Coaching

Through teaching, editorial expertise, narrative therapy, and good conversation, I support nonfiction writers to free their voice from creative blocks and old stories, understand what they really want to say to the world, and who they want to connect with. I help you establish a strong practice, learn the arrows in the quiver of your process, and to ring the bells of your message and drive mood and engaged connection through craft.

My clients are published authors of best-selling books, coaches and founders who use writing to spread their message and engage with people, and everyday people seeking deeper engagement with creative expression. I work with nonfiction writers as well as poets. I’d say many of my nonfiction writers learn to see the poet in them.

My clients have many projects they might bring to me—a book idea, a manuscript, a blog or newsletter to get off the ground or take somewhere new, an essay series, a memoir, or a goal of sharing their methodology, philosophy, or manifesto with the readers they care about. Or, without a specific project goal in mind, they’re ready to deepen their creative life, figure out what writing means to them, how to prioritize it, and grow with it.

My clients have a wide range of backgrounds and experience with writing, and one of the first things we’ll do is get to know your history with writing, to learn more about what might be blocking you now, why this matters to you, and where you want it to take you.

What all my clients—my writers—have in common is questions: What do I want to say in the world? What impact do I want to have? Who do I want to connect with? Who can I understand myself to be?

These questions often continue to evolve as we work together: Have I worked too hard in my field and I’m burned out or unserved by it? Do I need to make a big change in my life? How do I see the world and what led me to that understanding? How can I hear my voice? What does it want to say? To whom, and why, and from where is it coming? Is my story worth telling? Is my life worth exploring further? Why is writing so hard and so meaningful? What do I do this for, where is this coming from? How is this happening when it does, and what’s happening when it doesn’t?

Other questions writers often bring up early: How can I justify the time? How can I get into a rhythm with my writing or consistent practice? How can I improve at descriptive writing, storytelling or narrative, editing, outlining, or some other point of craft or process?

There are practical questions too: How should I go about sharing what I’ve done? What can I do to get this project ready for an agent? How should I think about calls to action, incorporating my writing with my business in various ways,

We may also face practical questions that involve others you work with: How can I fix or set up my team’s content processes? What’s our team or company voice, and how we do make that consistent across everything we do? Should we make a style guide?

Every one of these questions have come into conversation with my writers as we go on along this journey, and the big questions are at the heart of writing and my work as a writing coach. Just as we respond to writing prompts, we’re not looking for answers necessarily. What answers to be found are in describing where the light bounces when you turn a question on in the rooms of the mind.

What do we do together?

Some of my clients just do manuscript work with me, assessing ideas and process, structuring and developing, and loving a book along the way. With other clients, it may be multiple projects at once and working on integrating them or disentangling them, like private poetry surviving alongside a course supported by public essays. With most clients, we do a lot of asynchronous work on the page, on whatever project we are working on.

I meet with coaching clients weekly or every other week, and follow up with my detailed notes and assignments, as well as exercises and readings to explore.

To do all of this at once, it sometimes helps for writers who want to use writing for work or brand but also as a force of deep engagement with self and world, to consider our explorations along two tracks: professional writing and personal writing.

  • Professional writing supports your business, like a blog or newsletter, book or website. In addition to consistent output, this track involves figuring out big questions like who am I serving, how can I explain my work, and what’s my work story?

  • Personal writing is exploratory writing to free your voice, deepen your self-knowledge, understanding of the past and your beliefs, discover the origins of self-limiting or “problem” stories, and re-author them to better serve you now.

Of course, these areas overlap and that is the intention! But holding these two cups for you is how we’re able to keep moving toward specific projects and publications, and development goals in your craft, while also sailing the hilarious, impossible waters of the meaning of life.

I help my writers do all of this through the three pillars of practice, process, and craft. Practice includes your daily writing journal and how you show up as a writer in your life—taking notes, asking questions, being curious, open, and empathetic. 

  • Process includes how you develop ideas and create essays, posts, or books about them—ideation, outlining, drafting, development. 

  • Craft is all about form and style—your voice, your word choices and syntax, how you vary sentences, how sentences work and how the form of a piece of writing functions.

Each week, we focus on one or all three elements as we unblock your writing and free your voice.

As a coach, I ask, listen and guide, I teach technique, and I do hands-on editing on all your work. This means we’re working on the page together and in regular live discussion.

Sometimes I give very direct advice; sometimes I help you get there–depending on how I think that lesson will be learned. I’m also your editor on the page, working asynchronously during the week on whatever draft you’re developing. I take copious notes when we meet and share them along with your weekly assignments. When we meet we discuss your recent progress or blocks, troubleshoot issues in a story or develop an idea into a concept, structure a piece or live edit a page to get it shining in voice. 

We learn about your patterns, challenges, gifts, and opportunities as a writer. And through all of this work, we are aware of the longer journey you’re on in your creative life.

Is this for me?

The writers I work with are…

  • seeking a grounded life through creative expression

  • coaches, creators, or solopreneurs who need help finding their niche and articulating their work, capturing a space, or becoming a trusted, reliable source, or ‘thought leader’

  • passionate about improving their writing process and craft

  • uncertain about their voice and style

  • blocked in their writing or lives by big questions, an uncertain path, a difficult present, or a mysterious past

  • open to uncovering, deconstructing, and rebuilding the beliefs and stories that are holding them back

  • stuck in unfulfilling work, behaviors, or relationships and willing to use writing to understand and take action

  • …or are drawn to a creative life and not sure how to begin living it

No experience or achievement is necessary to start this journey. If you want to work hard and bravely, learn a lot and be held accountable, and start living more fully through writing–reach out and tell me your story.

Pricing depends on frequency of meetings, volume of work, and how much you can spare for this work in this season.

Weekly coaching is between $1,700 and $2,500; biweekly $750-1,200.

Short program

If you’re feeling stuck in some aspect of your writing or creative life, unsure of your voice, insecure about what matters or what you want to do, this Out of the Cage Interview might be the best next move. The one-month program begins with a 10-question writing exercise, where we’ll learn about your relationship with writing and unearth important parts of your writing story—your blocks, your inspiration, your motivation, your values. This experience will help you begin to change your relationship with writing, whether that’s a repair, a turning-toward, a strengthening, or a balancing. Begins with one hour and a half interview, after which I’ll send you my detailed notes, follow-up questions, and specific assignments to help you implement some changes to your writing relationship. We’ll follow up two weeks later with a one-hour session to discuss what’s changed, and give you direction for your journey from here.

I’ve gone through this 2-session experience with writers and it has never failed to be extraordinary. All you have to do is show up.

This process works just as well for musicians and artists of all kinds. If writing isn’t your primary form of expression but you’re curious how writing might help with your creative process, perspective, voice, I’d love to work with you!

The short program costs $500.