A Useful Review for Employing the Five Senses in Writing Scenes

Posted on by June 22, 2017
In writing, we only feel included as readers when our senses are involved. As we read with our senses involved, we learn more about ourselves and others by encountering the way the others record surroundings through their senses. As writers, we have a fuller picture when we allow our characters and ourselves as speakers to … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Finding the Motto Writer Within

Posted on by June 15, 2017
We are motto (and affirmation) happy in our culture. We circulate phrases from manufacturers and social service organizations from “Just do it” to “Just say no,” from “You deserve a break today” to “I brake for animals.” After I studied creative writing in graduate school and was publishing poetry, I was just starting to use … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

“Grave Matters”: Mary Ann Payne’s Writing Exercise Result

Posted on by June 8, 2017
I am pleased to share long-time Writing It Real member Mary Ann Payne’s writing in response to the writing exercise I shared last week. Grave Matters by Mary Ann Payne It’s time to bury the piano. Chop it up in tiny pieces and put it in a deep hole in the backyard next to the … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Burying the Dutch Oven: A Writing Exercise for Discovery

Posted on by June 1, 2017
A writing colleague of mine once shared in an essay that when she angrily broke up with a beloved college boyfriend under duress because her father didn’t like him, she took the Dutch oven they used for cooking and buried it in the backyard before she left. The topic of the essay was finding him … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Contest Winner Linda Robertson’s Poems

Posted on by and May 27, 2017
In our final week of posting contest entries from the fall/winter WIR writing contest, we have seven poems by Linda M. Robertson. Our contest judge Sharon Bryan wrote this about selecting these poems as winners: These poems speak in a voice that makes me want to listen to everything it says. They are so well-crafted that … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

“Long Meg Speaks” by Emma Hunter, a Winning Essay in the Fall/Winter WIR Contest

Posted on by and May 19, 2017
Our fall/winter writing contest guest judge Sharon Bryan chose Emma Hunter’s essay, “Long Meg Speaks,” as one of three winners. This week, we have the judge’s words about the essay as well as the author’s words about writing it, and, of course, the essay. Emma wrote this in answer to my request for words about … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Writing It Real Fall/Winter Contest Winner Dorothy Ross’ “A Night at the Plaza”

Posted on by and May 18, 2017
[I will be posting the work of our recent three winners this week and then for the next two weeks. I hope you enjoy their comments about the writing of their work, our contest judge Sharon Byran’s comments, and, of course, the writing. – Ed.] Here is Dorothy Ross on why she is writing the … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

What’s the Writer’s Job? Getting Going and Keeping on Going

Posted on by May 4, 2017
When I teach in person, people sometimes show up having purchased a copy of the recently updated edition of my first instructional book on writing: Writing in a Convertible with the Top Down, which I co-authored with Christi Killien Glover. Their interest prompts me to include exercises from that book during our class time together. This week, I’d like to … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Poetry and Essays by Carol Smallwood: Observer, Librarian, Philosopher

Posted on by and April 27, 2017
Librarian, poet and author Carol Smallwood came to my attention over the years when she emailed calls for essays to consider for anthologies she was editing. I was very pleased to learn about these anthologies and very pleased when she accepted my essays for inclusion in Poetry: Tips on Writing, Teaching and Publishing by Successful … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Sheila Reads Her Poems for National Poetry Month

Posted on by April 6, 2017
For National Poetry Month, tonight I am reading from my own poetry at the link below. For me poetry is an everyday experience and so there aren’t any huge production values or perfect lighting in this video. Just me sharing my poems and talking to you about what I hope poetry accomplishes for humanity. You can … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Finding Starts in Personal Essay Writing: Part 3

Posted on by April 5, 2017
Mining the Three Freewrites: Whether you have done these freewrites ( see Part 1 and Part 2)  in the course of one writing session or over several days, find out what the freewrites have to tell you about an essay you might write by combing through them and jotting down images and phrases that interest … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Finding Starts in Personal Essay Writing: Part 2

Posted on by March 23, 2017
[The following article appeared first in “The Heart and Craft and of Life Writing.”] Last week’s article included a freewrite to get you going toward writing on a topic that surprises you or allows you to get into a piece of writing in a way that is new to you. If you haven’t done freewrite … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Finding Starts in Personal Essay Writing: Part 1

Posted on by March 23, 2017
[The following article appeared first in “The Heart and Craft and of Life Writing.”] It  might not be obvious that those of us who write personal essays can benefit greatly from not knowing what we have to write about.  That is surprising to people who think of the essay as researched knowledge with a professorial, … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

The Way I See It

Posted on by March 9, 2017
“The Way I See It” is the “Prologue” from Writing Personal Essays: Sharing and Shaping Your Life Experience, Published in print and digitally by Sheila Bender’s Writing It Real, March, 2017 [Note: I wrote a slightly different version of this essay for the 1995 edition of my book. Everything I realized then remains important to … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Acknowledging the Value of Your Writing, Part 4

Posted on by March 3, 2017
Creating Self-Understanding Despite Fears of Revealing Your Own Shortcomings and True Experience Before we see what writers have said on the issue of fear about revealing oneself through writing, try this exercise: Select four or so pieces of your writing. Look for nouns that you used more than you knew you did. Circle these words … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Acknowledging the Value of Your Writing Part 3 of 4

Posted on by February 23, 2017
Healing Through the Dark Emotions From journal writing to writing finished plays, memoir, poems and fiction, writers evoke and examine encounters with the dark emotions incited by misfortune, abuse, divorce, severe lack of confidence, fear of difficult and horrifying situations in our world, as well as the loss of a loved one or of a … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Acknowledging the Value of Your Writing: Exercises for Week One and Two of Four

Posted on by February 11, 2017
I have been teaching a class called “Writing is a Friend with Extraordinary Benefits” for a couple of years now through Women on Writing. I have been extremely engaged in what my students write and thrilled by the evidence that by writing from certain models the writers have reaffirmed their belief in the value of writing. After … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Writing About Painful Topics

Posted on by February 2, 2017
My friend, the essayist Brenda Miller, wrote the introduction to my memoir A New Theology: Turning to Poetry in a Time of Grief. “I understood then,” she wrote, “that grief can be a channel in which you swim alone, where you can also find your brethren as they flicker along beside you, their bodies gliding … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

Help Writing Scenes That Engage the Reader (and the Writer)

Posted on by February 6, 2017
In 2005, I posted an article with excerpts from Riding in Cars with Boys by Beverly Donofrio’s and A Soldier’s Daughter Never Cries by Kaylie Jones along with exercises based on their writing. I am reposting the following short excerpts along with the ideas I had aimed at helping you launch new writing of your … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.

A Writer’s Role Models: Canadian Author Miriam Towes and Her 15-Year-Old Character Elfrieda

Posted on by January 19, 2017
This week, I have made a video for Writing It Real’s Weekly Article. In it, I share a passage from Canadian author Miriam Toews’ novel All My Puny Sorrows in which a talented 15-year-old piano player exercises her genius against the unwelcome authoritarianism of the Mennonite elders, who “willy nilly” as the girl’s mother says, … Continue reading →
To access this material you must be a member. Read about our Lifetime Membership benefits and discounts when you purchase Writing It Real services.