EVENTS Separate but together: an online writers’ retreat




When the pandemic put a stop to everyone's plans, and had creatives staring into space more than usual, many writers turned to online events to fill the void. Louisa Glancy found that a free online writers' retreat, run by Charlie Haynes, helped her alleviate brain freeze. 

If you are anything like me (that is to say, not an epidemiologist) you probably weren’t expecting 2020 to unfold quite as it has.

I don’t want to make light of the virus and its effects on our families, finances, career and mental health. Above all, my heart goes out to all those who have lost loved ones.

Yes, 2020 has been rough and has brought changes to our lives we could never have imagined just a few short months ago. But, if you are a writer, artist, or usually work from home, people may have said something like this to you: ‘I suppose not much has changed for you.’

‘No,’ you may have found yourself saying, having just cut your own hair, eaten something weird from the back of the cupboard, disinfected the post and popped on a face mask to go to the corner shop, ‘It’s pretty much the same as usual’.

Of course, nothing is the same as usual, and writing and creating against the backdrop of a pandemic is no picnic (even if you were allowed to go on a picnic). The world and its troubles have a way of coming to find you, even when you are hiding at your desk.


Mystery writer Agatha Christie.
(Picture credit: writingcooperative.com)

A kind of brain freeze had settled on me, and despite having some exciting things in the pipeline, I found myself doing an awful lot of staring into space (even more than usual). Seeking inspiration helped; I watched online talks about writing, took part in webinars, and read. I also found something that helped me on a practical level.

I started taking part in a series of free online writers’ retreats run by Charlie Haynes of Urban Writers’ Retreats. You join the retreats through a Facebook group. They start with a short welcome video from Charlie, with motivational words and advice, a breathing or gratitude exercise, smiles and encouragement. 

Charlie provides a timetable and a goal-setting sheet and participants post their goals and progress throughout the session. I have never been on a physical retreat let alone an online one, but I really enjoyed being part of a group, encouraging and supporting each other.

There was no pressure, no judgement, no comparing your achievements, just a good feeling of working away, separate but together. It was a bit like sitting in a library, looking up from your desk to see others deep in concentration, and feeling encouraged to return to your own project. I asked Charlie to tell me a little about how the online retreats came about and why she decided to run them.

I found myself doing an awful lot of staring into space (even more than usual). Seeking inspiration helped; I watched online talks about writing, took part in webinars and read.

Charlie: I had to cancel both my one-day retreats in London and the residential ones at quite short notice, but I wanted the writers to not miss out.

I've been running online retreats in a small private forum since 2014 but had never quite worked out how to take them to the public tech-wise; another barrier was payments and letting the right people in/out. I was trying to do something at short notice and realised that I actually wanted to support my whole community, and that doing retreats for free in an existing Facebook group would be the easiest and quickest way of setting it up, and doing all of the things I wanted, like having videos at specific times so that it felt more personal and created a sense of it being live.


Charlie Haynes of Urban Writers' Retreats. (Picture credit: Charlie Haynes)

I literally just decided how it should run and what resources I needed to create, based on what I wanted writers to experience. I set it up with the thought that I'd test it out and make changes for the next week if it was a disaster. Then I sent out a newsletter and some social media posts. Allowing it to not be perfect was the thing that released me to just have a go, after wanting to do this for ages but not feeling I could, without it being 'right'.

The group energy has been amazing, everyone is really supportive of each other, and there's a core of people developing who come again and again.

One of the quirks, for example, is that it's called Urban Writers' Retreat because I started with one-day retreats in London when I lived there, but I now live somewhere very rural with terrible internet. This means I can't do the video elements live, which was an important part of what I wanted to create for writers. But I can pre-record them and schedule in advance on Facebook. I then add in the human/live element by responding in the Facebook group.

Of course, the online retreats are different from in-person ones. Part of the physical retreat experience is going to a different place that's specifically set aside for this purpose, so you can't get distracted by the TV or be worrying that you should be doing x instead, because you are there to write. It's having that container of time that's just for writing, and making it feel 'real' and legitimate; some people find it easier than others to get that for themselves at home.


Absurdist writer: Albert Camus.
(Picture credit: writingcooperative.com)

I've tried to think about how I can make it something people really look forward to and get a lot from. So there are specific times and a timetable to help create that separation from the regular world, and I post at every break to help keep that sense of this being a real, live thing, not just something you're slogging away at alone. I wanted people to have a sense of personal connection, to make writers feel supported by a real live human who's rooting for them, it also adds another layer of accountability because they know I'm checking the replies.

So I comment on everyone's goals, come in at every break point and read every reply, and then send them congratulatory gifs (sometimes to commiserate, but normally to congratulate!) at the end – I do it through pictures because they make me laugh and it's more interesting to pick them for writers personally, rather than to just say a blanket 'well done' on everyone's posts. And of course, for some people who can't physically get to one of the retreats, can't take a full day or who just find social situations difficult, it's much better to be able to access something like this online.

I've tried to think about how I can make it something people really look forward to and get a lot from. So there are specific times and a timetable to help create that separation from the regular world.

The group energy has been amazing, everyone is really supportive of each other, and there's a core of people developing who come again and again. It just feels really good to be proactively creating something that empowers other people to feel positive, be creative and feel like they're making progress at the moment.

After the first weekend, a number of people said they'd got so much out of the retreat that they'd like to support it, so I've added donation buttons – but actually I think it helps everyone make better progress if there are plenty of us there, so while I'm very grateful for any donations writers feel they want to make, I want to keep offering them for free and without any sense of obligation, at least for the immediate future.

Once the physical retreats start again, I won't be able to keep doing the online ones weekly, but hopefully I'll try to find one day each month to continue them.

Retreats run:

Saturdays 10am-4pm
Mondays 10am-12pm and 1-3pm
Thursdays 8-10pm).

To book, go to Charlie's website, or her Facebook page.

*Header image: Charlie’s desk, by Charlie Haynes.

***************************************************************************************


Louisa Glancy is an artist and middle grade writer. Her day job is writing and editing for educational publishers. She lives by the sea in Kent and has a (sort of) pet herring gull called Gregory Peck. She also runs the Canterbury Coffee and Chat SCBWI group. 

Twitter: @LouisaGlancy
Instagram: @louisaglancy

***************************************************************************************

Fran Price is Events Editor for Words & Pictures, the online magazine for SCBWI-BI. Contact her at events@britishscbwi.org.





















No comments:

We love comments and really appreciate the time it takes to leave one.
Interesting and pithy reactions to a post are brilliant but we also LOVE it when people just say they've read and enjoyed.
We've made it easy to comment by losing the 'are you human?' test, which means we get a lot of spam. Fortunately, Blogger recognises these, so most, if not all, anonymous comments are deleted without reading.

Words & Pictures is the Online Magazine of SCBWI British Isles. Powered by Blogger.