The AWA Method and Me
Do you remember when writing stopped being fun?
I don’t have an exact date and time, for myself, but remember viscerally how it felt to know in my heart that I was a writer while also not wanting to have anything to do with it. For me the process was gradual but definitive. Writing had simply become something I never wanted to do. Story Time:
First, I’d like to introduce myself. I’m a writer and writing workshop facilitator currently living in the green mountains of Southern Vermont. I use the AWA method in all of my workshops because this method is what actually broke the spell I had been living under that was preventing me from doing this activity that I have always I loved.
My parents named me Devin. A goggle search will tell you it means poet. To this day my Mom claims to have no idea why she liked it for the baby that was going to be me. She just did. The same can be said for my love of language. I have no idea why I always loved words and buildings worlds and ideas with them. I just did. What has prevented me from owning my love and becoming the prolific prose generator of my wildest imaginings? (I’m so glad you asked)
Writing, the way I was taught to do it, was very hard for me.
As a girl in the 80’s I was categorized as “precocious” and an “old soul” by teachers and well-meaning strangers. It had the effect of making me feel smarter than my peers and afraid to ever let on if I found myself having difficulties with something academic. I’ve since learned that I was successfully masking a handful of learning differences. Dyslexia and dysgraphia, to name a few. This meant I had to use a tremendous amount of time and care when reading and writing. A process that was daunting and exhausting and became harder to maintain as academics became more rigorous.
If I wrote at the speed of my thoughts, one could barley read the words I’d just written. If there was a certain strict form I was meant to follow, this demand could make it impossible for me to begin at all. Even my spelling was inventive, which was not applauded in the pre-spellcheck world. All these obstacles caused my desire to write to dwindle to almost nothing.
Worse, I’d used this secret struggle against myself and decided I must just be “bad” at writing. I had myself convinced nobody wanted to hear from someone like me, anyway. And I proceeded to live this half life where I tried to pretend writing wasn’t for me. What happened?
I don’t know if you are familiar with the phenomena of a calling. For me, that glimmer of yearning and desire never went away completely. It showed up as jealousy when I read a book I loved or as heart break when I experienced a written work that moved me in a way that I wished to move others. Thankfully, I have very little tolerance for pain and discomfort and found myself in the self-help section of a book store reaching for Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way.
This book began my recovery from self-doubt and self-loathing. It started me on the path to unapologetic self-expression, which is a form of self care. It gave me permission to simply begin again and to let myself be guided by the wanting, even if I didn’t know why it was there or where it was leading me.
(I want to write in more detail about how I got from morning pages to becoming an AWA writing workshop facilitator in the posts that follow… join the mailing list to get the whole saga)
The abridged version is this: I started taking simple steps back to the creativity I had abandoned because of the shame I felt when I didn’t meet my limited understanding of artistic standards. I did it wounded. I did it scared. I did it gently. I tried to put down any expectations I might have about how it would turn out, or what it would be for, ultimately.
I let my writing be something I was willing to do, just for me. I let it serve the purpose of feeding my soul, instead. I let that be noble reason enough.
The most valuable thing I’ve learned, on my path back to being a person who writes, is what I need in place to make my writing possible. Deadlines, honestly, don’t really work for me the way they might work for others. Harsh or well meaning feedback also have an adverse affect on my creativity. My inner writer is very cagey and tender. She needs the most warm, most inviting and most supportive environment to venture into her creative self and start exploring.
Imagine my good fortune when I found the AWA method!
It is rooted in a desire to create those exact conditions for writers just like (you and) me. The principles and practices were designed to give space and time to creatives not unlike us, who haven’t felt safe enough to touch their truths and express them in the way only we can outside of judgement, form and “standards.” It is a place for people to come and be connected to others while they journey forth into the unknown of their imaginings, truths and wildest desires.
If this sounds like something you’d enjoy, I encourage you to try one of our workshops. Begin now. Come, experience yourself writing and know. A writer is someone you have always been and can return to being at anytime. I can’t wait to write again with you!
