Some Musings About a Writing Group

•

by Robin Mitzcavitch, Director of Religious Exploration

Are you a writer? Tell me your story. I will listen. How do you identify as one? How do you define the word “writer”? In my life, since I was able to write, I have written. You name it. I wrote little thoughts about the stories my mom read to me. I wrote a poetry book with my best friend at 10 years old. We walked with the handwritten and illustrated pages to a publishing company in our city and handed it to the woman at the front desk. I asked if they could please make it into a book for us. The woman smiled at us like we were a couple of cute puppies. She said something to the tune of, “Oh, aren’t you just darling!” I can’t remember what happened next, but alas, there was no book.

I wrote diaries, angsty teenager poetry, journals and essays. I wrote short stories, a novella, and three novels. I wrote a blog and have done business writing. I have never been published because I am afraid to send things out. I’m sure my stuff does not measure up to all the treasure of writing out there, but I still love to do it. In my fantasy of being called back by a publisher, I wonder if I would even want to be published because I don’t wish to go on the road promoting myself. Am I a writer? Yes, I will call myself a writer. What about you?

We use a theme-based ministry program called Soul Matters. It’s an excellent tool to keep UU related topics unified throughout many of the programs offered at the church. I use it with Religious Exploration and Aaron uses it with his worship planning. It has been used with small group ministry. Now, material is available to build a UU Writing Group, and I have been looking it over. Reading through materials using this month’s theme of Deep Listening, I was pleasantly surprised. The writing prompts, discussion topics, quotes and images got my writer’s wheel turning.

This month with the children, we have begun discovering how we can listen deeply to our own hearts, our own knowing. Next we will try to understand how and why some peoples’ voices are not heard or are not deemed as important as others’. Soon we will practice the skill of listening deeply to others and how that practice is akin to love.

The exercises provided in the UU Writing Group nicely illuminate this month’s theme of Deep Listening. I want to share some examples. Perhaps the hidden, or polished, or budding writer within you will be interested in getting involved participating or facilitating a UU Writing Group!

To deeply listen and be deeply listened to…
Rev. Emily Gage

May we open our hearts and minds to one another and the world.
May we let ourselves be changed by the stories around us.
May we deeply listen and be deeply listened to, and be held in silence and love.

Personal Warm Up Prompts

Ease your way into this month’s theme with one or more of these prompts. Use them as a free association exercise. Don’t try to create a full or finished piece of writing. Simply take around 5 minutes to jot down bullet point thoughts, a short intuitive response, idea fragments or maybe even sketch some images. Have fun getting your creative juices going!

Option A: If you could go back to a conversation & correct how you listened, what conversation would that be?
Option B: How have your wounds and losses altered the way you listen?
Option C: How good are you at listening compassionately to yourself?
Option D: Thinking back to your childhood, what did you learn about listening by watching your parents interact with each other?
Option E: If you asked Love “Where do you need me to direct my attention?”, how might it answer you back?
Option F: Listen to and reflect on one of these songs on The Practice of Deep Listening:

p.s. If music is your writing muse, you might want to check out our entire
Soul Matters music playlist on The Practice of Deep Listening:

Click here for our Spotify playlist on Deep Listening
Click here for the YouTube playlist on Deep Listening


Writing Project Exercises

Suggested Steps:

Step 1: Which project exercise/prompt is yours and why?
Spend some time reflecting on the options below. Treat it as a spiritual discernment exercise, in which you try to discern which option seems to be emotionally pulling you towards it. For those who are comfortable, you might think of it as asking, “Which exercise is my inner voice inviting me to explore?” Or to put it another way, the goal is to figure out which exercise is “yours” and why that is so.

Step 2: First thoughts
Write whatever comes to mind in response to the exercise you selected. Free associate using words, sentence fragments, images.

Step 3: Write your piece
Write your reflection, poem, story, song, or story inspired by your writing.
Take your time. For some, their piece will spill out whole cloth in a matter of moments. For others of us, it will be a journey of twists and turns, with us writing and rewriting as first drafts open us to new insights, inspiring second drafts, and even thirds.


Option A: Practice the Art of Listening

We practice to become good musicians. We practice to become good athletes. We practice to become good artists. But somehow we’ve been led to believe that we don’t have to practice to become good listeners. So, to gather fodder for your writing this month, identify a listening skill, find ways to practice it each day for a week, and then write about your experience.
And if you need help picking a listening skill to practice with, here are three good ones to choose from:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpnNsSyDw-g&t=47s  (found minute 1:20-2:05)

  • Ask “Will you tell me your story?” or say “I’d love to know how you came to this point of view.” 

https://urbanconfessional.org/blog/howtodisagree

So! Back to Robin. The options given of what to write about go from Option A to Option I and there are also visual photo prompts to stir your brain into a writing frenzy! Is this cool or what? Well, maybe it is for someone who likes to write. But it could be that you’ve always wanted to try your hand at writing and this is the nudge to begin. Anyway you look at it, I think it’s another avenue for folks to gather and discover and share. This isn’t a “how to write” or writing critique sort of group. It is a group that allows and supports ideas and sharing through the art of written word.

If you’re interested in talking more about getting a group like this rolling, either as facilitator or participant, or a participating facilitator, reach out to Robin or Aaron and we will listen. There is so much writing potential here! I can hear them, the stories …all the wonderful stories. Can you hear them too?

Dotting I’s and Crossing T’s,
Robin