Themed Workshops

This is our basic package that can be adapted to suit your needs. These are designed as 90-minute workshops, held once a week for three weeks.

Session One: Trust

We live in an age of declining social and political trust, where words are frequently used to entrench positions and discourage connection. Writing exercises offer a powerful opportunity to counter that trend: to write well we have to fully imagine the lives of others and in the process bridge differences and find common ground. In this workshop we’ll be using creative exercises and techniques to help you find the language to write, think, and build trust both in each other and ourselves.

Session Two: Attention

Our attention is highly coveted, as we know, and various forces conspire to fracture and distract it. Writing operates at a different speed from the rest of the world and encourages us to take the time to engage fully with deeper realities. Writing exercises can help us to focus and reflect beyond the reach of our smartphones: this workshop will help us to write – and think – about our relationship with our ‘popcorn’ attention spans.

Session Three: Climate

The changing climate is the great constant concern of our times – so vast that it can seem too big to be seen, let alone understood. Our response, as a result, may take the form of a low-lying anxiety that affects our relationships with others and can actually prohibit positive change. Exploring the subject through writing allows us the time to calmly address the issues, and doing so in a group dispels anxiety and creates mutual support. In this workshop, we’ll be using creative exercises and techniques to explore emotional and creative responses to the psychological and physical challenges climate change presents.

Participants will be asked to keep a course-specific notebook for the three sessions and will be given prompts and exercises to do between the classes. These will be optional but highly recommended. Forms exercises will take: diaries, journals, dream journals, real-life observations, short stories, and poems.