https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/jd-barkers-writing-life/id1674424465?i=1000698531052

This week at the Writers’ Gym, Dr Rachel Knightley is joined by New York Times and international bestselling thriller writer JD Barker. His work has been broadly described as suspense thrillers, often incorporating elements of horror, crime, mystery, science fiction and the supernatural. He is a frequent collaborator with James Patterson. JD shares the creative exercises and habits that support his writing life and how valuing every contact he made in his early career meant building the creative career he has today.

For a writing workout based on JD’s interview with Rachel, scroll down or visit WritersGym.com to download every Writing Workout in the series.

Find out more about JD at https://jdbarker.com

Join our mailing list at drrachelknightley.substack.com or get in touch at thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com

Writing Workout based on JD’s interview

Warm-up: Creative Stretch

“I turn off the Internet when I first start and I don’t turn it on until I get my daily word count done… which I’m usually done with by about ten, ten thirty. Then I flip that switch on the internet all the emails start coming in So basically the business side of this that I have to deal with…until three o’clock in the afternoon That’s what my quitting bell rings.” JD Barker

Take a pen and treat it like a magic wand.

Design your ideal writing day. Try writing it in third person, the writer experiencing his/her/their ideal writing day.

Tip: If the answer is ‘I don’t know’, dare yourself to fill the line anyway. Then maybe the next. Give it a few minutes – because the flow takes turning the tap on.

Main Exercise:

“Whenever I write, I listen to a thunderstorm soundtrack on noise cancelling headphones. And not only does it drown out everything going on around me, but it’s a Pavlov’s dog kind of thing. As soon as I hear that noise, my mind immediately snaps into writer mode.” JD Barker

– If I could give my focus one gift, what would it be?

– If I could give myself one piece of advice about my writing life, what would I offer myself?

Read the answers back to yourself. How will you use your personal training tips from you to you this week?

Cool-down Exercise:

“Years back it was paper notes, know, I scribble it down and put it down somewhere. I learned very early on, like when you wake up at three o’clock in the morning and you get an idea for your book, you’ll tell yourself you’re going to remember it in the morning and you never remember it in the morning. So I’ve always written it down.” JD Barker

Where in your house could you put a notebook and pen, or post-it notes, where you don’t have them already? What else would make the distance from brain to world a little less far?

 

I had my notifications turned off when I arrived at the Century Club our Writers’ Gym session last Friday night. So – while I introduced the writing warm-up, followed by creative exercises for clarifying ideas and engaging in curiosity that builds creative confidence for life and art – I didn’t see any of what was happening at the White House.

Instead, I was hearing from lovely, kind, talented people from all industries who want to do more of they we love. All shared different versions of one shared obstacle:

We want to feel confident enough, sure enough, before…

…we send that pitch.

…we apply for that job.

…we draft that story.

In life, in work and in art, we each find ways to distract ourselves from action in the same way:

“I’ll do it when I feel ready.”

If there’s one thing the world’s stage showed us on Friday, it’s the lack of correlation between being confident and being right. The problem is, as with anything important, giving up can sometimes feel like the closest thing to control. Despair and anger can feel like the closest thing to action.

But action isn’t giving up. It’s abandoning the perfect and moving forward in authenticity, one step at a time. It’s not stopping yourself for fear the world will.

So here’s a reminder of what we can all do this week, and why The Best Writing Advice Is Never About Writing but about everything:

Say The Thing. It might be throwing that first draft onto the page, so you can edit it later. It might be reaching out to a person who can help you move forward, asking for the specific feedback or advice or whatever it is you need. It might be offering something you can give. When we stop waiting for the world to be psychic and share our authentic offering, when we step our of expert mindset and engage in a spirit of curiosity, we learn something (in each conversation, and on our own blank page) that makes our world bigger and better.

There May Be Seven Basic Plots But There Are Infinite Original Voices. It doesn’t need to be the world’s most original idea. It just needs to be sharing our truth, in our own voice. As clearly as we can. If it’s in our head, our job is to get it out of our head and into the world.

Aim to Be Interested, Not Interesting. Sometimes, new writing coaching clients are surprised that my suggestion is conversation first, sharing material second. But the truth is the conversation we have gets that client in a clearer, stronger relationship with what they want to say. Then they say it clearer and better and the feedback they then get later down the line goes much, much further.

The first step? Keep listening to yourself. Not to criticise, not to compare, but to clarify. We have the right to our voices.

Aim to be interested, not interesting – First Draft Commandments, Your Creative Writing Toolkit

Writing Feedback: How to Give It, How to Take It
Friday lunchtime, online

Come and Write This Week…

(If you’re not in the UK, find your timezone here.)

The Writing Room | 11am-1pm Monday 3 March
Free for everyone on my mailing list (if you’re reading this, that’s you!). No expectations, no readings, just an open chat box and ten minutes’ (totally optional) chat together at the end. Click here.

Writing Audio Drama: From Page to Production | 1-2.30pm Tuesday 4 March
Audio drama has enjoyed a huge growth in popularity over the last few years. Major players are commissioning their own original dramas and there’s never been a better time to create your audio play. With producer and independent supplier to the BBC Chris Gregory, develop the skills to write your drama and the confidence to pitch it. Click here.

Monthly Writing Workout | 6-7pm Tuesday 4 March
Take your word-count for a workout at the Writers’ Gym. Creative exercises, supportive discussion, specific tips and techniques for the writer you are. A guaranteed boost to your knowledge, enthusiasm, confidence and your word-count! Free for members: type your discount code where indicated. Click here.

Writing Room EXTRA | 3-5pm Thursday 6 March
Members only: please check Voxer messages.

Coffee & Creativity at Olympic Studios, Barnes | 10-11.30am Friday 7 March
Grow your connections, build motivation and unlock inspiration in this creative networking event with a difference. Dr Rachel’s gently powerful facilitation provides a space to turn curiosity into creativity, wherever you are in your writing journey. Click here.

Friday Feedback and Writing Workout | 12-1.30pm Friday 7 March
Adding to our programme of regular workouts at the Writers’ Gym, this friendly group workshop is the perfect place to hone your writing – and the feedback you receive. We’ll begin with a creative writing warm-up, followed by a writing exercise with tips and techniques on giving and taking feedback on creative work. After this, volunteers will share their work with the group. Click here.

The Writers’ Gym is part of Rachel Knightley Coaching: creative confidence for life, work and art. www.rachelknightley.com

You don’t have to be a member to join a Writers’ Gym session: just come along. But if you’d like to access our weekly programme for free, and receive 30% off all our other events, ask about membership at thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com.

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/returning-to-being-a-writer-prano-bailey-bond-joins/id1674424465?i=1000697288392

Today’s episode and writing workout feature the art and life of Prano Bailey-Bond. Prano is an award-winning filmmaker and screenwriter who grew up on a diet of Twin Peaks in the depths of a strange Welsh community. Her work invokes imaginative worlds, fusing a dark vocabulary with eerie allure, revealing how beauty resides in strange places. Prano shares with Dr Rachel Knightley her early influences, creative fuel and sources of confidence and how directing her debut feature was when she reengaged with being a writer.

For a writing workout based on Prano’s interview with Rachel, scroll down or visit WritersGym.com to download every Writing Workout in the series.

Find out more about Prano at https://www.pranobaileybond.com/about

Join our mailing list at drrachelknightley.substack.com or get in touch at thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com

Writing Workout based on Prano’s interview

Warm-up: The Drive

“It was a filmmaker who said… some filmmakers are driven by wanting to tell the world something that they think, and some are driven by wanting to understand something that they don’t understand. And I think I’m probably the latter.” Prano Bailey-Bond

Take a blank sheet of paper and choose one of these questions:

• What do I want to say?

• What do I want to ask?

Tip: If the answer is ‘I don’t know’, dare yourself to fill the line anyway. Then maybe the next. Give it a few minutes – because the flow takes turning the tap on.

Main Exercise:

Read your answer back to yourself. What visual images come up? Or what conversations between characters in your life?

1. Draw one of the images.

1. Write one of the conversations (the actual dialogue – what the characters say to each other/how they argue with each other!).

 

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/adrian-tchaikovsky-talks-writing-health-and-insects/id1674424465?i=1000696112879

Today at the Writers’ Gym, Dr Rachel Knightley is joined by multi-award-winning science fiction and fantasy author Adrian Tchaikovsky. Find out how early experience running Tabletop roleplaying games combine with Adrian’s childhood inspiration (mainly insectoid) and adult inspiration (including coffee) to create his career as an author and what a healthy, happy writing life means to him.

Adrian Tchaikovsky is a British science-fiction and fantasy writer known for a wide-variety of work including the Children of Time, Final Architecture, Dogs of War, Tyrant Philosophers and Shadows of the Apt series, as well as standalone books such as Elder Race, Doors of Eden, Spiderlight and many others. Children of Time and its series has won the Arthur C Clarke and BSFA awards, and his other works  have won the British Fantasy, British Science Fiction and Sidewise Awards.

For a writing workout based on Adrian’s interview with Rachel, scroll down or visit WritersGym.com to download every Writing Workout in the series.

Find out more about Adrian at https://adriantchaikovsky.com

See him on tour: https://adriantchaikovsky.com/events.html

Join our mailing list at drrachelknightley.substack.com or get in touch at thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com

Writing Workout based on Adrian’s interview

Warm-up: Map of Me (or, in honour of Adrian, Spider of Me)

1. Write your name in the middle of a page. Circle it, andgive that circle as many legs as you like. At the end of each leg, write something you love. An interest, an activity, a band, a caffeinated beverage, anything. Spend 1-2 minutes filling the page. There’s no such thing as ‘random’ or ‘irrelevant’ or ‘wrong’. Just go for it.

2. Circle three things. Don’t think about why you’re picking them, just circle.

3. Select one of those three. Decide that whatever you write with that prompt, for fifteen minutes, is (the first draft of) something your dream publisher wants to publish.

4. Write exactly what comes to you, letting yourself have fun. Be curious. Remember there are no wrong answers. Write for fifteen minutes and see where you go.

Main exercise:

The First-Person Monty Python Helmet

Step into a character who loves one of those now. Consider what they see, hear, touch, taste and smell. What do they think in their minds, and feel in their bodies, as a response to their emotions?

 

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/dr-rachel-knightley-and-ashley-lexine-building/id1674424465?i=1000695551171

The Writers’ Gym is not just a podcast: it’s a membership platform, supporting writers (and writers-to-be) in buildingcreative confidence, growing their writing life and beating the inspiration addiction. Membership of the Writers’ Gym puts you in charge of your writing. It means creative confidence for life, work and art. It also means being part of a writing community with group and one-to-one sessions and personal support available throughout the week.

Founder and Writers’ Gym PT Dr Rachel Knightley is a fiction and non-fiction author, lecturer in Creative Writing and a qualified business and personal coach. This series, Rachel will be talking to award-winning authors across the genres. She kicks off this new series by introducing its producer: Writers’ Gym member, freelance writer (featured in Take a Break, Woman and Good Housekeeping) and Healthy Metal Hippie podcast founder and podcast editor extraordinaire Ashley Lexine.

For a writing workout based on each author’s interview with Rachel this series, visit WritersGym.com to download every Writing Workout in the series. See each workout below in the show notes.

Find out more about Ashley at https://healthymetalhippie.com

Join our mailing list at drrachelknightley.substack.com or get in touch at thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com

Writing Workout based on Ashley’s interview

Warm-up: Ideal week

1. Imagine your pen is a magic wand. What you write is going to happen. Not only is it going to happen, it’s going to happen without upsetting or offending anyone. What you plan is going to be absolutely fine.

1. Write the days of the week in the middle of a page. Put times at the side. Place writing time exactly where you want it. Then put in whatever else is important, around that.

1. Just look at it. Breathe it in. What does ideal look like? Imagine it happening. What does it feel like?

1. Take one small step. If there were one step you could make today, to make your week look one step more like the week you’ve just designed:

-What would it be?

-Who would you need to speak to?

-What would you tell/ask them?

Main exercise:

Assumption-identifier

Whether or not you’re a nine-to-five person, pick one of these three promises to gift yourself every workday this week:

-I promise my writing self I’ll take five-minute (or ten-minute) ‘writing breaks’ whether that means a locked loo door, or going outside like a smoker. If smoking breaks don’t destroy a working day, my writing breaks won’t either.

Or

– I promise my writing self I’ll write down my ideas as they happen. I’ll always have a pen, or my phone notebook. Wherever I am, I’ll make sure I write down key words to get me through that door later when I return to the thought. Or maybe I’ll ‘vomit draft’ the scene I think of right away.

From the show:

For creating time:

“If I go to the loo at work for five minutes, no one’s going to be like, where were you? I’m going to take out my notebook, sit on the floor, and it’s five minutes… the way other people do smoking breaks.”

For creating confidence (which is really curiosity!):

To get yourself out of ‘telling’ the reader and into ‘showing’ the reader what it is to be human… I dare you to jump into their head for five minutes or 10 minutes.” Transcribe what they think, feel, see, hear, the thoughts in their mind, the feelings in their body.

 

Every author you’ll hear on the new series of the Writers’ Gym podcast will say it. We don’t always come to it first in the conversation, but at some point that author will say, sometimes knowingly and sometimes like it’s a complete surprise to both of us, will say, ‘You know what? It’s a bit like going to the gym.’

The phrasing will change, but the sense of having just discovered it won’t. I founded the Writers’ Gym and I still rediscover it all the time: the surprise of Wow, what if it’s not meant to just feel easy every time? What if I simply need to keep taking the small steps, growing strength, building resilience? Showing up? What if it’s that simple?

Simple, of course, doesn’t mean easy. It is simple. It isn’t easy.

But it’s possible.

And it’s wonderful.

Healthy writing lives are what the Writers’ Gym podcast has always been about. Returning this Wednesday with my interview with Adrian Tchaikovsky and continuing over the next two months with bestselling and award-winning writers from novelist to poets and screenwriters, JD Barker, Prano Bailey-Bond, Rosie Garland, Gabrielle Kent, Kim Newman and Aliya Whiteley all talk about the importance of your unique curiosity.

The exercises and the reps that mean the fuel, the rituals and, yes, the coffee that turn inspiration to perspiration… Because it is possible – always – and only you can write what you can write.

Our different conversations are all about a writing life meaning relishing the opportunity of exploring what makes you uniquely you. All share the exercises and the reps that mean the fuel, the rituals and, yes, the coffee (Adrian claims it can be any coffee) that mean turning inspiration to perspiration: doing the work and showing up sometimes before our confidence or mood joins us. Because it is possible – always – and only you can write what you can write.

Which doesn’t mean you have to be on your own.

Every day this week is an opportunity to bring your word-count for a workout. The Writing Room is online today from 11am to 1pm, a silent space (until the last ten minutes when we chat) to enjoy writing time in the company of other writers. In the evening, join me for Fiction and Memoir Writing at Riverside Studios. Tuesday brings the third in Chris Gregory’s series of Writing Audio Drama workshops. Wednesday is Coffee & Creativity, Thursday is members’ event Writing Room Extra and on Friday evening I’m at The Century Club on Shaftesbury Avenue, with an in-person writing workout and creative confidence boosting discussion to apply creative confidence to what we want to create in art and in life: Write, Sip, Create at the Century Club, 28 February 7-8.30pm

Scroll down to book, or write to me.

The Writers’ Gym is part of Rachel Knightley Coaching: creative confidence for life, work and art. www.rachelknightley.com

Come and Write This Week…

Coming up next month: Writing Feedback: How to Give It, How to Take It

The Writing Room | 11am-1pm Monday 24 February
Hosted this week by Writers’ Gym member and office manager Bella Barbieri this week while I have a heath appointment (thank you, Bella!) and free for everyone on my mailing list (if you’re reading this, that’s you!). No expectations, no readings, just an open chat box and ten minutes’ (totally optional) chat together at the end. Click here.

Riverscribes: Fiction and Memoir | 7-8.30pm Monday 24 February
All the inspiration, support and techniques you need to weave initial ideas into fully realised stories. Whether you’re working on a story, novel or non-fiction, want some creative inspiration, or whether you’re intrigued by the idea of writing and want a creative outlet, this is the place to discover and develop your ideas and your voice. Click here.

Writing Audio Drama: Writing in Sound | 1-2.30pm Tuesday 25 February
Audio drama has enjoyed a huge growth in popularity over the last few years. Major players are commissioning their own original dramas and there’s never been a better time to create your audio play. With producer and independent supplier to the BBC Chris Gregory, develop the skills to write your drama and the confidence to pitch it. Click here.

Coffee & Creativity | 1-2.30pm Wednesday 26 February
Quality writing time and excellent company! Grab a coffee and have a mid-week chat, a write and then another chat with your fellow creatives. Free for members: type your discount code where indicated. Click here.

Writing Room EXTRA | 3-5pm Thursday 27 February
Members only: please check Voxer messages.

Cocktails & Creativity at the Century Club | 7-8.30pm Friday 28 February
Join us for an evening workshop with cocktails, where creativity meets confidence in a unique blend of writing exercises, discussion, and networking. Whether you’re an experienced writer, just starting out, or simply curious about the craft, this event is designed to boost your word count, confidence, and connections—all in a relaxed and welcoming space. Click here.

You don’t have to be a member to join a Writers’ Gym session: just sign up. But if you’d like to access our weekly programme for free, and receive 30% off all our other events, email thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com.

If you’re not in the UK, find your timezone here.

Before my @drracheknightley Instagram became a pro account, the bio said ‘Loves cheese, cats and coffee.’ Then I added ‘vegan’ before cheese, because I’d given up dairy. Then I took vegan out again, because as Poppy (played by the magnificent Holly Gillanders, who happened to introduce me to instagram!) would go on to say in my audio drama Winter Spring, “There’s no such thing as real cheese. It’s not like apples or sunlight. Humans invented it… If we use cow or cashew milk it’s no more or less real.” Then I deleted cheese, cats and coffee entirely and replaced them with Author and Coach.

Then, as I got to feel more at home on Instagram, I noticed all three coming back. They weren’t back in the bio, but they were in the visuals of my life and work. It wasn’t deliberate, but what I was sharing was authentic. As a result, there they were, over and over again. Because it was true. I do love cheese, cats and coffee.

I’ve been thinking a lot his week about what it means to feel at home in our life and work. How we build that home, one authentic step at a time. When clients come to clarify the writing voice they want to unlock, it’s sometimes for their fiction and non-fiction, or for their public speaking and social media voice. Whether it’s for life, work or art, the work we do together is based on who they truly are and how truly at home they want to be in what they do, say, write and live. The reason these things (creative writing, social media presence, job interviews, you name it) get easier is when we speak from a place of authenticity then performance means doing, not pretending. We’re showing up authentically.

When we don’t yet feel at home in our self-expression, it’s hard to imagine feeling different is possible.

Which can mean we focus on others’ expectations – or, let’s be honest, our own picture of those expectations! – and create our own monsters, our own reasons to stay quiet, or stay stuck.

But it’s not only possible – it’s wonderful.

And once the itch is there, once that call to adventure is heard, it’s time to get curious. Authentically curious. What do I love? What do I enjoy? What do I offer? How we move that message out and build our own audience starts with how we make ourselves at home in who we are.

The Writers’ Gym membership platform will be a year old next month. I’m so proud of every single person in it.

I’m proud of how everyone has dared to turn distant dreams into specific goals, and step into the habits that mean achieving them. Whether you join us for the Writing Room (free every Monday, for everyone on this mailing list), as a member, a one-to-one client, or are just curious about what you’re ready to create, I’m so glad you’re here. And I’m here to help you love being authentically you.

Audio Drama is on a half-term break this week but join me in person at Write, Sip, Create at the Century Club, 28 February 7-8.30pm and Coffee & Creativity at Olympic Studios, 7 March, 10-11.30am or online here:

Come and Write This Week:

The Writing Room | 11am-1pm Monday 17 February
Free for everyone on my mailing list (if you’re reading this, that’s you!). No expectations, no readings, just an open chat box and ten minutes’ (totally optional) chat together at the end. Click here.

Coffee & Creativity | 1-2.30pm Wednesday 19 February
Hosted by Writers’ Gym staff member, Bella Barbieri. Quality writing time and excellent company! Grab a coffee and have a mid-week chat, a write and then another chat with your fellow creatives. Free for members: type your discount code where indicated. Click here.

Writing Room EXTRA | 3-5pm Thursday 20 February
Members only: please check Voxer messages.

You don’t have to be a member to join a Writers’ Gym session. Just sign up for any session. But if you’d like to access our weekly programme for free, and receive 30% off all our other events, email thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com or download a brochure at writersgym.com

If you’re not in the UK, find your timezone here.

Want to bring more of yourself into your life, work and art? Get in touch.

For Writers’ Gym personal training or creative confidence coaching for life, work and art, email info@rachelknightley.com or visit rachelknightley.com

Creative Confidence for Life, Work and Art | Write with us this week (scroll down for calendar)

‘How shall I bear so much happiness?’ asks Jane, when such an ending is finally in sight. It’s a rhetorical question, an achievement in itself given how much of Pride and Prejudice she’s spent being in touch with everyone’s feelings but her own; such a pro at not being disappointed or sad or angry about the actions of her friends and family that Bingley’s friends hadn’t had to work hard at all to convince him she wasn’t interested. 

Being good at hiding emotions is a skill. 

So is smoking. 

So let’s be careful what we get good at. 

Suppressing inconvenient feelings doesn’t make them go away. It does, however, distract our energy away from creating what we want. It at best diverts and at worst cuts off the source of our fuel as writers: what interests us, what moves us, our questions and observations about the world and ourselves, that make up our unique ‘artist’s palette’. 

Why am I talking about this now? 

Because a number of coaching clients and Writers’ Gym members are finding it a lot easier to blame themselves for ‘difficult’ feelings than listen to what those feelings are asking for. What they’re a call to action for, whether that’s writing on the page or creating in life. 

It can be a lot easier to tell ourselves what we ‘should’ feel than listen honestly, let alone build the habit of transcribing some of that truth.

When we train ourselves to become estranged from what we feel – when the muscles we prioritise exercising are the ones for holding back from instead of thinking on the page – we can still be efficient. We can still have neat handwriting. We can still be intelligent and articulate. But we can also start to wonder if we’re being glib, or shallow, or didactic, or notice we’ve taken to preferring exclamation marks or looking up the ‘right’ or ‘best’ word over the vulnerability of emotional depth. 

In a week where the world has provided so many ways of reminding us that anger and sadness and fear can be appropriate responses, we need to be able to honour these real emotions for joy and enthusiasm and passion to be real emotions too. We can’t create the world we want, on the page or off, from a place of denial. 

This week, allow your emotions to be your writing prompts. 

Give them to someone else by all means: mix someone from the colours of your memory, imagination, observations and questions – that unique artist’s palette every writer has (and has every right to). Bring your reality into your characters. Maybe into your developing dialogue, if you’re joining us and Chris Gregory at the Writers’ Gym on Tuesday afternoon for Writing Audio Drama. Fiction matters. It has made us all feel seen, heard, understood. It’s why we read. It’s why we write. It’s why it’s hard and why it’s important.

Instead of telling your feelings they’re a problem, listen for the opportunity. They have something to say. Whatever it is, it’s entirely your story to tell.

Some of our amazing writers and creative confidence builders at Olympic Studios on Friday for Coffee & Creativity. Join me at The Century Club, 28 February 7-8.30pm and Olympic Studios, 7 March, 10-11.30am. 

Come and Write This Week:

The Writing Room | 11am-1pm Monday 10 February 
Free for everyone on my mailing list (if you’re reading this, that’s you!). No expectations, no readings, just an open chat box and ten minutes’ (totally optional) chat together at the end. Click here.

Riverscribes: Fiction and Memoir | 7-8.30pm Monday 10 February
All the inspiration, support and techniques you need to weave initial ideas into fully realised stories. Whether you’re working on a story, novel or non-fiction, want some creative inspiration, or whether you’re intrigued by the idea of writing and want a creative outlet, this is the place to discover and develop your ideas and your voice. Click here.

Writing Audio Drama: Dialogue, Characters and Episodic Writing | 1-2.30pm Tuesday 11 February 
Audio drama has enjoyed a huge growth in popularity over the last few years. Major players are commissioning their own original dramas and there’s never been a better time to create your audio play. With producer and independent supplier to the BBC Chris Gregory, develop the skills to write your drama and the confidence to pitch it. Click here.

Coffee & Creativity | 1-2.30pm Wednesday 12 February 
Quality writing time and excellent company! Grab a coffee and have a mid-week chat, a write and then another chat with your fellow creatives. Free for members: type your discount code where indicated. Click here.

Writing Room EXTRA | 3-5pm Thursday 13 February
Members only: please check Voxer messages.

You don’t have to be a member to join a Writers’ Gym session. Just sign up for any session. But if you’d like to access our weekly programme for free, and receive 30% off all our other events, email thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com or download a brochure at writersgym.com

If you’re not in the UK, find your timezone here.

For Writers’ Gym personal training or creative confidence coaching for life, work and art, email info@rachelknightley.com or visit rachelknightley.com

Last week, I was asked one of what I privately call The Questions about creative writing (there are about ten of them, I might share another next week):

‘When you have more than one idea, how to you know which one to pick?’

Depending on who’s asking, and what level of challenge they’ve told me they’re up for, the are the answer will be one of these (all of them equally true):

1. You don’t. You guess. You write one and either get to the end of that (recognising the subjectivity of having ‘finished’ is the next level in the being-a-writer video game) and move on to another. Or, more often than not, you find different shades from both/all the options mixing in together as you go.
2. You don’t. You start writing anyway, not quite knowing which one you’ve picked and let the paving stones form beneath your feet. The result? Something that is a bit like one or all of your ideas. But you don’t get to choose. David Lynch’s man on the other side of the door with the jigsaw pieces gets to choose.
3. You don’t. You only know what article is due, or what callout is coming up, and you prioritise based on those external circumstances.
4. You don’t. You start writing one of them and either stay there or find your brain has rebelled and picked another.

You’ll have seen that what these all have in common is not just the two words they start with. What they really have in common is not remotely entertaining the alternative. Th alternative being, ‘You wait to be sure.’ Or ‘You don’t write anything because you’re not sure.’ Or ‘You wait to feel confident.’ Or ‘You wait until you have enough time.’

I love deadlines. They make us so much less precious about what’s in our heads. I love other people for the same reason. Other people remind us an idea can be good when it’s still incomplete, still developing. Discovering Chris Gregory of Alternative Stories loved the ideas behind Winter Spring did wonderful things for me. He was curious about what I was curious about. That shared curiosity meant I developed that idea and brought something into the world I might never have if I hadn’t shown him an incomplete, vulnerable idea.

I’m so glad I did.

That’s why I’ve invited Chris to run Writing Audio Drama for the Writers’ Gym this week. Everyone who books will receive a recording of each session as well as entry to the live workshops. I think this will mean as much to you as it has to me. As Chris says, ‘Writing can be a solitary game, but in audio drama you know when you’ve written those words other people will be bringing them to life with you.’

So, for anyone who’s ever asked themselves (or someone else) ‘How do you know which idea to pick?’, come and listen to your own answers. Because, I promise you, you’ve already got loads of them.

Come and Write This Week:

The Writing Room | 11am-1pm Monday 3 February
Free for everyone on my mailing list (if you’re reading this, that’s you!). No expectations, no readings, just an open chat box and ten minutes’ (totally optional) chat together at the end. Click here.

Writing Audio Drama: Week 1 | 1-2.30pm Tuesday 4 February
Audio drama has enjoyed a huge growth in popularity over the last few years. Major players are commissioning their own original dramas and there’s never been a better time to create your audio play. With producer and independent supplier to the BBC Chris Gregory, develop the skills to write your drama and the confidence to pitch it. Click here.

Monthly Writing Workout | 6-7pm Tuesday 4 February
Take your word-count for a workout at the Writers’ Gym. Creative exercises, supportive discussion, specific tips and techniques for the writer you are. A guaranteed boost to your knowledge, enthusiasm, confidence and your word-count! Free for members: type your discount code where indicated. Click here.

Writing Room EXTRA | 3-5pm Thursday 6 February
Members only: please check Voxer messages.

Coffee & Creativity, Olympic Studios, Barnes | 10-11.30am Friday 7 February
Grow your connections, build motivation and unlock inspiration in this creative networking event with a difference. Dr Rachel’s gently powerful facilitation provides a space to turn curiosity into creativity, wherever you are in your writing journey. Click here. Click here.

Lunchtime Writing Workout | 12.30-1.30pm Friday 7 February
Boost your confidence and your word-count with Dr Rachel Knightley’s lunch-hour writing workout. Whether you’re an experienced writer or just beginning, enjoy exercises, discussion, tips and techniques to build your strength, knowledge and creativity. Free for members: type your discount code where indicated. Click here.

If you’re not in the UK, find your timezone here.

You don’t have to be a member to join a Writers’ Gym session. Just sign up for any session. But if you’d like to access our weekly programme for free, and receive 30% off all our other events, email thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com or download a brochure at writersgym.com

For personal training and creative confidence for life, work and art, email info@rachelknightley.com or visit rachelknightley.com

My actual birthday was a weekday, and not one of the cooler ones. Rather than move work out of it I moved it out of my workday, giving myself the gift of the kind of time I truly relish. Not an absolutely empty day: however well-behaved I manage to be about utilising my time, a totally empty day is way too shapeless for me to really enjoy it. What I really love is a workday with a hard, ‘stop now’ deadline at the end. That deadline was my penultimate Realise Your Writing Resolutions session. After the workshop, I’d asked my partner to put in place another excellent deadline: pizza would be arriving as I finished the Zoom. It was a beautiful Thursday, balancing time to play with the kind of work that needs to feel like play to be done well.

Giving yourself what you want can sound so easy. So obvious. But that’s not what it felt like. I don’t know about you, but it took me decades to accept the possibility – no, the existence – of there being skill or strength involved. Time was something we simply didn’t have enough of. Anybody who didn’t appreciate how busy we were was a privileged idiot. Yet creating time – not literal hours in the day but the self-knowledge and then the self-esteem to make it healthy and sustainable – can only happen when we give ourselves Room to Dream (thank you again, David Lynch).

Making time is one of my favourite things when I work on in audio drama. What the experience in a character’s head isn’t someone with more or fewer hours than the rest of us, yet how hurried the thoughts and emotions, how busy and cramped or echoey and lonely the psychological landscape, we experience the location and tempo their story takes place in, because that’s what it’s like to be human. We make our own time, whether we’re ready to acknowledge it or not, but it takes time – our time – to learn do it in a way that works for us.

Last night, I had my ‘actual’ (or, I suppose, non-actual) birthday. There was much cake and even more Angelo Badalamenti. I was talking to a friend I met through TM (thank you again, David Lynch) about this way of having a birthday week: making time for the things and people I value, and the value of being able to create that jigsaw of time that is genuinely representative of me. She mentioned another mode of thinking about how we’re honouring ourselves when we do that: the week, rather than the day itself, will cover the moment the planets align as they did when we arrived. I thought about that image, that bigger picture I’ll never see: zooming out, something restored or returning, like those traffic lights outside the action of Twin Peaks commenting (or not commenting: it’s always up to the viewer) in their silent, unobserved consistency and ever-changingness. We don’t make time. We don’t make space. But we have more to do with how we experience our reality than I dreamed.

Audio Drama:

Writing Audio Drama with producer Chris Gregory | From 4 February
Audio drama has enjoyed a huge growth in popularity over the last few years. Major players are commissioning their own original dramas and there’s never been a better time to create your audio play. With producer and independent supplier to the BBC Chris Gregory, develop the skills to write your drama and the confidence to pitch it. Book here.

Come and Write This Week:

The Writing Room | 11am-1pm Monday 27 January
Free for everyone on my mailing list (if you’re reading this, that’s you!). No expectations, no readings, just an open chat box and ten minutes’ (totally optional) chat together at the end. Click here.

Riverscribes Fiction and Memoir | 7-8.30pm Monday 27 January
All the inspiration, support and techniques you need to weave initial ideas into fully realised stories. Whether you’re working on a story, novel or non-fiction, want some creative inspiration, or whether you’re intrigued by the idea of writing and want a creative outlet, this is the place to discover and develop your ideas and your voice. Click here.

Your Creative Writing Toolkit: Editing, Rewriting, Publishing! | 2-3.30pm, Tuesday 28 January
Based on my book of the same name, this is the final session in the current workshop series series solidifying the key skills of writing creatively – whether you’re focusing on fiction, memoir or any other genre or audience. Click here.

Coffee & Creativity | 1-2.30pm Wednesday 29 January
Quality writing time and excellent company! Grab a coffee and have a mid-week chat, a write and then another chat with your fellow creatives. Free for members: type your discount code where indicated. Click here.

Writing Room EXTRA | 3-5pm Thursday 30 January
Members only: please check Voxer messages.

Realise Your Writing Resolutions | 6.30-8.30pm, Thursday 30 January
Don’t just make a commitment to your writing for Christmas and New Year: show it your love throughout 2025. If you’re ready to create more time with and space for your writing, and identify the places you and your writing want to go together, this is where to begin your strongest writing year yet. FULLY BOOKED: JOIN WAITING LIST

If you’re not in the UK, find your timezone here.

You don’t have to be a member to join a Writers’ Gym session. Just sign up for any session. But if you’d like to access our weekly programme for free, and receive 30% off all our other events, email thewritersgym@rachelknightley.com or download a brochure at writersgym.com

For personal training and creative confidence for life, work and art, email info@rachelknightley.com or visit rachelknightley.com