Where is my mind? - Experiences of my first write club

Armed with pen and paper I attended "write club" in ScHARR Library yesterday afternoon facilitated by my IR colleague Helen Buckley Woods and joined by 4 other ScHARR colleagues keen to get some writing done in peace and quiet.

I'll be honest, I very nearly cancelled at the last minute, having competing tasks that needed doing and such is life not getting as much done in the morning as I hoped...but as my book chapter wasn't going to write itself, I forced myself to go along, keen to see if this approach would help, as I wasn't getting any writing done sat at my desk (it's writing week in ScHARR this week).

I'm glad I did. We started the session by each sharing our aim for the session, mine was to get to the end of editing a chapter, which give or take a few paragraphs I did. I chose to handwrite as I felt if using a computer, the call of other tasks, emails etc might be too much, but others typed away.  We spent 50 minutes in complete silence, which flew by. We then had a 10-minute comfort break, resuming to write for another 50 minutes.  We ended the session by all discussing how we found it and whether we had met our aim for the session.

On the whole, I found the session very positive, I found the change of scenery (away from distractions) and total silence conducive to getting my head down and getting some writing done, without any interruptions.  There was also something encouraging about knowing others were doing the same, there was a "we're all in it together" vibe or "peer-pressure" as another colleague put it! The only less positives about it were the time flew by and it could be difficult to get back into the swing of writing when I go back to it, but this can be true any time you are writing something.  I'm keen to try another session, maybe using the computer this time to see how I fare with that. If you have some writing that is hanging over you and you aren't getting anywhere, maybe give it a try, there are more sessions for ScHARR staff running on Wednesday and Friday this week with places still available.