A time to retreat

A pre-Christmas treat

Dec 22, 2024

I’ve just returned from one of the most amazing, life affirming experiences of my life. I would like to share it with you.

For many years I have wanted to go on a writing retreat but there were a number of things holding me back. If I’m honest, I never really fancied a solo retreat, only me and my thoughts, the “what if this or that doesn’t work”, nobody to bounce ideas off. But at the beginning of this year I connected to a fellow writer through Beth Kempton’s Winter Writing Sanctuary online course. It turns out that although this course has people on it from all over the world, one such person lives only fifteen minutes away from me…what are the chances? We have spent the year checking in with each other, supporting each other on our various writing pursuits, fathomed out how to run a Substack account (still working on that one) and attended a local book festival and creative writing course together (which was pretty awesome too).

So, on one such check in, we got talking about a) how our love of writing has developed this year and b) how much we have valued each other’s support this year. I don’t know who said it first but it was suggested that to celebrate our writing wins it would be great if we could go on a writing retreat together sometime. Before I knew it, we had agreed we could fit one in before Christmas and a beautiful, cosy little cottage was booked in the heart of the Yorkshire Dales with breathtaking views over Swaledale.

We had three nights and two full days of writing bliss. We set our intentions once we had settled in, lit the fire and put up numerous sets of fairy lights. We were treated to a stunning sunrise, breathtaking views, gorgeous spaces inside the cottage for solo writing and allowed time for plenty of discussions about our writing dreams. We ventured out a couple of times into a blustery landscape which blew away any cobwebs we may have been storing within.

We ate lovely food, drank a few snowballs, created artefacts using nature as our inspiration and talked! We talked…a lot, about our hopes for the coming year. It was so refreshing to be with a kindred spirit, someone who understands the everyday issues writers face, someone to support, encourage, promote and share dreams with. No judgement, just immense trust and honesty prevailed in our own haven of creativeness. I highly recommend undertaking such an activity, if you can find the time and right person to go with.

Thank you Dianne for an amazing retreat. I wonder what 2025 will bring for us.

Here are some tips if you are inspired to undertake a writing retreat…

Set your intentions but be flexible. Thoughts and ideas come up and need to be considered and possibly debated
Plan in some creative time. The writing life can be intense, so mindful activities to help relax and promote self-worth is a welcome break. We created with clay, watercolours and natural materials
Treat yourself to regular, little treats whilst you are there…it is not a boot camp. “snowball anyone?”
Make sure you make several list of things to take prior to departure, and be as specific as you can, especially if you can’t just go out and replace something
Try to capture a sunrise or sunset, they are magical phenomenon
Try to spot the moon, stars (see above)
Don’t forget to move, eat, hydrate, rest eyes regularly. It makes for clearer writing.