I gifted myself a writers retreat this year (you can read why this came about in my blog Following Your Passion) and wanted to just put some words together for anyone interested in this sort of retreat or if you are thinking of writing something yourself and wondering if it would help you.

So this writers retreat was for beginner or budding writers and was all about getting unstuck! If you want to start writing a book and you don't know how or where to start or if you have an idea for a book already and just need to get more into the flow of the writing process.

Facilitated by Melaina Faranda who has had 67 books published and hosted many writers retreats and rural oral story telling courses all around Australia sharing her passion of stories as well as her knowledge on the writing process, self editing and publishing hints. She is a natural born story teller and has such a way with words. Her passion for stories and writing was infectious and spilled onto the 8 women in our retreat. If you would like to get in touch to go on her mailing list for courses, her e-mail is storywellaustralia@gmail.com

Our retreat was held in this gorgeous building called The Groomsman Cottage, part of Binna Burra Mountain Lodge

It was wonderful to be in a room for 3 days with such like minded people and all help each other flesh out our ideas and stories. It felt so safe and gentle and so many incredible stories were shared. I felt so honoured to be listening to these interesting women and be part of holding a space for us all to create. I can't wait to read all their books!

Getting into nature was a great part of this retreat as we looked at what inspired us to write. Mine was nature and people's stories. Having space and stillness and walking among fire flies at night and getting up early to see the sun rise and set amongst the trees and over the valley was great fuel for writing inspiration. 

Some of Main Take-Aways

Find your ideal conditions for writing.

Is it with paper and pen or typing on a laptop. What feels best? Where are you? Do you need to write alone or in a writers club at the library so you are surrounded by others writing? So I don't feel bogged down or distracted by work at my usual home office desk, I am now going to set up another desk and laptop to do my writing. Finding a place where you are wearing only a writers hat instead of your other hats so you can slip in and out of writers mode and take yourself seriously when it comes to your writing.

Unblock The Pipes!

• Start each day with your 'morning pages' which is just stream of consciousness writing for 1-3 pages. This is to unblock the writing pipes and is literally just writing down whatever thought is in your head. It can jump around the place and sentences don't have to be finished if one thought cuts off another. Don't worry about spelling, grammar or even punctuation. Just write. I found it interesting that the more I did this, the more flowing my sentences became. Things just got less choppy on the paper as your mind starts to get into a flow.

• Practice 'free writing' also which is to write for a 5-10 minutes on any theme or concept. You must go with your first idea. Could be about an image or something on your desk or a conversation you've had. It can take any direction as long as you stick to the theme or concept and just write!

Both stream of consciousness writing and Free writing is just for you. You can throw it away if afterwards if you want to but no need to write it for anyone else's eyes but yours. It's a great way to just practice your writing and get into a flow as a warm up.


Doorways!

• If the topic about what you are writing about feels hard and big and overwhelming, find a smaller doorway to go through! This could be having a conversation with someone about what you are writing and see if that takes you down another path and get you started. 
  

• It could be an image (photo or print of a person or landscape) it could be a painting that makes you feel or it could be something you know is in the room of a scene you want to write. Describe it. What does it make you feel? Start from that doorway.

• Go on a story safari and look for keepsakes in your home and in nature. Look at it and write about it. What story does it have to tell you? 

• Use characters as a doorway. Describe everything about them and see if that takes you on another direction...only choose the parts you want to keep in your story. Flesh all your characters out in your mind and on paper. 

Different Perspectives

• Books don't have to be written in chronological order. If you are stuck, start with an emotional scene that you know you want to happen and this might fuel your passion to keep writing what happens after. You can always go back and fill the beginning in later.

• Everything will be edited again and again and again so you can either polish as you go or do a word vomit and then go back and polish it all once it's done.

Character Development

• One of my favourite activities was picking one character from our book idea (whether this was fictional or memoir) and fleshing them out. I felt I really got to know who they were by writing them into a scene and describing what they were seeing, feeling, touching, tasting, hearing. Also what they were longing for, what they were afraid of, what they were craving, where would they prefer to be vs where they currently were. What they were holding and wearing. I have a character so vivid in my mind now even though I thought I knew her well before...

We did a whole day of self editing lessons which is too much to share here but there is so much to the writing process and just taking small steps a time each day or even each week is progress.

Unless you have a contract you are in the wonderful and no pressure stage of writing on your own timeline whether that takes months or years. Even 1 hour a week is progress as long as you dedicate that hour to writing and take it seriously.

The view from my room

The Retreat Itself

My retreat was a pretty special one and one that I gifted myself for my Birthday. It cost $1500 for 3 days but this included my own luxe accommodation for 2 nights in a skylodge at Binna Burra (the view was amazing!) 2 meals a day in the restaurant (for me that was lunch and dinner as I don't usually eat much breakfast) and the 3 days of writing classes.

There are so many ways to begin writing though if you know you have a book in you, so if you don't want to try out a retreat, join your state or city's writing club (these are mostly done through library's) and see if they have a writing day or guest speakers that come for instructive type classes.

And there is a plethora of ways to get started online as well! Have a look at these online writing communities and see what might suit you! 

I need people so I gravitate towards getting inspired and started with people physically around me and then take it from there but whatever floats your boat!

Or maybe you just want to pick up a pen or your laptop and start writing some morning pages as soon as you wake or dedicating an hour a week to working on that book inside you.

And if you have written a book and had it published, well done to you! It's an amazing feat and it's one thing I don't think this world will ever have too much of! Thankyou for your book! 

Yours in Health,

Alisha x

I gifted myself a writers retreat this year (you can read why this came about in my blog Following Your Passion) and wanted to just put some words together for anyone interested in this sort of retreat or if you are thinking of writing something yourself and wondering if it would help you.

So this writers retreat was for beginner or budding writers and was all about getting unstuck! If you want to start writing a book and you don't know how or where to start or if you have an idea for a book already and just need to get more into the flow of the writing process.

Facilitated by Melaina Faranda who has had 67 books published and hosted many writers retreats and rural oral story telling courses all around Australia sharing her passion of stories as well as her knowledge on the writing process, self editing and publishing hints. She is a natural born story teller and has such a way with words. Her passion for stories and writing was infectious and spilled onto the 8 women in our retreat. If you would like to get in touch to go on her mailing list for courses, her e-mail is storywellaustralia@gmail.com

Our retreat was held in this gorgeous building called The Groomsman Cottage, part of Binna Burra Mountain Lodge

It was wonderful to be in a room for 3 days with such like minded people and all help each other flesh out our ideas and stories. It felt so safe and gentle and so many incredible stories were shared. I felt so honoured to be listening to these interesting women and be part of holding a space for us all to create. I can't wait to read all their books!

Getting into nature was a great part of this retreat as we looked at what inspired us to write. Mine was nature and people's stories. Having space and stillness and walking among fire flies at night and getting up early to see the sun rise and set amongst the trees and over the valley was great fuel for writing inspiration. 

Some of Main Take-Aways

Find your ideal conditions for writing.

Is it with paper and pen or typing on a laptop. What feels best? Where are you? Do you need to write alone or in a writers club at the library so you are surrounded by others writing? So I don't feel bogged down or distracted by work at my usual home office desk, I am now going to set up another desk and laptop to do my writing. Finding a place where you are wearing only a writers hat instead of your other hats so you can slip in and out of writers mode and take yourself seriously when it comes to your writing.

Unblock The Pipes!

• Start each day with your 'morning pages' which is just stream of consciousness writing for 1-3 pages. This is to unblock the writing pipes and is literally just writing down whatever thought is in your head. It can jump around the place and sentences don't have to be finished if one thought cuts off another. Don't worry about spelling, grammar or even punctuation. Just write. I found it interesting that the more I did this, the more flowing my sentences became. Things just got less choppy on the paper as your mind starts to get into a flow.

• Practice 'free writing' also which is to write for a 5-10 minutes on any theme or concept. You must go with your first idea. Could be about an image or something on your desk or a conversation you've had. It can take any direction as long as you stick to the theme or concept and just write!

Both stream of consciousness writing and Free writing is just for you. You can throw it away if afterwards if you want to but no need to write it for anyone else's eyes but yours. It's a great way to just practice your writing and get into a flow as a warm up.


Doorways!

• If the topic about what you are writing about feels hard and big and overwhelming, find a smaller doorway to go through! This could be having a conversation with someone about what you are writing and see if that takes you down another path and get you started. 
  

• It could be an image (photo or print of a person or landscape) it could be a painting that makes you feel or it could be something you know is in the room of a scene you want to write. Describe it. What does it make you feel? Start from that doorway.

• Go on a story safari and look for keepsakes in your home and in nature. Look at it and write about it. What story does it have to tell you? 

• Use characters as a doorway. Describe everything about them and see if that takes you on another direction...only choose the parts you want to keep in your story. Flesh all your characters out in your mind and on paper. 

Different Perspectives

• Books don't have to be written in chronological order. If you are stuck, start with an emotional scene that you know you want to happen and this might fuel your passion to keep writing what happens after. You can always go back and fill the beginning in later.

• Everything will be edited again and again and again so you can either polish as you go or do a word vomit and then go back and polish it all once it's done.

Character Development

• One of my favourite activities was picking one character from our book idea (whether this was fictional or memoir) and fleshing them out. I felt I really got to know who they were by writing them into a scene and describing what they were seeing, feeling, touching, tasting, hearing. Also what they were longing for, what they were afraid of, what they were craving, where would they prefer to be vs where they currently were. What they were holding and wearing. I have a character so vivid in my mind now even though I thought I knew her well before...

We did a whole day of self editing lessons which is too much to share here but there is so much to the writing process and just taking small steps a time each day or even each week is progress.

Unless you have a contract you are in the wonderful and no pressure stage of writing on your own timeline whether that takes months or years. Even 1 hour a week is progress as long as you dedicate that hour to writing and take it seriously.

The view from my room

The Retreat Itself

My retreat was a pretty special one and one that I gifted myself for my Birthday. It cost $1500 for 3 days but this included my own luxe accommodation for 2 nights in a skylodge at Binna Burra (the view was amazing!) 2 meals a day in the restaurant (for me that was lunch and dinner as I don't usually eat much breakfast) and the 3 days of writing classes.

There are so many ways to begin writing though if you know you have a book in you, so if you don't want to try out a retreat, join your state or city's writing club (these are mostly done through library's) and see if they have a writing day or guest speakers that come for instructive type classes.

And there is a plethora of ways to get started online as well! Have a look at these online writing communities and see what might suit you! 

I need people so I gravitate towards getting inspired and started with people physically around me and then take it from there but whatever floats your boat!

Or maybe you just want to pick up a pen or your laptop and start writing some morning pages as soon as you wake or dedicating an hour a week to working on that book inside you.

And if you have written a book and had it published, well done to you! It's an amazing feat and it's one thing I don't think this world will ever have too much of! Thankyou for your book! 

Yours in Health,

Alisha x