2025 Women’s Creative Writing Workshop Retreat: Inspirations for a New Year
January 2-8, 2025, seven days, six nights in Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca, Mexico. It’s the start of 2025, a new year, and we are inspired to revisit the years passed and the one that now begins. What are our hopes, dreams, wishes, aspirations. What are our regrets. What memories come up that bring us gratitude, […]
Day of the Dead 2019 Women’s Writing Retreat: How Memory Inspires Us
Arrive Wednesday, October 30 and leave Monday, November 4, 2019. The retreat can accommodate up to 10 women. We gather for Day of the Dead 2019 in the traditional Zapotec village of Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca, Mexico to write with intention for five nights and four days. Day of the Dead inspires us to revisit our […]
Flores y Cantos Mixed Media Art Exhibition at Museo Rufino Tamayo
The opening was last night. The food was amazing. The exhibition ethereal and dramatic. The premise: in the language of the Aztecs, Nahuatl, when the two glyphs flower and song are joined, the new meaning is art and poetry. This concept was essential to the Aztec worldview, according to exhibition creator Carolyn Kallenborn, professor at University […]
Women’s Writing Retreat in Oaxaca, Mexico: Take a Discount and Express Yourself
This is our 8th year to offer the Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing and Gentle Yoga Retreat from June 22-29, 2018. We want a full-house and are offering a 10% discount off the already high-value, low price of $895 for a shared room and $1195 for a single room. It’s not too late to get on […]
Women’s Creative Writing and Gentle Yoga Retreat, June 22-29, 2018, Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca, Mexico
Lifting Your Creative Voice Writing and Yoga Retreat When: Arrive Friday, June 22 and Depart Friday, June 29 Where: Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca, Mexico This is our 8th year for the Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing Retreat. We welcome new, inexperienced writers and those who are more seasoned and want to go to the next level. […]
Oaxaca Women’s Writing Retreat: Registration Open
Please Share With Friends! Thank you, Norma
Lower Price, Return to Teotitlan del Valle: 2018 Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing Retreat with Gentle Yoga
2018 Writing Workshop is Cancelled We are moving the retreat back to the quiet of Teotitlan del Valle from Oaxaca City and lowering the price to make it more affordable for you to attend! This is our 8th year for the Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing Retreat. We welcome neophyte women writers and those of us […]
Bug Poetry to Whet Your Appetite: Oaxaca Inspiration
I asked my writing sisters who attended the 2017 Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat to write about their experience tasting Oaxaca edible bugs after I wrote the essay for Mexico News Daily. I just heard from Lee Schwartz, who offered up this poem as a taste bud tickler. Birds, Bees and Witchery Grub by Lee […]
2017 Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing + Yoga Retreat: Lifting Your Creative Voice
For the 7th year, women will gather in retreat for a week of creative writing, daily yoga, meditation and exploration in Oaxaca, Mexico. Our workshop is limited to 10 people. Will you be one of them? Some of us are novices. Others are published poets and writers. All are welcome and encouraged. If this is […]
2016 Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat: Lifting Your Creative Voice
This is our 6th annual Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat and we hope you can join us! Many retreat participants return each year and we limit registration to 10 women. So, if this is something you have always wanted to do, please do not hesitate. Starting at $995 per person. Arrive by Friday […]
Exquisite Corpse Poem 2015, Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat
The Exquisite Corpse Poem is a collaboration. Each writer in the group contributes a random sentence or phrase that then becomes part of a complete poem. The result is surprising and creative! We do this each year as part of our closing ceremonies for the Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat. For 2015, our […]
Women’s Words, Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat Closes for Another Year
Our fifth annual Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing Retreat just ended. After an intensive week of writing, listening to each other’s words and offering feedback, our participants dispersed to upstate New York, Denver, Manhattan, North Carolina, the north coast of British Columbia. We are a diverse group. Our words resonate, are distinctive and universal. I have […]
News: Two Spaces Open for Women’s March Writing Retreat
We have been SOLD OUT for months, but today I received two cancellations for the 2015 Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat that starts March 6, 2015. That means we have TWO SPACES OPEN now. If you have been thinking about expressing your creative self and escaping winter, this could be the workshop you […]
Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat 2015: Lifting Your Creative Voice
Announcing the 5th Annual Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat. Arrive Friday, March 6, depart Saturday, March 14, 2015–8 nights, 9 days with market tour, plus options for traditional Oaxaca cooking class, and temescal* sweat lodge. SOLD OUT! JOIN THE JULY 28-AUGUST 6, 2015 SESSION. You are a woman with something to say. You keep […]
New Book of Poetry Crafted During Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat
Poet Katie Kingston has news! Lost Horse Press has just published her new book of poems, Shaking the Kaleidoscope. It is her first complete book! Katie wrote this morning to tell me, “Two poems from the Oaxaca conference are in the book, so I was pleased to acknowledge the Oaxaca Women’s [Creative] Writing Retreat. The chapbook [instructor] […]
Third Annual Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing + Yoga Retreat: Lifting Your Creative Voice
Arrive Friday, March 8, leave Saturday, March 16, 2013–8 nights, 9 days. Our Third Annual Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat: Lifting Your Creative Voice is a workshop based in the Zapotec weaving village of Teotitlan del Valle. Imagine a setting so beautiful that it inspires all the best within you to write and […]
Tribute to International Women’s Day Through Poetry
Who knew there would be a full moon illuminating the courtyard at Las Granadas Bed and Breakfast last night, March 8, when Professor Robin Greene and I planned our Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat a year ago? And, who knew that it would coincide with International Women’s Day? Who knew that nine magnifient women […]
Photo Diaries: Blending Photography and Prose
What is photojournalism? Our workshop instructor June Finfer, Chicago documentary filmmaker/photographer/playwright explains it this way: It is making a picture, capturing the connection, creating something out of what you are feeling as you go beyond the surface of what you see. Our charge this week is to make photographs and then write about impressions that […]
Pablo Neruda 2011 Prize Finalist Inspired at Oaxaca Women’s Creative Writing + Yoga Retreat
Poet Katie Kingston was selected as a 2011 Finalist for the Pablo Neruda Poetry Prize for her poem written during our Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat in Oaxaca. Katie gave us permission to publish the poem and to share her workshop experience (below). Woman Resting Teotitlán del Valle, Mexico I have been waiting days […]
Novelist, Poet and English Professor Robin Greene Leads Creative Writing Workshop
Robin Greene, novelist, poet, English professor, yoga practitioner, parent and wife, is a native New Yorker who is a “Southerner by choice.” She came to Fayetteville, North Carolina in 1989, and joined the faculty at Methodist University where she is now Professor of English and Writing, the Director of the Writing Center, and Literary Editor […]
Writer’s Guide to Reading in Public: 8 Tips
Writers are solitary, work in silence, and are often intimidated by the daunting prospect of reading their work in public. Robin Greene, MFA, the leader of our Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat attributes this fear to our collective wish to “get it right and not make mistakes.” She says that imperfection is what makes […]
Vocal Yoga: Medicine Melodies, Ah Ohm Hoong Rahm Zah
A moment remembered from the Women’s Creative Writing and Yoga Retreat: Our yoga guide Beth Miller gathers us around her in a circle. We sit on chairs, backs tall. At the head of the room is the traditional Zapotec altar complete with candlesticks and an incense burner ready for the next celebration. Forefinger touches thumb […]
Food and Poetry: Writing About Eating, Ingredients and the Kitchen
After our cooking class with Reyna Mendoza Ruiz, Robin Greene, MFA, led us in a writing about food discussion. She referred us to Poet Laureate Mark Strand’s poem, “Pot Roast.” He uses words masterfully: gaze, sit, spoon, “I bend, I raise my fork in praise.” We come to a place where we are ‘eating poetry.’ […]
Creative Writing Workshop in Oaxaca: Soft and Hard Sounds of Language
“Writers pay attention to the emotional quality of the sounds,” says our workshop leader Robin Greene, MFA. Think of the word “mother,” she continues and the comforting “mmmmm” sound. The quality of the sounds are the tools to create an emotion. The hard sounds of “t” and “k” convey the harshness of an emotion as […]
Benediction to Silence: Writer’s Meditation
As I mentioned in my last post, during our writing and yoga retreat, we observed periods of silence in order to explore the feelings this would evoke that could be translated to our writing. This was my experience. Benediction to Silence The silence is stunning, solitary, others do not know, I must tell them by […]
Oaxaca is perfect for creative renewal.
Many of you are already engaged in learning, doing, and expanding your creative lives through writing, yoga, painting, photography and more. Some of you are exploring your creativity independently and others are taking courses or workshops locally or attending regional or national conferences or pursuing your creative lives professionally. Why would someone consider coming to […]
Creative Writing: Wherever you go is where you are.
Creative writing is creative ignorance, according to Robin Greene, MFA. Robin is the author of several books: poetry, non-fiction and memoir, and fiction. As she gathered us around the table for the women’s creative writing and yoga retreat, she talked about what it means to write for her. Then, she opened it up for our […]
Oaxaca, Mexico Women’s Writing and Yoga Retreat 2012: Lifting Your Creative Voice
Oaxaca Women’s Writing and Yoga Retreat: Lifting Your Creative Voice, Arrive March 2-Depart March 9 — 7 nights, 8 days Add-ons: Arrive March 1 and take a regional cooking class on March 2. Depart on March 10 and go on an artisan villages excursion on March 9. Imagine a setting so beautiful that it inspires […]
A Gift: Lifting Your Creative Voice Chapbook from the Oaxaca Women’s Writing Retreat
Today I received an extraordinary gift. Morgen, one of the participants from our women’s writing and yoga retreat, has collected the product of what we wrote and spoke during our week together in March and created a chapbook. I received this just moments ago as did the other women who were with us. It came […]
Oaxaca Women’s Writing Retreat: Lifting Your Creative Voice
Click on this link for March 2012 program http://wp.me/p1v1Ek-1hB You are invited to join Professor Robin Greene, MFA, for six days of writing, renewal, and self reflection. In a supportive small group atmosphere, you’ll be encouraged to find your own creative center and to surprise yourself with the power of your words. You’ll have the […]