Happy New Year to everyone, especially to my blog subscribers. By what date is it determined to be too late to offer this wish, I wonder.
I have returned to Helsinki this week, but I believe the snow-scape and minus temperatures are similar to those in Ireland at present. Who needs a better excuse than to engage in and hopefully prolong a 'Slowanuary?' It really is a great time to hunker down and to get writing.
For any of you who already write, you will know it is a great way to process and to make sense of things that have happened to you in life. You can choose to write memoir in many ways. Some writers write in first person point of view (PoV) present tense and re-live the experience. I usually write memoir pieces with a 'double perspective,' both remembering the incident but also injecting the account with my current perspective and PoV. It may incorporate a mature reflection on what took place, perhaps exploring motives and feelings of other people involved as well as my own.
If you feel you need help with beginning to write, perhaps getting tips with mining your memories and tapping into your creative juices, the following may be useful, regardless of where you live in the world. My friend and author Carolann Copland has recently posted:
Stephen King said that “Writing is not life, but I think that sometimes it can be a way back to life.”
As a positive start to the new year, I am running four online Writing for Wellbeing workshops that will mine your memories, tap into your observational skills, and spark your imagination through guided writing exercises. The Writing Tap workshops are for those who would simply like to explore how writing might help them to reduce stress and focus more.
After nine years of dealing with spinal operations and recovery, during which my mental health also took a battering, I know that writing has been a huge part of my healing. Our ability to tell stories is integral to our survival. Humans are all naturally gifted story tellers, and writing has intellectual, physiological and emotional benefits. Writing down responses to experiences helps us to reflect, and therefore process, our thoughts.
There is no need to share your writing with others during these workshops, as this can be a very personal experience.
Participants need no previous creative writing experience. All that is needed is a pen and paper, and a willingness to enhance your own wellbeing.
For more information on The Writing Tap workshops and other creative writing workshops for beginners and intermediate, see: https://carolanncopland.ie/courses-events/