Would your writing practice benefit from regular inspiration and gentle, inclusive accountability?
If you’re looking for silent support, camaraderie, and the transformative power of a group context for your writing practice, you are invited to join the Writing Circle.
Each Writing Circle cycle begins on the new moon and continues for the full moon cycle of ~28 days. Participants commit to sharing a piece of writing, as frequently as we are inspired, within a private group of fellow writers. Some people share their offerings nearly every day; others may not share at all. As recipients of each other’s writing, we act as witnesses — WITHnessing — offering no feedback or commentary beyond a simple “Thank You.”
Writing Sangha’s Writing Circle was created specifically for women of color; queer, nonbinary, trans, and gender-fluid people; and people whose physical or mental health challenges, neurology, and/or other identities and life circumstances make other spaces feel less safe… and our allies. Many of us are graduates of Corporeal Writing’s Ethnoautobiography classes offered in 2021 and 2022. Feel free to check out our Community Agreements, and if you’re still not sure if the Writing Circle is for you, the answer is YES!
The roots of this writing circle…
Writing Sangha’s Writing Circle, formerly known as The Offering, was born in December, 2022. You could think of it as a kinder, gentler, more inclusive version of The Grind.
The Grind is a commitment to share a piece of writing Every Day, No Excuses, by email, by midnight, with a small group of random friends and strangers, for a month at a time. You can only be invited to The Grind by someone who’s successfully completed the previous month. I’ve been invited. I’ve considered joining. And yet… I never really felt like the target audience. I choose to honor my writing practice a little differently.
Janice Lee is a phenomenal writer / teacher / healer / portal opener. She began the first writing class I took with her by pointing out that the expectation of equal reciprocation has very capitalist, transactional roots. As an alternative, she invited us all to show up and contribute how we were able, when we could, and for us all to trust and appreciate our respective levels of participation as appropriate for the conditions we each found ourselves in. This sentiment very much informs Writing Sangha’s Writing Circle.
Instead of grinding out our poems or stories or what-have-you, we tend to them lovingly, and offer them generously, as raw or polished as they may be, as often as we are inspired. Aside from a few simple agreements — we sign up for one moon cycle at a time; we keep everything we receive confidential; we bear witness without offering feedback beyond the occasional “thank you” — there are no expectations of productivity. Nobody will shame or guilt you if you miss a day (or week) or two. You can offer three words, three lines, three images, three pages, three chapters… you get the idea.
If it supports you to feel a sense of accountability, then yes, this could be it! And I hope all Writing Circle participants will take comfort in the fact that life is shifting all the time, meaning no explanations or apologies are necessary when we show up as we are, when we can.
See you on the proverbial page!
Writing Sangha 