'Writing Makes Everything Glow'

In February 2022, we met for a long weekend of writing together, and came up with a collective manifesto of sorts, to describe who we are and what we want to create together. Here's what we came up with...

We are a group of writers who know the value of writing:

Writing makes everything glow. It transforms the way you see the world, yourself and what is possible.
Writing is a doorway. As Louise Glück says, writing is thinking.
Writing brings clarity and catharsis to our busy lives as parents, carers, workers with day jobs, and as humans struggling with mental and physical health challenges in a messed up unfair world.
Writing is a chance to feel the buzz of making something that is completely and utterly mine.
Writing challenges us to keep learning, to step out of our individual and collective comfort zones.

We came together as a collective because we jump so many hurdles and dismantle countless roadblocks every time we pick up a pen or open a laptop to write, and there will be many more to come as we continue with our writing lives. Yes, we need time alone to write, but we reject the idea that writing is a solitary pursuit. We need all the help we can get.

But we are not simply a writing group for ourselves. We are writers who have a commitment to sharing our practice because we know that not everyone needs, wants or is able to go to uni or sign up to expensive writing retreats.

We want to give other people the chance to experience what we’ve experienced:

To feel the encouragement of friends in those moment when we think we’re stupid and everything we write is terrible.
To sit round a table giggling as we try to work out what a gerund is and whether it really matters.
To feel the glow of helping someone bring their story to life.

Our community workshops and projects will be a space to:

Share safely with supportive, creative people
Give yourself permission to honour your own experience (or let us give you that permission if you’re not quite there yet)
Make sense of what’s going on in your creative life (we think this helps with the not so creative life too)
Be reminded that your boring, insignificant story is actually fascinating and important.