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Sheila Bender's Writing It Real

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Sheila Bender's Writing It Real
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Tag Archives: trust your writing

Interview with Jennifer Jamieson Woods About Writing Her Autobiographical Novel No Guarantees

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on October 8, 2020 by Jennifer Jamieson WoodsOctober 8, 2020

Last week, we posted Chapter 40 of Jennifer Jamieson Woods’ autobiographical novel No Guarantees.  This week’s post is an interview with the author about writing the novel she needed to write. Sheila Jennifer, thank you for sharing the story of … Continue reading →

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Posted in From Our Contributors, Reading for Writing, The Working Writer, WIR2020 | Tagged trust your writing, women's voices

Staying in a Committed Relationship With Your Writing

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on January 31, 2019 by Sheila BenderJanuary 31, 2019

According to Webster’s II New Riverside University Dictionary, commitment means “the state of being bound emotionally or intellectually to an ideal or course of action.” Emotionally or intellectually are good words for the writer to fuse. To keep on writing … Continue reading →

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Posted in Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2019 | Tagged on writing, trust your writing, writing life

The Light Had Been Shining

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on September 13, 2018 by Sheila BenderSeptember 13, 2018

When I was in third grade, my teacher asked me to write a Chanukah play to be presented along with a Christmas play for the kids in my class. I am not sure how she identified me as a writer. … Continue reading →

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Posted in Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2018 | Tagged trust your writing, writing life

 On Finding Deep Power

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on October 5, 2017 by Sheila BenderOctober 5, 2017

What have writers shared about unleashing one?s best and most insightful creative work? G. Lynn Nelson, a professor of English at Arizona State University believes we must undo some of what we have been taught about language and use language … Continue reading →

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Posted in Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2017 | Tagged trust your writing, writing advice, writing inspiration

Continuing: A Short Study of Writing Memoir As an Accumulation of Short Pieces

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on July 27, 2017 by Sheila BenderJuly 27, 2017

It may seem hard to imagine how to write a life in short pieces rather than with a more traditional narrative arc, but it works. Here are excerpts from memoirs-made-of-pieces that I like very much: Excerpts from Abigail Thomas’ What Comes … Continue reading →

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Posted in Instructional Exercises, Reading for Writing, WIR2017 | Tagged memoir, personal essay, trust your writing, writing exercises

A Three-Part Study Guide to Writing Short Memoir

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on July 19, 2017 by Sheila BenderJuly 19, 2017

Part One To get a feel for short memoir, you might enjoy reading from Writers’ Digest magazine’s column called “5-Minute Memoir.”  Here are links to a few of the columns: Writing from the Mat Hidden in Plain Sight The Beauty … Continue reading →

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Posted in Instructional Exercises, Reading for Writing, WIR2017 | Tagged memoir, trust your writing, writing exercises, writing memoir

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

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on June 8, 2017 by Mary Ann PayneJune 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 Mattersby Mary Ann Payne It?s time to bury the piano. Chop it up in tiny … Continue reading →

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Posted in From Our Contributors, Literary Gallery, WIR2017 | Tagged reading for writing, trust your writing, writing exercises

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

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on May 4, 2017 by Sheila BenderMay 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 … Continue reading →

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Posted in Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2017 | Tagged trust your writing, writing advice, writing inspiration

Finding Starts in Personal Essay Writing: Part 3

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on March 30, 2017 by Sheila BenderApril 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 … Continue reading →

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Posted in Instructional Exercises, Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2017 | Tagged overcoming writer's block, personal essay, personal essays, trust your writing, writing advice, writing exercises, writing memoir

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

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on February 9, 2017 by Sheila BenderFebruary 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 … Continue reading →

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Posted in Instructional Exercises, Reading for Writing, Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2016 | Tagged trust your writing, writing advice, writing inspiration

Why I Want to Write

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on December 8, 2016 by Katherine ClarkeDecember 9, 2016

[Editor’s note: Sometimes I teach a class for Women on Writing that I call “Writing is a Friend with Extraordinary Benefits.” The following essay by Katherine Clarke is reprinted with permission of the author, is an example of what happens … Continue reading →

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Posted in From Our Contributors, Literary Gallery, WIR2016 | Tagged trust your writing, women's voices, writing inspiration

A Passion for Writing Might Save Us in These Times

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on November 22, 2016 by Sheila BenderNovember 27, 2016

What are we writers to do in a nation where so many young and old seem to have gone mad, publically shouting and bullying, using crude names for those of the female sex and for people of non-Christian religions and … Continue reading →

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Posted in Literary Gallery, Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2016 | Tagged trust your writing, writing inspiration

If You Want to Write…

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on June 3, 2015 by Judy ReevesJune 3, 2015

This week, Judy Reeves, author of the new book, Wild Women, Wild Voices, shares her thoughts on writing practice. Here article serves as a good review for all of us who are busy concentrating on revising and publishing and may … Continue reading →

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Posted in From Our Contributors, Instructional Exercises, WIR2015 | Tagged on writing, overcoming writer's block, trust your writing, women's voices, writing inspiration

How a Personal Essay Becomes Fully Manifest

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on September 24, 2014 by Betty ShaferSeptember 25, 2014

Betty Shafer asked me to read an essay about losing her adult son. It had been a year since she began the essay following an emotional author reading I gave at the Colorado Mountain Writer’s Conference she attended in June … Continue reading →

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Posted in Revisions - Sample Successes, WIR2014 | Tagged personal essay, revising writing, trust your writing

A Lesson About the Value of Writing from Henrik Ibsen’s Play Peer Gynt

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on September 17, 2014 by Sheila BenderSeptember 21, 2014

Flying home from Scandinavia in late August, a little uncomfortable in the cramped airline seat, I was remembering stretching my legs on a trip I’d made to Norway years before. That time, I accompanied my daughter to a linguistics conference. … Continue reading →

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Posted in Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2014 | Tagged overcoming writer's block, reading for writing, trust your writing, writing memoir

On Writing Personal Essays: Rest Assured, It’s More Than “Only” the Personal

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on September 3, 2014 by Sheila BenderSeptember 3, 2014

As personal essayists, we sometimes worry whether people will be interested in what we have to say since our material is “just” personal experience. That worry exists alongside its cousins “Who am I to write about this or to tell my family’s secrets?” and “What if … Continue reading →

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Posted in Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2014 | Tagged personal essay, trust your writing

Interview with Memoirist Sue William Silverman

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on May 21, 2014 by Sue William SilvermanMay 23, 2014

I am pleased to publish this interview with award winning memoirist Sue William Silverman about the writing of her newest memoir and her advice to those of us who write from personal experience. The Pat Boone Fan Club: My Life … Continue reading →

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Posted in From Our Contributors, The Working Writer, WIR2014 | Tagged memoir, Publishing, trust your writing, Trusting Images, women's voices, writing advice, writing memoir

Digesting World News

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on May 14, 2014 by Sheila BenderMay 14, 2014

This essay originally appeared in Writing It Real August 2006. The question I was exploring is still one many of us ask when we consider the world’s situation: Where is our writing in all this? How should it matter? Every time … Continue reading →

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Posted in Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2014, Writing Makes a Difference | Tagged trust your writing, writing advice, writing inspiration

People Who Write — Sandra Hurtes’ Story of Blog to Book

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on January 15, 2014 by Sandra HurtesJanuary 16, 2014

Sandra Hurtes created a blog, felt she had a book there, and engaged in the process of selecting and shaping the entries and adding to the material to create a book-length account of herself as writer.  The result is the … Continue reading →

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Posted in From Our Contributors, Reading for Writing, WIR2013 | Tagged personal essay, Publishing, trust your writing, writing life, writing memoir

Create the Mother Lode: Exercises for Short Writing That Leads to More Writing

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on December 18, 2013 by Sheila BenderDecember 18, 2013

[This excerpt appear in slightly different form in the anthology Women Writing On Family: Tips on Writing, Teaching and Publishing, edited by Carol Smallwood and Suzann Holland.] Even when life seems too busy to “really” write, you can work on gathering … Continue reading →

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Posted in WIR2013 | Tagged journaling, overcoming writer's block, personal essay, sudden nonfiction, trust your writing, writing exercises

Writing Important Life Occasions

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on July 24, 2013 by Sheila BenderSeptember 12, 2013

Our lives present us with births, deaths, marriages, anniversaries, and other beginnings and endings. The following prompts excerpted from A Year in the Life: Journaling For Self-Discovery can help us focus our attention on our joy or grief and keep us … Continue reading →

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Posted in Instructional Exercises, The Working Writer, WIR2013 | Tagged literary journals, trust your writing, writing exercises, writing inspiration

In May I Rush to Use Sensory Details

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on June 5, 2013 by Sheila BenderSeptember 12, 2013

As adults, we are so used to summarizing and editorializing. We have learned that abstractions are considered “smart” in writing and having opinions makes us sound even smarter. That’s what our teachers wanted from us on papers and on essay … Continue reading →

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Posted in Instructional Exercises, Sheila Bender On Writing, The Working Writer, WIR2013 | Tagged trust your writing, Trusting Images, writing advice, Writing Craft Tools, Writing Poetry

Taking Chances

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on March 5, 2013 by Jack HeffronMarch 6, 2013

After years of writing, editing, publishing authors and teaching, Jack Heffron knows why we get stuck and how to work around that and back into our material. He’ll be teaching with Meg Files and Sheila Bender at our Writing It … Continue reading →

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Posted in From Our Contributors, The Working Writer, WIR2013 | Tagged Informational Writing, on writing, trust your writing, writing advice, Writing Craft Tools, Writing Fiction, writing memoir

A Children’s Book From the Heart: Interview with Penny Holland

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on February 6, 2013 by Penny HollandFebruary 6, 2013

Creating stories to delight children and help them understand sophisticated social concepts is a primary objective of children’s book authors. But it is often hard to cut to the essence of situations in language children understand. Penny Claire Holland had … Continue reading →

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Posted in From Our Contributors, The Working Writer, WIR2013, Writing Makes a Difference | Tagged children's book writing, trust your writing, writing advice, writing career, Writing Fiction

The Third Law of Motion – An Interview with Meg Files

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on January 23, 2013 by Meg FilesMarch 6, 2013

This week’s interview is with my colleague Meg Files about her process for writing The Third Law of Motion, her newest novel and the book’s impact on its audience. You can study with Meg at our April Writing It Real conference … Continue reading →

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Posted in From Our Contributors, WIR2013 | Tagged trust your writing, Writing Fiction, writing life, Writing Scenes

Four Tricks that Keep a Writer Going

Sheila Bender's Writing It Real Posted on April 18, 2012 by Sheila BenderApril 18, 2012

Don’t Think. Write! Many authors who write about writing say, “Don’t think. Write!” I am one of them. But I also think it is fair to say to those who write, “Don’t think. Play!” If you allow yourself to play … Continue reading →

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Posted in Sheila Bender On Writing, WIR2012 | Tagged trust your images, trust your writing, writers' block, writing inspiration

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