Why You Should Do Write or Die

A Write or Die session is like having someone (well, two people: you and me together) clean both your windshield and your rearview mirror. It’s easier to move forward with a project or a plan or a dream when you can see both where you are going and where you have been and, as you check your look in the mirror, where you are now.

I have a bullshit meter that’s highly tuned. This is a result of me bullshitting teachers and therapists for decades, unwittingly, but the end result was that I never got any project of great meaning finished because at the end of the day I had no idea who my audience was;  I had no idea who I was, and I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to say. 

For some reason, everyone let me get away with this. No one, not even my thesis advisor in my M.F.A. program, held my feet to the fire and said: Break through the not-knowing. Break through the fear. Stop chasing squirrels. Keep your eye on the ball. Trust your voice. And if they had, I would have looked at them, bewildered, for how can a person who doesn’t have a steady sense of self have any idea what her voice is?

Three years ago, I finally put myself in a corner tight enough where I felt I had no escape. I had to write because I had left home and had told all my friends I wasn’t coming back until I had written a book. It wasn’t an idea: it was a decision, and a decision means there’s no going back. Write or Die. I had to figure out who I was, who my audience was, what the thing was I wanted to say, and what my voice was. And so I did.

I can now help people who are stuck in their lives/projects/books because I unstuck myself and I figured out what the major stumbling blocks were, and I figured out how to get people to see these blocks and to then see ways through them.

We do exercises (you do exercises) and then you read them out loud to me. We talk about them, and I tell you what I heard and what I didn’t hear until you feel really excited to spread your wings and see what you make happen next. 

This is my most favorite work. I get to show people the amazing abilities and wonder they contain. I get to help them flip the switch from I can’t to I can. 

Who needs drugs when there is this kind of high?

I love doing Write or Die sessions by phone. They last about 75 minutes, and you use paper and pen. I tell people that what happens in Write or Die, stays in Write or Die. You can tell me anything and it’s completely confidential. You need to feel safe to feel free. 

I also love doing group Write or Die sessions. They last about 3 hours and I have 10 people or less. The cool thing about a group is that you have instant community and you get to learn from listening to other people.

Both cost $150 a person. 

Do it. You have this one life. You might as well bloom hugely, because you can.