Writing Prompts from The Wellness Community and a DJ

 

A reader asked me if I’d post some of the writing exercises we did at the Wellness Community in Redondo Beach last Saturday. (This is an amazing place that offers free psychological help to anyone whose life has been touched by cancer. Check out their website for a Community near you. www.WellnessCommunity.org )

 

Here are the exercises we did:

(All were timed to five minutes – and then read aloud.)

- Write about your worst moments this past month, write about the best ones.

- Focus on what your five senses are picking up right now at this minute and write about it. (This is a good exercise to do every time you write in your journal – especially if you’re new to keeping one. It quiets down your mind and grounds you.)

- Write about the time you were told you had cancer - or heard that a loved one had it.  (prompt came from reading Alice Hoffman’s wonderful New York Times essay “Sustained by Fiction While Facing Life’s Facts “ about her breast cancer.)

- Write about surviving something. Prompt came from “Survival” a poem by Ted Kooser.

- Write about what you have control over.  Prompt came from Elizabeth Edward’s book Resilience  p.32-33 about the total lack of control she felt having cancer, and from an interview with Sheryl Crow in the L.A. Times who said pretty much the same thing. 

-  Since it was Halloween - Imagine you’re going to a costume party tonight. Who do you want to go as? Explain your costume in detail. (Amazing how many people loathed Halloween and hated parties. Which made for a more interesting exercise.)

- Write a list of three wonderful things to do for yourself this coming month.  

 

On my morning walk today listening to the radio I heard a DJ ask, “What’s the most valuable thing you’ve ever lost or found?”  And I thought wow. What a great writing exercise.  Try it.

 

Apologies to readers who left such nice comments under “About Writing Time” – I hadn’t checked those comments since 2006 (!) but just read and answered them the other day.

 

I’m off to Lake Arrowhead for my first writers retreat up there. Next week I’ll post some of the writing prompts we used.

 

 

 

Comments

[Susan]

careful when you drive up there --at night, driving up the mountain, suddenly the fog rolled in and I couldn't see anything! very scary!!

[Barbara]

Susan - Even during the day that fog is pretty daunting. I just sent out an email about it to the workshop participants. And fog or no fog, I've never driven up or down the mountain at night.Thanks for your warning!

[Marilynn Stumfall]

The thing to do when having to go up the mountain is to check the webcams. They have them on 18 now just going into Rim forest and other places on 18. There are multiple ones placed through-out the small cities like Blue Jay and the Village---which give clues on the fog and road conditions---we just drove up last night and it was clear. Try mountaininfo.com, for one.
Marilynn

[Loren Stephens]

Have a great trip. I'll look forward to the timed writing prompts. Love doing them. Should be a beautiful weekend. Loren

[Jeff Perlis]

Congrats on holding your 1st Writers Retreat in Arrowhead. May this be the first of many. I want to attend the next one.

Jeff Perlis

[Susan]

Scared the living daylights out of me! You had fog during the day too?! Oy. But it is so lovely there...

Marilyn, I had no idea about that--my timeshare that I was driving to up there didn't know there was fog, as it was completely clear in Arrowhead, so I was completely taken aback. Extremely scary; I was on the wrong side of the road and didn't even know it!!!
Good to know for the future!