“If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.” —Woody Allen On Thursday I made the five-hour drive to Milanville, Pennsylvania, with two writer friends. We arrived at the Highlights Foundation’s retreat center after dark, the final eight miles of the trip made stressful by rain, fog, and serpentine country roads. As is always the case at Highlights, we were greeted warmly and invited to sit down to a hearty, healthy dinner: baked lemon chicken, salad with homemad

Last Wednesday night I manifested a dream. For years, ever since I became a writing workshop leader, I have felt called to offer a class for stepmoms that would teach them what I have learned through experience: that keeping a journal is an invaluable tool for weathering the often stormy seas of stepmothering. In the service of this dream I became a certified Journal to the Self® facilitator and took various classes through the Therapeutic Writing Institute. I took a curricul

Yesterday afternoon I had a brilliant idea: I called my friend Rebecca to see if she wanted to have a writer’s date at the library. Miraculously, she was available and enthusiastic about the idea. As I write this, we are sharing a large round table tucked into a corner of the Oakton Library. The table is next to a floor-to-ceiling wall of windows that faces the parking lot, and the sun is streaming in, casting bands of shadow onto the table. Rebecca is laser-focused on her iP

Last Monday afternoon was the first meeting in 2016 of “Writing from the Heart,” a women’s AWA workshop in Purcellville. I like to start a new session with a “getting to know you” exercise. Sometimes it’s a verbal sharing of what we’re working on or what we like to write, and sometimes it’s a short piece of writing about ourselves. On Monday, I asked everyone to write for 5 minutes in response to this prompt (why don’t you try it, too?) “If I could write anything, it would be

Writing is a sacred calling. As you read my blog, know that I understand there is something within you that will not let you rest until you write. Call it what you will—Soul, Spirit, Inner Wisdom, Divine Mind, the Muse, God, Goddess—it will have its way with you. Once you have been called, it is only a matter of time until you answer. Put it off for months, years—decades even—and the call will remain, as surely as the sun rises each new morning. As you grapple with this call—