Cheers! is one month old! To celebrate, I’m sharing a bonus post about designing your very own writing retreat - I hope you enjoy and share with all the writers and creatives in your life!
Last weekend, I facilitated a writing retreat. For myself. In my own flat.
Now that I’m in a solid routine with this newsletter, it is time to dive back into my creative writing in parallel. I will build out a consistent habit for working on my novel week-over-week. But first, I felt like I needed to do some deeper, uninterrupted thinking about the project. I wanted a few days in solitude to dream, plot, and talk to myself out-loud without anyone witnessing it.
The stars aligned last weekend as my partner was away for three nights and most of my close friends were out of town. What better time to isolate myself than when I have very few temptations for socializing?
I’m no stranger to retreats. One of the benefits of attending a Jesuit University is that they like to send you away for weekends to reflect on your life in some beautiful place along the New England coast. Especially as a university student, taking a weekend away from drinking and campus life felt magical. You can crack all sorts of challenges open with a little space and time away from your phone in nature.
I chose to stay at home for this self-imposed writing retreat because I was lucky enough to have the space to myself and didn’t feel the need to venture out of the city — or spend money on accommodation.
Here are ten tips on how to design your very own writing retreat- wherever you are:
Pick a Project: I love goals. As previously stated in this newsletter, if I don’t have a goal, I’m not getting off my couch. When I went into this weekend, I picked a specific project to focus on for the entire retreat. If I hadn’t, there’s a good chance that I would’ve used the time building out more content for Cheers! – which is also great, but not how I wanted to use this uninterrupted time. Especially if you’re working on a few things, make sure you go into the retreat having one project in mind.
Be Opportunistic: Is there a weekend or day coming up where you’ll have the house to yourself? Even if your home won’t be completely empty and if you’re sharing with flatmates, a partner, or family, is there a weekend when people will have loads of plans that will keep them occupied? Make it as easy as possible to shut yourself away without disturbance or to spread out across the empty house while they’re out.
Prepare your Space: Building a new habit is all about the environment. Even if you’re retreating at home, how can you switch things up to transform your place into the right space for a retreat? Maybe it’s giving your house a deep clean the night before– clearing away the day-to-day clutter, washing all your bedding, organizing your desk. For me, it was all of these things – and buying a paddling pool to put out on the terrace to dip my toes in as I wrote outside in the sweltering temperatures.
Stock up on Snacks and Order Takeaway: I find cooking really relaxing, but I find cleaning the kitchen a chore. To eliminate another time suck, I stocked up on easy-to-reach-for snacks throughout the weekend and I treated myself to a few meals in. If I were in a hotel, I’d be getting room service. This is the next best thing.
Make a Schedule: All good retreats come with an itinerary – meals, readings, activities, quiet time. Staring at a blank schedule is like staring at a blank page – it makes it very difficult to get started. We can all benefit from a little structure. Part of my prep was time blocking my schedule for the entire weekend. Did I stick to it the entire retreat? No. But it did help me map out what I wanted the shape of the weekend to look like.
Move your Body: Even on normal weekends, I’m tempted to never leave my house. I just love my flat, and I love sleeping in. But I know that I feel more creative and energized if I’ve moved my body.That’s why I scheduled movement into my days as if it was on the retreat’s itinerary. On Friday evening, I went for a walk around my local park. Saturday morning, I got up bright and early for 7:30 AM Barry’s Bootcamp (And was subsequently shocked at how many people are up that early on a Saturday). On Sunday morning, I went to a yoga class. Getting a workout in helped to clear my head and focus on my writing.
Limit your Screen Time: My phone is my biggest creativity killer. I didn’t want to turn it off completely for the weekend, but I made sure it was in the other room during focus time.
Treat Yourself: There are many things said about the tortured artist. But I believe it’s harder to access our creativity if we’re feeling stressed, distracted, or unhappy. With a retreat in your own home – especially if you work from home – it can be tough to signal that the workday is done and your creativity retreat has begun. One way to create that separation is to kick off the weekend doing something a bit indulgent or fun. I started my weekend off with a Lymphatic Drainage Massage (my new obsession) at home on Friday evening. Fully relaxing and letting go of the work week made me so excited to dig into my writing — even on a Friday night.
Set Social Boundaries: Even with most of my close friends out of town, I still had a few people reach out to make plans. These were people I really wanted to see and plans that sounded fun. But I had promised myself that I would say ‘No’ beforehand. I also made sure to share with enough people that I was planning a self-imposed retreat so that I would feel accountable to myself and not bail on my plans at the last minute. It’s so hard to say “I’m busy” when your plans are just with yourself. But people will be more supportive than you think.
Be Flexible: All of these things aside, let yourself be flexible. I entered this retreat thinking I might come out with 5,000 words. (Spoiler alert: Did not) What I realized I needed as I dug into my work on Saturday morning, was planning, thinking, and dreaming time. I read Save the Cat! Writes a Novel cover-to-cover and used hundreds of notecards to jot down ideas on plot, character, and setting. Spending time to outline and think through the novel was exactly what I needed to get my project off the ground.
One final thing that worked for me was not drinking alcohol all weekend. Years ago, I used to think that all good writing happened in romantic garret apartments, a few glasses deep into a bottle of crisp white wine — circa Ernest Hemingway in Paris in the 1920s. But the only thing that happens when I drink as I’m writing is that I think I’m writing something brilliant (I’m not) and I get very sleepy. I would always wake up the next day to look at my draft and wonder what I was thinking.
I love a drink, but the absence of hangovers all weekend (and for the rest of this week) has made me far more productive and creative. I look forward to breaking my fast tomorrow evening with a glass of wine, but I’m definitely going to incorporate more pauses for sobriety in my writing practice.
This is a post about a writing retreat - but replace “writing” with nearly any creative project or hobby and the tips all still feel relevant!
Cheers to one month of writing to you!
Kelley