Freewriting with the Flow

​Join us for a public Foster Writing Circle, where we cultivate a nurturing space for writers to access their creativity without fear or judgment.

​Imagine you want to swim or row across a river to reach a dock on the other side. The best strategy is to find a point upstream where you can get in and swim diagonally across, going with the current and letting it carry you forward and over to your goal with ease.

​What does crossing rivers have to do with writing? Sometimes, writing feels like fighting an invisible current all day and getting no closer to your goal. Maybe you need to get out and start from a different place on the riverbank! Sometimes, the whole river is dammed, and nothing is flowing at all. Sometimes, you’ve tortured a metaphor to the point where it has become completely ridiculous.

​In this writing circle, you’ll join other writers to practice some freewriting techniques — ways of starting to flow with the current instead of against it. Your host, Dylan Tweney, will create a spacious, nonjudgmental framework for getting into the flow with meditation and short freewriting exercises. You’ll also have plenty of time to work on your own writing projects. At the end, we’ll check in with one another and close the circle with encouragement and hope.

​About Dylan: I am a writer, editor, journalist, open-water swimmer, and mindfulness practitioner. I spent over two decades in the fast-paced world of tech journalism, learning how to write fast, edit fast, and lift up reporters to become great journalists. Since March 17, 2020, I’ve been practicing every weekday morning (and facilitating practice once a week) with a mindfulness group in the Plum Village tradition of Thich Nhat Hanh.