Date/Time
Date(s) - Fri 1st Nov - Fri 29th Nov, 2024
12:30pm - 2:00pm
Order, chaos, knots and threads: exploring an authentic neurodivergent writing practice
Join writer Rebecca Schiller, and a small group of eight other neurodivergent writers, for a supportive and creative month of exploration, experimentation and discussion as we break the writing rules and find innovative and authentic ways to make progress and shape our writing practice so that it works for us.
Suitable for new and experienced writers of memoir, non-fiction, fiction and poetry and open to anyone who identifies as neurodivergent, whether or not you have an external diagnosis.
Many of us learned to write in a neurotypical world ill-suited to neurodivergent patterns of processing, creating and working, but finding an alternative and sustainable writing practice can be daunting and difficult alone. This Neurodivergent Writers Month will offer a neurodivergent-friendly space in which to unpick our learned writing behaviours and beliefs with others who understand. We’ll explore and test other ways of working, sharing knowledge and inspiration with our peers and finding ways to motivate ourselves and each other; bringing awareness to the opportunities and mitigating some of the challenges of writing from a place of neurodivergence.
Course outline
In each of the four weeks, Rebecca will gather the group to focus on a different stage of the creative process; taking a journey from the first spark of an idea through to finishing a piece or project. Participants will meet on Zoom for a weekly workshop and discussion, each tied to a stage of the writing process. During our workshops, informed by what we have discussed, we will each set our individual writing intentions for the week along with wellbeing intentions to ensure we are looking after ourselves as we create.
To help us make progress with these, there will be optional support and structure throughout the course including: an online writing space; a group forum to share work and chat with your peers; writing and reading exercises; and group drop-in Zoom sessions with Rebecca to ask questions, share news of your writing week and help you stay motivated.
Each writer will also receive a one-to-one tutorial with Rebecca and can choose to submit up to 3,500 words of writing or notes, either in advance of their tutorial or as a follow up.
Moniack Mhor Neurodivergent Writers Month includes:
- an introductory welcome session
- four weekly 1.5-hour online workshops
- one 45-minute one-to-one tutorial and feedback on up to 3,500 words
- three optional 45-minute ‘write together’ sessions
- two optional 45-minute drop-in sessions at the ends of weeks 1 and 3 to check in with Rebecca, discuss progress, ask questions and get support from Rebecca and your group
- a final online ceilidh session – with optional sharing of work
- Contact and support from your community of writers via Google Classroom (optional)
Welcome Session
A chance to meet each other and introduce ourselves and our writing, acknowledging how awkward and scary this can feel for many of us. We’ll talk about how the course will work, what each of us is hoping to get from our time together and understand any needs or boundaries that will ensure the space feels safe for everyone.
Week 1 – The Beauty of the New
We’ll explore ideas: what generates them, how to capture them, how they make us feel, how important they are as fuel for the rest of the writing process, how to decide between competing ideas, knowing when to let go and when to hold on. Using the theme of ‘the new’ we’ll set gentle writing and wellbeing intentions for the week, focusing on how to use ‘newness’ positively in our writing practice.
Week 2 – Order and Chaos | Knots and Threads
In our second week, we’ll begin to explore what happens when we take an idea and begin to weave it into something more. We’ll examine structure in an informal, anything-goes way; looking for meaningful, generative and nourishing ideas for mapping and planning our writing. The group will discuss the ups and downs of trying to order our creativity and the potential untapped energy in creative chaos as well as finding ways to get lost in our work without losing our way entirely. A week of knots, tangles and golden threads.
Week 3 – The wide, wide middle
In our third week, we’ll rove over the expansive middle of a project. Using the support-network we’ve built, we’ll help each other traverse what can often be the hardest, scariest and loneliest part of writing. We’ll look at how to keep going through uncertainty, discussing how to use what motivates each of us to overcome stuckness and waning momentum. We’ll look for ways to re-energise ourselves, develop habits that don’t feel constraining and build a survival kit to turn to when we travel across the wide, wide middle.
Week 4 – Is it really the end?
In our final week we’ll examine what it means to finish a writing project: the obstacles to doing so, how to decide when something is ready to press save and send, how to take that seemingly final step and what happens next when the ending turns out to be just the beginning of the next new stage? We’ll also gather up and reflect on what we’ve learned during the month so it can be useful to us in our future writing. We’ll review the intentions we made at the beginning and set new ones for our writing going forwards. We’ll also offer the opportunity to share our work – if that feels right for you – and discuss if and how the group might continue to support each other after the course has finished.
Timetable
Welcome Friday 1 Nov 12:30–13:30 Introduction
Week 1 Monday 4 Nov 12:30–14:00 Workshop 1
Week 1 Wednesday 6 Nov 12:30–13:15 Write together 1
Week 1 Friday 8 Nov 12:30–13:15 Drop-in and discuss 1
Week 2 Monday 11 Nov 12:30–14:00 Workshop 2
Week 2 Wednesday 13 Nov 12:30–13:15 Write together 2
Week 3 Monday 18 Nov 12:30–14:00 Workshop 3
Week 3 Friday 22 Nov 12:30–13:15 Drop-in and discuss 2
Week 4 Monday 25 Nov 12:30–14:00 Workshop 4
Week 4 Wednesday 27 Nov 12:30–13:15 Write together 3
Week 4 Friday 29 Nov 19:00–20:30 Ceilidh
Tutorials
Your one-to-one tutorial with Rebecca will be scheduled when the course starts and will most likely take place in weeks 2 or 3.
How will this course be neurodivergent friendly?
- all participants and the host will be neurodivergent
- you can attend from home
- we’ll be asking all participants to let us know any access needs, accommodations and preferences in advance and will be shaping the details of the course to meet these needs
- there’s a flexible programme, with optional activities so you can do what suits you
- there’s an understanding that people have different learning and communication styles
- there’s no obligation to share writing with the group
Do I need an official diagnosis to attend?
No! Anyone who identifies as neurodivergent is welcome to participate, whether or not they have an external diagnosis.
What’s a ‘write together’ session?
We meet up in a quiet Zoom room and get on with our own writing in the company of others. If we like, we can have a few minutes’ chat before and after. You can have your camera on or off, as you prefer.
Tutor
Rebecca Schiller is author of several non-fiction books for adults and children, including her memoir of coming home to her neurodivergent mind, Earthed, and its re-imagined North American edition, A Thousand Ways to Pay Attention.
Alongside her own new writing projects, she leads the writing support network Mothers Who Write, mentors other writers and hosts retreats for writers and neurodivergent people. Her journalism has appeared in a range of publications including The Observer and she is co-founder of the human rights charity Birthrights.
Rebecca lives on a croft in the north-east of Scotland with her family, plants and animals.
Author pic: Penelope Fewster.
Fees
The full fee for this online course is £360. A deposit of £100 is required to secure your place, which is non-refundable after a 14-day cooling-off period. The balance payment of £260 is due six weeks before the course begins.
Bursaries are available, and you also have the option to pay in instalments, please email online@moniackmhor.org.uk to enquire.
All activity takes place on Zoom, and workshops include a short break. Moniack Mhor staff will be on hand to support you during your course.
For more information please email online@moniackmhor.org.uk.
Access
Please let us know in your booking form if you have any access requirements when working online so we can do our best to support you. For more information about access to our courses, please visit our Access page.
Terms and Conditions
Please read our Terms & Conditions before booking.