Rediscovering Your Creativity, a Virtual Workshop

Connect with your inspiration and other writers! The Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow (WCDH) is pleased to present a virtual writing workshop instructed by Dairy Hollow alumna Karen J. Cantrell. Anxieties about the future, as well as negative scripts from the past, can interfere with a writer’s ability to maintain focus and perceive insights. Through “Rediscovering Your Creativity,” a four-session workshop, Karen will guide participants in meditations to overcome their fears, develop visualization abilities, access their divine inspiration, and learn techniques for self-affirmation. The process is collaborative, and participants are expected to journal and write short scenes to explore their memories and identify seminal moments. During the fourth week, participants will share a story, essay, or poem inspired by their workshop experience. Participants will be provided with a recording of the final meditation to provide ongoing support.

Writers of all genres and level of experience are welcome.  Ideally, participants will have journaled and written the exercises given to them beforehand. The meditation process, like the writing process, is a muscle that gets stronger as it is exercised. However, this is not a prerequisite.

“Rediscovering your Creativity” will take place on four consecutive Wednesdays from January 6 through January 27, 2021.  Classes will be on Zoom and will begin at 6:30 – 8:00 pm CST.  Session one, “Washing off Fear,” will be held on January 6.  Session two, “Reconnecting with your Passion for Writing” will be the following Wednesday, January 13.  “Finding your Life's Purpose” will be on January 20, and “Affirming your Worthiness” on January 27. The cost is $100 for all four sessions or $35 per individual session.  Class size is limited, so register early here or by emailing coordinator@writerscolony.org.

Over the workshop’s four sessions the writer will have the opportunity to collaborate and develop perceptive abilities and to share and connect during a time of uncertainty, and for many, isolation. Participants are expected to journal and write short scenes to explore their memories and identify seminal moments. During the fourth week, workshop attendees will share a story, essay, or poem inspired by their workshop experience.

Jane Elzey, author of The Cardboard Cottage Mystery series, said, “As creatives, we get stuck. Sometimes we get really stuck and need a good push from behind. Workshops like Karen’s can be the inspiration needed. I found it very helpful in tapping into my inner muse at a time I thought I’d lost her. No matter how much you already know (or don’t) about overcoming your writing fears, using visualization, or finding your inspiration, Karen’s workshop will help reinforce and reunite you with your innermost creative self.”

Workshop participant George Trahanis said, “Karen Cantrell created a trusting environment in which I felt safe to explore the areas of my life that needed attention. The work helped me get in touch with my inner self and inner guides, all of which helped put me on the road to my true journey.”

Karen J. Cantrell’s work has appeared in various publications, including Past Ten, the blog for the Living Lutheran magazine, The Palo Alto Review, and an anthology from Red Hen Press. In 2014 she left a full-time teaching job to pursue writing full-time and to travel. Along the way, she studied hypnotherapy at the American Academy of Hypnotherapy in Albuquerque, NM. She is a certified hypnosis practitioner and integrative life coach with experience in natal, interlife, and past life regression therapy. The practice of hypnotherapy has helped her understand the patterns in her life and to explore the effects of her family’s secrets. She is currently completing a memoir.