Venue: The Writers Workshop
Facilitator: Amanda Marples
Getting to the page and staying there can be tough for any writer, whether you are an academic, novelist, poet or freelancer.
If you are neurodivergent (or think you might be), it can be even tougher, and there are good reasons for that. Join Amanda Marples for a comprehensive walk through all the common areas of difficulty. In this series of workshops you will learn why you are like you are, why your brain seems to be conspiring against you, and what you can do about it.
You do not need a diagnosis to attend these sessions. Sessions are designed to stand alone, so you can just attend the ones you think might be most helpful. You can also block purchase all 6 workshop at a reduced price. Sessions are fortnightly on Sunday mornings until 20th April, 2025.
What workshop 4 is all about:
Sometimes, neurodiversity looks like being glued to a chair with a racing mind and a body that Just. Will. Not. Move, regardless of the million-miles-an-hour commentary your brain is producing. It's not fun for anyone, but a disaster if you’re a writer trying to make a competition deadline, a freelancer with an article to file or a new writer who doesn’t want to watch another free afternoon go down the drain. Join Amanda Marples for the fourth workshop in the series and learn all about paralysis and task initiation and their less cool mates focus and concentration. In this session you will learn how to:
get the best out of your poor old struggling executive function
stop getting distracted by the weird noise outside
Prioritise and stay on task (as opposed to starting five new projects at once and not finishing a single one)
get started in the first place…and keep going.
Workshop 5: Imagination & Overwhelm. (6th April) Creativity requires ideas, and stability. What if you don’t have much of either? This workshop will expose, explore and offer solutions to some of the most difficult areas for neurodivergent writers: rigid ways of thinking, aphantasia and emotional dysregulation.
Workshop 6: Demand avoidance. (20th April) Ever found yourself wanting to write something and immediately thought…nope? Does it have a weird, illogical stubbornness about it? Welcome to Demand Avoidance. This final workshop is all about this bewildering, poorly understood feature of neurodiversity. Learn what demand avoidance is, where it comes from, and how to deftly sidestep it to land on the page where you belong.
Please note: Unfortunately, the Writers Workshop space is not wheelchair accessible. We apologise for any disappointment. Amanda is planning to offer these sessions online in the future, and also offers individual mentoring. For more details and to join Amanda's mailing list please visit reconcilecreative.com