Write It Down! classes are designed to empower and encourage everyone to write down their lives, thoughts, hopes, fears, ideas and imaginations on paper with a pen, irrespective of education or writing skills.
We believe that this is crucial. Not only to experience the scientifically acknowledged benefits of therapeutic writing, but to leave a record for future generations, to kick-start creativity and to discover our unique writing voice.
Writing holidays, retreats and workshops might conjure images of grammar lessons and storyline-plotting, but that's not what Write It Down! is about. We want to celebrate the joy of writing in all its forms. In our busy lives we are always promising ourselves that we will stop, slow down, relax. We'll start that novel, or simply 'do something creative'. We'll empty our minds of the chaos we've collected along the way, and find time to follow our thoughts for longer than two minutes, allowing ourselves to escape into our imaginations. Maybe we will learn to meditate, or take a long walk through wild landscapes and peaceful forest paths.
“Writing is not life, but I think it is a way back to life ...”
But our ever increasing ‘to do’ lists take priority and our life, and our family's lives fly past; the small wonderments are never recorded. We live our lives publicly on social media, editing as we go, presenting our ‘brand’ to the world, when what we truly need is to strip away our protective clothing and be honest with ourselves, inviting our subconscious out onto the page and back into our lives.
We need to stop feeling guilty about 'wasting time' day-dreaming, and instead give ourselves permission to sit and think, to nurture the inner being that stays silent and suppressed in our hectic everyday lives. We need to write letters to our lovers, to our mothers, to ourselves. We need to play with words and ideas. We need a hard copy record of our thoughts and feelings, our children’s lives – our world. Our signatures, our handwriting is the visual expression of our individuality that we need to practice, treasure and preserve.
our classes are about you.
“We need to learn to hold our minds as still as our bodies ...”
Whether you want to take up writing professionally, learn to keep a journal, gain some inspiration for a project or idea, or simply discover a part of you that you weren't sure was there, these classes set the groundwork for continued self-exploration through simple, fun and unique exercises.
This is a way of finding out who you are and uncovering your own true originality – something that can only come from within. Write It Down! will give you the space and the tools to listen to your inner voice, away from the distractions of everyday life.
Creativity is not out there, beyond us, in a special place, only reserved for artists. It’s here and now in everything that we do. We just need a sense of fun and adventure to take it on.
They are about recording your daily adventures. Seemingly insignificant shopping lists, musings, loves, hates, hopes and fears become treasure troves of memory in later years. Political and cultural movements are written in these pages, as are love letters, thank you letters, flowers pressed, scraps of fabric and magazine cuttings preserved. This is not about spelling, punctuation, grammar or the ability to use big words and quote passages from Barthe or Flaubert.
Write It Down! classes and retreats are not about technique, writing the novel inside you or about publication. They are about YOU and the written expression of your delight in this world. They are about achieving clarity and acknowledgement of your unique writing voice, unrestricted by fonts designed by someone else. About holding the pen in your hand, recording your life in your own font and enjoying the sensuous pleasure of writing in it's most basic form.
Everyone should write and everyone is the authority on their own writing. It is impossible to get it wrong. And, when we write in a group we gain through nurturing, supportive, non-judgemental sharing.