Teaching

“There is humanity in what Donaleen does as a teacher, and I feel I have grown so much personally and as a writer over the past two years I have been working with her.”
Tanya Behrisch
Cooperative Education
Simon Fraser University

How do you overcome those crushing notions that you have nothing worthwhile to say, that you can’t write?  How do you get past your fear of the blank page? How do you rekindle your dreams to be a writer if you’ve been focused on raising children or furthering your career? How do you get past thoughts that you’re too old to start writing NOW?

I offer individual and group writing workshops for writers at all levels of ability. Dissolve personal and creative blocks and spark your imagination to help you write more freely and joyfully, whether it’s a professional document, a school assignment, a screenplay, or a piece of fiction, nonfiction or poetry. Gain practical tools, techniques, and resources to improve your craft as a writer. Share your writing with others, if desired. Individual attention and constructive feedback provided.

Creative Writing Workshops

Write a Wild Horse allows you to take risks in your writing. To be weird, silly, nasty, dramatic, outrageous, experimental, emotional. To express yourself more freely, trust your own impulses, and allow your authentic voice to emerge. Whatever your genre, whether you’re a professional or a novice, Write a Wild Horse will get you out of the stall and into the open frontier of your creativity.

Nonfiction Writing Workshops

The Examined Life – Writing A Memoir supports the creation of your autobiography. Whether it’s for publication or for your grandchildren, learn to draw meaning and congruence from the events of your life and the lessons learned. Shape them into a readable and inspiring memoir.

Sharing Your Wisdom – Developing Your Nonfiction Book helps teachers, coaches, and others with a message of hope and healing to take their book idea from concept to outline to completed manuscript. Receive “how-to’s” to take you through the process, step by step, and to overcome the many forms of resistance that you will encounter along the way.

Journal Writing Workshops

In Your Own Write is a great opportunity to spark creative joy, dissolve writer’s block, and retrieve undiscovered, abandoned, or disenfranchised aspects of yourself. Engage in structured and unstructured exercises such as writing sprints, dialogue writing, stream of consciousness, body-centred writing, and mind mapping.

From Heart to Hand – Journaling to Heal is for adults and youth who have experienced loss, hardship, disappointment, or any life challenge. Practice writing exercises that support healing and reconciliation, and discover journal-writing techniques that can open the door to a more joyful and expansive life.

Did You Know I Would Miss You? When You’ve Lost Someone to Suicide is for adults and youth who are suffering from this complex and devastating loss. Learn how to cope with the aftermath, bring understanding and relief to your grief, and rebuild your life in a way that has meaning for you. These workshops are based on my book, Did You Know I Would Miss You? written after losing my brother to suicide in 2004.

Where Mystics Walk – Scribing the Spiritual Journey supports the development spiritual growth and awareness. We all have a yearning to return to our Source, in whatever name or form has meaning for us. Writing is a reliable and powerful portal to our own mind and heart, a channel of astonishing truth and wisdom. In the pages of your journal, explore the mystical stages of Awakening, Purification, Illumination, Dark Night of the Soul, and Divine Union.

“What Donaleen provided was more than a writing workshop.  It was a deep exploration of my psyche, my motivations and my state of being.  I came away feeling challenged, exhilarated and wanting more.”
David Clark, M.A., R.P.T.

Custom-Designed Workshops

Gather together a group of 6 or more friends and/or colleagues and bring me in to offer a series of weekly classes, a one-day or a weekend event. You can choose from the workshops described on this site or I can custom design one to meet the needs of your group. If you’re hosting it and providing a space plus tea/coffee, you get a 50% reduction on the fee.

“Thank you, Donaleen, for your participation in our Agency Day celebrating Family Services of Greater Vancouver’s 75 year anniversary. Your journal-writing work shop was well received and much appreciated!”
Lyn Martens, M.A., R.C.C.
Associate Executive Director
Family Services of Greater Vancouver