Gather the Harvest

On August eighth, twelve women gathered in the RCWMS office for one of our recurring seasonal writing workshops. A number of those were familiar faces, while a few were there for their first Resource Center program. Rebecca Welper led the group, which included women in their thirties through their sixties. The evening included prompts and quiet writing time, with opportunities to share aloud what had just been written. The prompts were based on the “Gather the Harvest” theme, inviting reflection on summer memories, the full moon, metaphorical and literal fruits of one’s labor, and gratitude. To foster an approach to writing as a spiritual practice, participants were encouraged to delve deep into their personal experience and reserve judgment about what they wrote and heard from others’ writing.

Pens flew across pages, and fingers clicked away at keyboards. At first, however, participants showed a hesitance to share, a common occurrence when new groups form. By the end of their evening, everyone found her voice, heard her words aloud, and got supportive feedback from the group. After the workshop, one participant said she appreciated the community aspect of writing together. She mentioned an “intimacy that rises within me at the onset [of the workshop] and remains. It allows for a depth of expression that I cannot always get to when writing alone.”

Connection with each other and depth of expression are what we aim to facilitate when we offer these writing workshops and weeks of writing at the beach. Have you been to one yet? This fall we have several opportunities for you to gather and write together. To see what’s coming next and register, take a look at our calendar. Hope to see you soon.