrases like, “We all must go through the cycle,” and “Return to the fold.” It explored themes of cleanliness and worship, drawing parallels between doing laundry and meditation.
Whether you want to create a new world or improve your descriptions of place in your current content, finding parallels and multiple meanings to elucidate (like The Shrine of Clean did at Meow Wolf) is critical to providing an immersive experience through language. This is the way you transport your readers to another place. And Meow Wolf did a great job showcasing how it can be done with minimal words. This means a magical sense of place can be created in even the smallest spaces such as ads, headlines or social media posts.
To help you brainstorm parallels between the place you’re creating and transformational themes, do the following exercise:
Quick Exercise to Craft Language that Transports & Transforms Readers
Set a timer for 3 minutes.
Make two columns.
1 min: Write “place” at the top of the first column, then list all the characteristics of your place you can think of.
1 min: Write “transform” at the top of the second column. List all the characteristics of who you and your readers want to become.
1 min: Read through your lists and draw lines from one side to the other that form parallels you could use in your writing about your magical place.
This exercise can help you write about your magical place and immerse your readers in a way that serves you both. It marries strategy and creativity, maximizing your written output in a way that helps you and your readers think differently.
Of course, it helps to have an end in mind, a clear purpose for why you are writing what you are writing from the outset. This way, you can check your descriptions of place and transformational language to ensure it is guiding your readers towards that purpose.
For example, if you are offering a yoga retreat in another country, your end goal may be to get twenty people to sign up. Therefore, you want to describe the country you all will be visiting as well as how being in that location with you and a small like-minded community will transform them. Once they put themselves in the shoes of the character you describe in that setting, signing up will be the next logical step. If you’ve already led this retreat before, it can be as simple as telling the story of one of your previous students, how she felt signing up, traveling, practicing yoga by the ocean, and highlighting the transformations she went through that changed her life for the better.
“Writing is the painting of the voice.” -Voltaire
During that first trip I took to the Grand Tetons at sixteen years old, I wrote a poem that I’d like to share with you here to close out this post. I feel like it simply and delicately describes both my internal and external environments at that time. If you are feeling stuck when it comes to adding or exploring the magical element of place in your writing, I’d encourage you to try your hand at a free-form poem. Who knows what creative ideas may rise to the surface? You may surprise yourself!
Untouched
The snow lies still
Untouched
How soft the delicate powder
Sifted purity
Through the wispy fingers
So white in the
Vast unknown
That spreads high into forever
Over my small existence
Here.
I stand
Tall outside
But frail and tiny in here.
In here where I
Humbly
Kneel
Silently admiring
This purity
Searching
For a glimpse of it
In here.
But all I find
Are these painfully familiar
Tracks
That selfish animals have imprinted
On my soul
So hard and deep
That I can only wait.
Wait in despair for
Another animal
Or maybe in hope of a fresh
Snowfall
To remind me how it feels
To be
Untouched.
-Kristen Hugins
***
What magical place will you write about next?
What elements of it captivate and transform you (and therefore will captivate and transform your audience)?
