Lorraine’s Workshops
Lorraine is available to speak to groups on the following topics. Contact Lorraine for availability and details. Check the Events & Appearances page for the current schedule. To read what previous workshop participants have had to say about Lorraine’s workshops, visit the Comments on Lorraine’s Workshops page.
Peruse the entire page, or use these links to scroll down to a particular workshop description:
The First Page / The Ending: Framing Your Story
Iceberg Tips: Deep Memoir Writing from the Top Down
The Inner Spring: Writing memoir using love as the narrative thread
Stillbirth: What Healthcare Professionals Need to Know
The Three Writers Inside Every Writer: A Memoirist’s Guide to the Literary Universe
Window to the Soul: Writing a Deep and Unforgettable Spiritual Memoir
Wisdom of Words: Writing to Heal the Spirit
- The Inner Spring: Writing memoir using love as the narrative thread
Beneficial for memoirists writing their story for publication as well as for those writing to understand their lives better or grapple with a life challenge
We begin with the premise that each of us comes into the world as pure love springing from a sacred source. All our stories are about what happens to that clear pool of serene divinity — our very essence — once we begin living. Sometimes we don’t have to live very long at all before love seems to go wrong. In this context, we will examine the many meanings of love and use a story matrix to trace and write the evolution of love in our own lives. Ultimately, we will write to celebrate the triumph of true love wherever we have found it and untangle what is love from what is not — all to restore the inner spring to its natural serenity. The course is infused with excerpts from the works of excellent memoirists, famous and not, and in this way exposes participants to new vistas in literature.
Next presentation of The Inner Spring scheduled for June 8 - 10, 2012 in Mahwah NJ. View details.
- Window to the Soul: Writing a Deep and Unforgettable Spiritual Memoir
Created for new memoirists, or those new to the spiritual memoir, as well as those writers with works under way who are looking to deepen or improve the flow of their prose or just get unstuck.
We will begin with a brief overview of the distinctly American tradition of the spiritual memoir so we understand the lineage and purpose of the genre. Next we will address the building blocks of spiritual memoir — inner events, outer events, and reflections — and proceed to study how they can be juxtaposed into engaging sequences, complete with segues. Creating sequences allows us to better see where chapters can effectively start and stop. We will learn how to expose life patterns as we write for the purpose of revealing progressively deepers versions of — and understandings about — ourselves. Micro-lessons will include how to deal with unknowability, the difference between a memoir and an autobiographical novel, and the decision on where (not how) to end your book. The course is infused with thoughts from various spiritual traditions and excerpts from the works of respected spiritual memoirists. Lorraine constantly changes the excerpts covered in her courses.
Next presentation of Window to the Soul not currently scheduled. View details of the June 2010, Mahwah NJ retreat.
- Iceberg Tips: Deep Memoir Writing from the Top Down
Manna for writers looking to start or deepen their memoirs in long or short forms, including books and essays. Ideal for a weekend workshop, though parts can be adapted for a day-long workshop.
Participants will identify five or six different “tips,” or ways awareness surfaces in their consciousness, and then write them into full fruition — an essay or a chapter — in such a way as to capture them in all their depth and significance. It’s wonder-filled writing because the writer lowers the proverbial water level and sees what’s in her own psyche as she writes. Interspersed in this workshop are micro-lessons, including thoughts on when to unpack the writing, and when not to, and the value of actually reporting on one’s own life. At the end we will explore how the ocean metaphor can be used to create resolution in our life stories and how what first surfaces in our consciousness suggests the structure of those pieces of writing we weave from personal experience.
- The Three Writers Inside Every Writer: A Memoirist’s Guide to the Literary Universe
Ideal for new writers envisioning or writing their first work; writers who already have completed a work and are figuring out how to publish it; advanced writers who have written one memoir and are contemplating writing more.
We will open with a reading from the very first memoir ever written and explain the surprising origin of the genre and the reasons for its endurance. Then we will address developing and strengthening the three writers inside every writer — The Artistic Self, The Genius Self and The Business Self — for two essential reasons. One, only when we understand their various roles will we become completely conscious and in command of our own creative writing process. Two, when their respective roles are clearly delineated in our minds, each can enhance and protect the others instead of interfering with them. In considering The Artistic Self, we will cover three simple but inspired ways to instantly organize the life stories we want to tell, and delve into the power of introducing an innovative but countercultural idea to our subject matter, no matter what it is. In The Genius Self, we will cover how to employ the subconscious mind to work with us when thinking does nothing but mire us deeper into problems. To accomplish this, we will discuss archetypal realities and delve into dreaming, inner gold work and imaginal journeying. In The Business Self, we will discover why now more than ever it is pivotal for an author to understand the economics and realities of traditionally breaking into print in literary journals and books and entertain the option (and fun) of true self-publishing, which is very different from subsidy publishing. The course is infused with excerpts from the works of respected memoirists. Lorraine constantly changes the excerpts covered in her courses.
Next presentation of The Three Writers Inside Every Writer not currently scheduled. View details of the October 2010, Mahwah NJ retreat.
- Wisdom of Words: Writing to Heal the Spirit
Designed for individuals looking for solace and self-understanding in times of great loss, and also for those who want to gently explore their hearts for the meanings in significant life experiences, quiet or dramatic.
Available in varying lengths for mid-sized to large conferences or for private intimate groups.
Quietly, and often in flashes, our higher selves offer us comfort and insight every day. Lorraine opens this workshop by introducing the blank page as a place to capture these soul whisperings, which enter our hearts and minds from a higher, wider dimension than the one in which we live and suffer. She teaches how to collect and appreciate these whisperings as the makings of new perspectives and understandings.
A variety of short writing exercises help participants crack open their own memories and experiences to find the lights of insight within them. With each exercise comes a different frame of perspective through which to view and explore pain, grief and love. Short passages by noted authors, famous great people and classical works are used as springboards to get creative juices flowing. To ease participants’ sense of aloneness in the world, the passages span eras and cultures, reminding us that loss and confusion, seeking and finding, have been part of the human drama from the start.
No writing experience is required.
- The First Page / The Ending: Framing Your Story
Two workshops for authors and essayists, to be taken independently or as a set.
- The first page is the most important one in any work — the one that causes editors or readers to stop reading or compels them to turn the page. Learn the hallmarks of a great opener, including secrets of setting, voice, juxtaposition, timing and quality observations.
- The ending is just that — a closure. Stories end. They don’t stop. Learn what makes an ending resonate. We’ll talk about imagery, surprises, feeling, “elevator revelations,” and effective ways to use quotations.
Participants in both workshops are invited to send Lorraine the first and/or last pages of a work-in-progress ahead of time. In the afternoon they will be read aloud, anonymously, by an independent reader and we will evaluate them in terms of what was covered in the morning. Everyone will leave with ideas for a polished start, and end, to their works.
- Stillbirth: What Healthcare Professionals Need to Know
Designed for medical and support staff to help them tailor hospital protocol to best meet the needs of stillbirth parents.
Should a stillbirth mother stay on the maternity ward? How does the language used by those around stillbirth parents affect them? Lorraine reads passages from Life Touches Life and speaks from personal experience to address such questions. Others include: How will stillbirth parents respond to the decorations in the maternal-fetal medicine department? Is taking pictures of parents and baby upsetting or healing? What is the psychological impact of going home from the hospital holding nothing at all? What’s the best way to follow up with stillbirth parents?
Lorraine’s talk on this topic in July 2004 at Chilton Memorial Hospital in Pompton Plains NJ was previewed in The Chilton Physician (101 KB PDF file; Adobe Acrobat Reader required; if you have trouble accessing this newsletter, refer to “PDF (Adobe Acrobat) files” on our support page) and was written up in this Chilton Memorial Hospital press release.