In Writing from the Soul circles, writers gather in an atmosphere of openness and non-judgment to freewrite together from soul-inviting prompts. We are all shy in an atmosphere of critique and so the point of these circles is to create a field of acceptance and deep play — to receive each other deeply through our writing. The point isn’t to create finished pieces but to be generative — to open the channels and get us writing for the fun of it. I personally find the resulting freewrites to be rich sources of material that I later mine for poems, essays and stories. The circles are also great fun and can be deeply healing. How often have we been received without fear of critique and evaluation? What a relief.
You can begin with a single partner, meeting either in person or over the phone to write together and read aloud. You'll be surprised at how supportive, inspiring and intimate this can be. The key is to simply do the practice together and listen deeply to one another when you read your pieces aloud. It's important to make it a hard and fast rule not to make evaluative comments, whether positive or negative.
Why no positive feedback? If someone says, “That was amazing! I loved it!” It might feel good in the moment, but it’s a drug. If no one says that about your next piece, you’ll start to wonder why. To create the conditions for our deeper self to expose itself in our writing, we need to cultivate an extreme indifference to praise and blame, and to do that we have to first give up the habit of relying on praise for validation. Being in an atmosphere of non-evaluation can be such a relief — it’s easier to relax and open.
The more you let go of evaluation of self and other, the less your habitual mind will interfere and you will begin to access work from another region of your mind and heart. It is not unusual for people to be completely surprised by what they have written, for a story to pop out of nowhere, or a poem, or the answer to a dilemma. You might even get the first sentence of your memoir in the middle of the fourth paragraph of a timed writing on a totally different subject.
Once you have a little practice with the process, it will be easy to start your own Writing from the Soul group. Just follow these principles and the basic practice outlined here.
You can begin with a single partner, meeting either in person or over the phone to write together and read aloud. You'll be surprised at how supportive, inspiring and intimate this can be. The key is to simply do the practice together and listen deeply to one another when you read your pieces aloud. It's important to make it a hard and fast rule not to make evaluative comments, whether positive or negative.
Why no positive feedback? If someone says, “That was amazing! I loved it!” It might feel good in the moment, but it’s a drug. If no one says that about your next piece, you’ll start to wonder why. To create the conditions for our deeper self to expose itself in our writing, we need to cultivate an extreme indifference to praise and blame, and to do that we have to first give up the habit of relying on praise for validation. Being in an atmosphere of non-evaluation can be such a relief — it’s easier to relax and open.
The more you let go of evaluation of self and other, the less your habitual mind will interfere and you will begin to access work from another region of your mind and heart. It is not unusual for people to be completely surprised by what they have written, for a story to pop out of nowhere, or a poem, or the answer to a dilemma. You might even get the first sentence of your memoir in the middle of the fourth paragraph of a timed writing on a totally different subject.
Once you have a little practice with the process, it will be easy to start your own Writing from the Soul group. Just follow these principles and the basic practice outlined here.
