Writing retreats are hands-down my favourite way to make substantive progress on a manuscript.

At one point in my life, I was a single mother of a young child, doing a Masters degree part-time and working a full-time management level job in the non-profit sector. People would say to me “I just don’t know how you do it!” and I would secretly think “Gah, I don’t know either!”

But it’s also true that I had discovered a secret weapon.

I would organize writing retreats for myself.

Not the kind where you spend a month or so in the woods with a group of fellow writers, where there’s a lunch buffet every day (Hello Banff Centre!) or someone brings lunch to your studio door (Hello Yaddo!), but private self-directed retreats that gave me some much-needed alone time with my writing project. 

Organize Your Own Writing Retreats

Here's how I did it...

I would look ahead on the calendar, identify a time when I could arrange childcare for my...

Wondering why writing is difficult sometimes?

Last week I met up with a colleague and friend I hadn’t seen in over a year. It was SO GREAT to see her. We connected as though we’d just been together yesterday and both the wine and conversation flowed freely.

I wish it worked that way with writing.

But the truth is, the longer I abandon my writing, the harder it is to get back to it and the more awkward and difficult it feels when I do.

(BTW, I don’t use the word “abandon” lightly – once a few weeks have gone by, that’s how it feels to me. Something in me is terrified that this time I’ve given it up for good.)

Although I don't feel you "should" feel that you have to write every day, the reality is that we can’t let our creative work go for a long time without experiencing a sense of disconnection – both from the writing and from ourselves as writers.

If you’re wondering why writing is difficult, could it be because...

Does anyone remember a time when they weren’t crazy busy? [sits on hands]

I have a vague feeling that those halcyon days once existed, along with plaid bell-bottoms and rotary phones, but most days I suspect modern life was essentially constructed with this much overwhelm baked in.

I am of the generation that can still remember when we couldn’t carry $800 computers in our pocket and this whole Internet nonsense was merely a glimmer in some engineer’s eye. (Also, we had Atari and Fun-Dip so those were good days.)

It may be entirely true that it’s never been harder to focus on creating one’s art. But you know what? Even if it is true, it doesn’t matter: art must still be made. (Maybe now more than ever? When the world desperately needs to be brought to hush for a minute or three.)

So if the overwhelm isn’t going away, we must find ways to still make art in the middle of everything, to create in the chaos.

My experience is that just like...

Curious about how to publish a book of poetry? In my experience, these are more or less the basic steps...

1. Read other people’s poetry.
2. Write poems.
3. Get feedback.
4. Hate feedback.
5. Revise anyway.
6. Subscribe to 5 poetry journals (or read them monthly at the library).
7. Read other people’s poetry.
8. Send poems out.
9. Get poems rejected.
10. Be hurt.
11. Deal with it.
12. Revise anyway.
13. Send poems out again.
14. Read other people’s poetry.
15. Publish a poem!
16. Receive ZERO DOLLARS for publication.
17. Revise anyway.
18. Send more poems out.
19. Read other people’s poetry.
20. More poems rejected.
21. Be hurt.
22. Deal with it.
23. Read other people’s poetry.
24. Revise anyway.
25. Send more poems out.
26. Publish more poems!
27. Receive $25-50 for publication.
28. Read other people’s poetry.
29. Attend poetry workshop.
30. Get feedback.
31. Hate feedback.
32. Hate the douche giving you the feedback.
33. Revise anyway.
34. Get another poem published!
35. Big AHA moment: douche was right!
36. Revise again.
37. Read chapbooks.
38. Research chapbook publishers.
39. Submit...

What's up with the writing police?

Experts abound in every field and every expert offers advice from their own world-view. The writing advice most often offered to new writers is:

“You should write every day.” 

I hate this kind of writing advice.

To be clear, I’m not saying you shouldn’t write every day -- it’s not the specifics of the writing advice that bothers me in this case, it’s the should.

Any time someone hits me with a should, I want to hit back. That’s their truth, not mine. I’m turned off right away and just not interested. It’s like I have an inner 12-year old who sticks her fingers in her ears and yells NANANANANAH. (She’s a cutie-pie, that girl: red pigtails.)

This kind of writing advice seems to imply that “real” writers write every day, making the rest of us feel like imposters if we can’t get to our desks 365 days of the year. As though the rest of us just have "cute little hobbies."

Many of us wish the world was a kinder and more compassionate place. We’re clear that political dialogue should be constructive rather than destructive, and people attacking one another will not help us solve our problems or heal the world’s seemingly intractable divisions.

We’re good humans, or we try to be.

We know that being kind to one another is essential to combat the isolation and loneliness generated by an increasingly online lifestyle where we don’t speak with people face-to-face anymore as much as we used to. We make conscious efforts to reach out with grace, kindness and compassion when we see people suffer.

Except maybe when it comes to ourselves and our own writing. Then, we say things to ourselves about ourselves and our creative work that we would NEVER say to another living being EVER. Things like:

• “Yeah, I knew you couldn’t do it.”
• “Kids in grade school write better than this.”
• “This story is awful....

Are you a published author who’s organized in your own life and loves to support other writers so that they achieve their writing goals too?

Then please read on…

Resilient Writers works with women writers to help them finish their books and create a writing life they love.

We do this with our monthly membership program, The Writer’s Flow Studio, which helps writers go from a state of fear to a state of flow in their writing lives so that they can sustain a consistent and rewarding writing practice.

We also support writers who’ve started a book but struggled to finish it on their own through our signature 12-week group coaching program, First Book Finish, which teaches them the First Book Finish Framework and provides the mindset and writing craft support they need to finish their draft and/or revise it and submit for publication. We have a 90% success rate for the writers entering this program.

We also do some limited 1-on-1 developmental editing support,...

Friend, if you are paying attention even with just one eye open, it’s a hard hard world. My heart goes out to everyone affected by the horrible acts of war unfolding day after day in Ukraine.

For the first time ever, scientists have named a heat wave -- Zoe has devastated Spain and caused many deaths. It used to feel like climate change was the future, but now it's all too real.

The US and China are at loggerheads again, this time over Taiwan.

When we wake up to this kind of thing, it’s tempting sometimes to just pull the covers over our heads and stay in bed.

And it doesn't end... there's always something happening on either a global scale, or locally, or (sometimes more devastating still) within our own families and circles of loved ones.

But what if you have an antidote?

Bear with me here: I’m not saying that you personally are saving the world through poetry. It might be true that your short stories, and mine, won’t resolve climate change or stop the next...

Busy Women On Writing Books

This is the the fourth instalment in a new interview series on writing, profiling women writers who’ve written and published books while also working, parenting, volunteering, caring for family, attending school, and ALL OF THE THINGS.

For this week's interview, I'm pleased to introduce you to Lori McNulty.

Lori McNulty is a Vancouver-based author, photographer, and digital storyteller. Her book, Life on Mars, was short-listed for the 2017 Danuta Gleed Literary Award which recognizes the best debut short fiction collection by a Canadian author.

She was short-listed for the 2014 Journey prize and a finalist again in 2015. Her non-fiction appears in several anthologies including Body & Soul: Stories for Skeptics and seekers, as well as The Globe & Mail. Both her fiction and non-fiction have been long-list finalists for the CBC Canada Writes Prizes. 

As a writer-in-residence aboard the Canada C3 icebreaker in 2018, Lori navigated part of...

Nothing has made more difference to my writing life than working with mentors -- writers with more experience than I had at the time who could encourage me to push myself and my writing further than I know I'd have been able to do working on my own.

I can't say enough about how that has transformed my poetry, fiction and non-fiction work. If you think your work could benefit from an experienced set of eyes, here are 5 good reasons to find a writing mentor, along with what and what not to expect once you find them

A Writing Mentor Can Offer Deadlines

Working with a writing mentor will mean external deadlines. Based on mutual agreement, you’ll identify a regular time period for you to submit your work and receive feedback. If you are the kind of self-disciplined angel who takes deadlines seriously no matter who sets them, then may life continue to shower blessings in your general direction.

For the rest of us, having a set time by which we must deliver a poem or story or...