Assignment: The 20 Minute Per Day, Five Day Writing Retreat

I am participating in a writing retreat next week, and I wanted to encourage some of what happens there 'here'.

Perhaps you have a little more time over the Easter Holidays, perhaps not, but the main thing is to choose 5 sequential days for writing, and to do 20 minutes of freefall/diving deeper writing per day, each day. Do not miss a day.


- Do not plan what you are going to write. Sit down, face the blank page, take a moment to sit in stillness, and then write 'what comes up'. Prose, poetry, musings, whatever arises. Stop after 20 minutes, or continue if you are able.

- Go Fearward - write what makes you shake, what you 'don't want' to write about. Or, simply, go where the energy is. There may be several things come 'up' for you as you sit down, choose the one with the most energy.

- Do not edit as you write. Do not edit when you finish. Leave the work as is.

- Give all the sensuous detail: enter into whatever world arises for you as fully as possible, using all your senses: what is heard, felt, seen, smelt, tasted etc. Slow down, climb in.

- The 10 Year rule. If you have something from recent past and from distant past arise from you - choose the 'oldest' piece of inspiration, or the one that is 10 or more years old. And, if only 'new' things arise, that's fine, write that.

- Post up your 20 minutes of work in the Responses to Assignments board. If you want the work to be anonymous, send it for posting to one of the moderators (Andrea / drchanteuse, Ayla, Rudyan, Leigh-Anne/quietlaughter, Burt, myself - Note that I will not be able to post anything  from the 24th March- the 3rd April, and from the 12th - 19th April). If you write more than 20 minutes, choose a shorter section of the work to post up.




In case you are interested in what happens on the 'real retreat':

Write 10 pages in the morning, double spaced, based on the above guidelines; hand them into the teacher by 1 p.m,  have lunch and rest or go for a walk etc until 4 pm when everyone gathers. Silence is maintained until this time. The work is read out anonymously, and everyone comments on the writing.  Supper at 7, and off to bed, start again in the morning…

This is more or less the structure of my own retreats.

Re: Assignment: The 20 Minute Per Day, Five Day Writing Retreat

Since we have a focus on the Diving Deeper writing guidelines by doing this 'retreat with ourselves', I would like to bring some attention to the commenting as well.

During the retreat, all writing is read out anonymously, but even though we have not made this an anonymous assignment, why not take the opportunity of practicing our commenting accordingly nevertheless.

Please makes sure to make your comments to all writing on Diving Deeper according to our commenting guidelines. The comments are requested to be solely about the writing. Here’s a short freshening-up summary for impatient readers:

1. Ask yourself:  what is your motivation behind you wanting to comment and the content of that comment? Is it to support the writer you are commenting to, or?

2.  Ask The Writer: Ask the writer if they are okay with some 'deeper' analysis and commentary on their work. (Obviously not in anonymously posted work!)

3. State what works for you in the writing: There is always something. It's like people, you might really find them awful, but keep taking a look and there will be something to love. Always.

4. Ask questions about the writing: Ask questions rather than make statements about what you don't like or what in your opinion doesn't work. If you feel you don't understand something, or it is confusing or whatever, see if you can frame your impression in the form of a question.
 
5. Be willing to be wrong - and state this: If we are giving 'criticism' I believe we really need to be willing to take responsibility for our own 'filters': our preferences, ideas, beliefs, our lack of ability to understand certain things (even if we don't know we don't understand!);  our cultural bias; gender bias etc. None of us here read/see/ experience anything without it coming through our filters.

6. Share how you feel reading the work: what it is that I 'feel' reading the writing (confused, blank, irritated, whatever), rather than make statements that sound like facts about the writing. By the way, statements include 'positive' statements like saying 'this is amazing/wonderful',  much as I like and use such statements.  See if you can say what it is about the writing that makes you have the thought 'this is wonderful'.

7. Tune In to what you feel will support the writer most:  this includes craft and the personal level, rather than just using the space for commenting to simply state my own system/beliefs/ideas. This tuning in takes skill, time, and deep listening and a willingness to let go of what I think I know.

8. If you are the writer being commented upon: Remember that what anyone says is 'theirs'. You don't have to agree or disagree. If the words seem harsh, they may not be meant that way at all. It can be very hard to tell sometimes. Even if they do have 'hard' or unloving energy - this is not about you, it is about them. Nothing needs to be taken personally. Nothing.

 If you feel the comment is 'off' but you are not sure, ask other trusted 'readers'.

9. Commenting 'online' : This takes an even greater skill than in person or  directly on someone's hard-copy. If someone sends me hard-copy notes on my work, I'm free to put it aside when i feel 'ready'. If the sharing is in person, I can 'feel' them, (90% of what we communicate is through body language etc, not the words); if it is on the telephone I can sense vocal tone and also have a far more immediate interaction to go deeper. We lack this here on the Pod. So, it's doubly important to take a look at our motives for commenting in particular ways, and to be as loving as possible through the written word.

Re: Assignment: The 20 Minute Per Day, Five Day Writing Retreat

Just wanted to say to heck with posting short bits if you've written a long piece! How can I say that when I go ahead and post 3000 words in one shot?

and maybe I'm too late to say this for everyone – whatever you do re posting, please, don't stop writing after 20 mins if you want to keep going :-) – the main thing is to do 5 consecutive days of writing, without 'planning' what you write etc.

Love,
Sandra

Re: Assignment: The 20 Minute Per Day, Five Day Writing Retreat

Note my suggestion here for a 3 hour per day 3 day version…

Re: Assignment: The 20 Minute Per Day, Five Day Writing Retreat

Please read the note I made to Leigh-Anne's piece here. - It's about continuing a piece the next day, and about reading comments on a continued piece.