Writing Prompts and Rituals for Winter Solstice (Yule!)

December 20, 2022January 14, 2024 Jaclyn6 Comments

Yule, or the winter solstice, is a time of year when the days are the shortest and the earth begins to tilt to bring us more daylight. At its heart, Yule is a celebration of both the darkness and the light, and it is an opportunity for us to celebrate winter. This post contains ideas for Yule traditions, the spiritual meaning of winter solstice, Yule rituals for writers, and winter solstice writing prompts to help you connect with the season and your craft.

Winter Solstice

It’s impossible to let the solstice pass without recognition when one lives this far north. At 3:00 pm, the sun has already set and on cloudy days it’s hard to tell if it’s coming up at all. These days, depending on how you count your twilights, we are getting about three hours of sunlight, and everything else is dark.

Winter Solstice is one of our family’s favorite holidays, and we’ve created some of our own family Yule traditions. There’s something beautiful about knowing that you have been through the darkest time of year and you know each day will get brighter and brighter. Every solstice, we create a mandala with natural materials.

We also celebrate by decorating “Bruce the Solstice Spruce.” A few years ago, we started the tradition of finding our tree in the woods and bringing him home with us. The white and black spruces that grow up here might not be as full or as round as the store-bought trees, but there’s something magical about the act of actually bringing the tree in from the cold and celebrating it.

What is Yule?

Yule is an ancient Scandinavian festival that corresponded to the Winter Solstice, the shortest day or the longest night of the year. It was known as the time when the world is the darkest and people would wait with bated breath to see if the sun would return. But it was also a time of great celebration, because the sun did return.

In the Northern Hemisphere, the Winter Solstice usually falls on December 21st or 22nd. In the Southern Hemisphere, Midwinter usually happens on June 21st or 22nd. When it is Yule in the Southern Hemisphere, it is Litha in the Northern Hemisphere and vice versa. Yule follows Samhain in the Wheel of the Year, and it in turn is followed by Imbolc.

The solstice actually is just one measurable moment: the moment when the pole of your hemisphere is tilted as far as it will be from the sun, creating the longest night. However, because of the importance of this holiday, many cultures celebrate this time of year for many days, like the Twelve Days of Yule or the week of Saturnalia.

Winter Solstice Meaning

Yule at its heart is a celebration of the sun. We have made it through the long dark. We are on the slide into spring. The sun is coming up more and more each day, making the world brighter and lighter. As the sun returns, we know the plants and animals and mushrooms will also return.

On one hand, the Winter Solstice represents the depths of winter. The landscape is at its most threatening, and it is a time that the land is calling us to go inward, reflect, rest, and hibernate. On the other hand, it’s a time of incredible celebration because the darkest time of year has passed and we have made it through. The days get brighter from here.

Yule vs. Christmas

Winter Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere is celebrated on December 21st or 22nd, when the earth reaches its ultimate tilt, while Christmas is celebrated on December 25th. But there are other differences between these holidays as well. Though a lot of Christmas traditions come from old pagan Yuletide celebrations, to me they are very different holidays.

For me, Yule has been the hardest sabbat to write about. Christmas is so prevalent in my culture and was such a bulwark of my childhood that I can hardly ignore that it is happening. But all of the trappings of consumerism and expectations at this time of year honestly used to make me a little bit scroogey about Yule.

On the other hand, this is such a spectacular time of year in the Great North. All day, the light is breathtaking. At night, the aurora borealis are dancing among clear, glowing stars. There is magic in the air, and it begs to be celebrated.

In our family, we’ve decided that we will celebrate everything. We do celebrate both Winter Solstice and Christmas. But, unlike Samhain and Halloween, or Ostara and Easter, I do not think of these holidays as interchangeable.

Instead, we celebrate them separately, as two holy days that are interconnected. On solstice, we make a mandala, honor the sun, and celebrate nature, including decorating Bruce the Solstice Spruce. We try to spend as much time outside as possible, even when it is 30 below zero, like this year.

On Christmas, we celebrate abundance, warmth, and generosity with a big meal, family and friends, the coziness of home, and gifts under our solstice spruce. To me, Christmas represents the time when the return of the light is noticeable, the day when it really does feel like there is more light than there was just a few days ago, and that is definitely something to celebrate.

Winter Solstice Traditions

One of the beautiful things about this time of year is that there are so many ways to celebrate. You can honor the return of the sun, or you can honor the shadows and darkness. You can host friends and family, or you can retreat into your own cozy little world. Bonfires, feasts, sacrifices, and inebriation have all been part of Yule. But reflection, rest, home, and hearth are also important this time of year.

One Yule tradition that has persisted is bringing greenery inside the house. This happened both as Yule trees, which were decorated, or Yule logs, which were covered in ashes, and burned later in the year. You might bring in mistletoe to embrace the properties of the tree it grows on. You could create a simmer pot of spruce or pine. You might bring a stick of willow or birch inside to watch the leaves bud as a reminder of the coming spring, or an omen of good things to come.

Another lovely winter solstice tradition is to give a gift, offering, or sacrifice. This time of year, we put out bird seed in recognition that even our feathery friends might be in need. It’s a time when we must give what we can because we do not know if our neighbors have enough for winter.

In honor of the return of the sun, it’s also a wonderful time to bring fire into your world. You can light a candle or have a bonfire, sit by the fireplace, put up twinkle lights, or just spend time in the precious sunshine.

Yule Correspondences

One of the most recognizable symbols of Yule is evergreen. But this doesn’t just mean pine and spruce trees. Mistletoe is also evergreen, and was thought to bring the properties of whichever tree it grew on. Holly and ivy are also traditional evergreen Yule plants. Animals that correspond to Yule might be squirrels, deer, owls, ravens, or bears.

Food that evokes the Winter Solstice are oranges, apples, gingerbread, fruitcake, cinnamon, root vegetables, and game meat. The colors that correspond to Yule are those of the sun and holly: red, green, and gold. You might also choose to reflect the colors of the land this time of year: white, blue, silver and black. Crystals that correspond to Yule follow the colors: emerald, rubies, diamonds, bloodstones, garnets, and quartz are just a few. Wreaths, candles, stars, and bells can also be used to represent this time of year.

Any of these correspondences, whether they be plants or colors, can be used to bring the joy and meaning of the season into your life. Anything you do with intention can help connect you to the turning of the Wheel of the Year. So break out your owl pictures, hang some mistletoe, light some candles, or eat an apple — it’s all ritual and celebration!

Yule Rituals for Writers

Here are some ideas about how to celebrate Winter Solstice. These Yule ideas are geared particularly at writers, as they are ways to connect with your creativity and your craft this holiday season. However, I’ve tried to leave them open-ended enough that they can act as Winter Solstice celebration ideas for anyone who wants to connect more with the season and the land. It’s a great time to reflect, be generous, take some time for yourself, and dream about the year to come.

Start a journal. It is time to go inward. Like the land, we can pull into ourselves so that we can grow even more next year. One way for writers in particular to connect with this inward-facing energy is to journal. Use one of those nice notebooks you haven’t touched. Use some of the prompts below that call to you. You might choose to start a daily practice, or to journal through the twelve days of Yule. Use your words to discover yourself.

Write the story of your year. As the year comes to an end, write about the key events of the year. What have you accomplished? What have you overcome? What is the overarching narrative of the year? What has changed? How have you grown?

Give gifts. What do you have to give, in terms of your writing life? Could you give lessons, encouragement, or even your writing itself? You have gifts to give, and giving can connect you to a community. How can you be generous this season?

Set intentions and make wishes. It’s a particularly good time of year to think about what you want to grow in your life. As the light comes back, take some time to think about the big picture dreams you are trying to nurture. It may not quite be time to set particular goals and make a plan, but explore your thoughts and intuition to dream about the potential for the coming year. Why are you writing? Is it to make money? To inspire people? To entertain? How can you grow into your fullest potential this year? What would it look like? It’s a great time to make a vision board.

Rest. Like the earth. As the world sits in stillness and waits for the light to come back, the animals, plants, and fungi outside are resting up for all the growth that is to come. We too need rest. This can be a busy time of year, and if you are anything like me, you have a huge to-do list of all the projects to complete, holiday plans to make, travel, and festivities. But these expectations of busyness at this slow and calm time of year makes it all the more important for us to be conscientious about the rest we are getting. Allow yourself to enjoy the time with others and to rest.

Winter Solstice Writing Prompts

Here are 30 Yule writing prompts to help you connect with your intuition and creativity at this powerful time of year. I have purposefully created these prompts to be interpreted in many ways, as inspiration for creative projects like poetry, fiction, or personal essays, or as Yule journal prompts. Don’t worry too much about what they mean. Instead, let your creativity fly with whatever comes to mind. It’s an especially good time of year to use these as winter solstice journal prompts, letting you turn inward to reflect and see what your imagination holds.

Write about a time of starvation.
Write a narrative that begins with finding a word written in the snow.
Start with a memory of a smell you associate with winter.
Write about an unexpected creature killed during a hunt.
Write about your biggest accomplishment this year. What kind of future does it propel you into?
Write about a scarcity.
You kiss someone under the mistletoe, and in that kiss, you gain some of their powers.
Write about what happens when the light comes back.
Listen to your dreams. Go to bed with a notebook and pen on your bedside, trying to remember your dreams. When you do remember your dream, write it down. Start your writing there.
Write the story of the next year. Pull one tarot card (If you don’t have a deck, you can use this.) per month, and write the story that comes up.
Write about giving birth to the sun.
Write about overcoming the darkness.
Go outside if you can. Take a walk with no set destination and let your intuition guide you. Write about where you end up.
Write about the naughty list.
Write about a party that lasts as long as the ale keeps flowing.
What percentage of your day is darkness on Winter Solstice? Do an erasure of a text that blacks out that percentage of the words.
Write about a fruitcake.
Write about being caught by the Wild Hunt.
Look at the variety of paints in the color white from Sherwin Williams. Pick one that is evocative to you. Start your story with the name of the color.
Write about a fire that burns all year.
Write a story that begins with an ending.
Find out how long the shortest day is where you live. Write a story that takes place in that amount of time.
Write about the first sunrise after the long dark.
This image by Hernan Sanchez on Unsplash.

This image by Tamara Bellis on Unsplash.

This image by Jakob Owens on Unsplash

This image by Szabo Viktor on Unsplash

This image by Brigitta Schneiter on Unsplash.

This image by Andrej Nihil on Unsplash.

This image by Vladislav Nahorny on Unsplash.

It’s not an easy time of year, but it is one of my favorites. As a girl who originally grew up in Florida, I couldn’t have imagined loving the world when it was forty below. But there’s something otherworldly and magical about the landscape of the north at this time of year. Everything, the trees especially, is dusted with hoarfrost, like icing on every surface. The snowflakes are distinct and glistening, which my four year old calls “glitter snow.” And the entire day is a sunrise or a sunset, depending on how you choose to look at it.

Either way, the light turns from pink to blue and slants across the ice to reflect on itself again and again so that the whole world is sparkling. And there’s something about the way that the air nips your cheeks that reminds you to be grateful that you are alive — that even if the sun isn’t shining, just existing is enough.

As I finish writing this, it is 12:18pm and already the sun has begun to set. The hills around us are pink with alpenglow and the snow is taking on the icy blue of twilight. There are hundreds of boreal chickadees in the yard. They are shaking the birch trees so that their seeds fall from their catkins and litter the snow. Even in these darkest of times, the land is preparing for new growth, and we can, too.

If you are looking for more prompts and rituals based on the Wheel of the Year, you can find them here. For more creative writing prompts, look here. For more ideas about how to deepen your writing practice with rituals, check out this post.

Writing Prompts and Rituals for Mabon (Autumn Equinox)

September 11, 2022January 14, 2024 Jaclyn5 Comments

Mabon, or pagan Thanksgiving, is celebrated on the autumn equinox. This post contains witchy writing prompts for fall equinox, Mabon rituals for writers, autumn correspondences, history, and the meaning of Mabon to help artists connect their craft to the season and find more creativity and inspiration. They can be used as autumn creative writing prompts or Mabon journal prompts. Use these fall ritual ideas to spark your imagination and decide how you want to celebrate the autumn equinox.

Change is in the air, here. Each morning on the drive down the hill to school, my daughter calls out, “It’s looking a lot like fall out here!” from her carseat. As much as I may be resisting it, she’s right. Mushrooms are coming up. The sky feels crisper. The aspens are turning pink. If I embrace the present at this time of year, it really is beautiful.

In our garden, we currently have more than we can eat. I have been trying to get everyone I see to take my kale. But it is also becoming clear which plants will not have the chance to ripen before the temperatures drop (I’m looking at you, winter squash and peppers).

What is Mabon?

Mabon, which happens on the fall equinox, is the time of year when the earth is balanced between summer and winter. It’s known as the pagan Thanksgiving, the season of feasting and harvest, and a season to begin to prepare for the winter. There is balance between the light and the dark.

It is the first official day of autumn. In the northern hemisphere, Mabon falls between September 21 and September 24. In the southern hemisphere, it takes place around March 20th. (Note: Google will let you know the exact time of balance for this year!) When it is Mabon in the northern hemisphere, it is Ostara in the southern hemisphere and vice versa.

Mabon is the second harvest, situated on the Wheel of the Year between Lugnasadh (the first harvest) and Samhain (the last harvest). It is the height of harvest season. We are reaping what we have sown this year, and feeling the abundance that has come as a result of our hard work.

Mabon, which happens on the fall equinox, is the time of year when the earth is balanced between summer and winter. It’s known as the pagan Thanksgiving, the season of feasting and harvest, and a season to begin to prepare for the winter.

Meaning of Mabon

“Mabon” is a relatively new holiday, the term being coined in the 1970s(!). It was named after the Welsh god Mabon ap Modron, which means “great son of the great mother.” Legend has it that Mabon was stolen from his mother, the earth goddess, and held prisoner. This is a story which resonates with the tale of Persephone, who is taken from her mother in fall, held in the underworld through winter, and brings spring back to the land when she finally returns.

That being said, many cultures celebrate, and have celebrated, the autumn equinox. There is a lot to celebrate at this time of year. And when you live as far north as I do, it seems like something that you have to mark. The tilt toward winter has begun. It’s time to harvest, slow down, and prepare.

Mabon is a day of balance: there are twelve hours of light and twelve hours of darkness. On this day when the sun fleetingly finds equilibrium, we can begin to take stock of where we are out of balance, and what we can do to bring more harmony into our lives.

This is a time of gratitude because we are harvesting the fruits of everything we’ve worked for through the previous seasons. But as the earth tilts closer toward darkness, we are also called to think about which of our plantings we are going to harvest and preserve (metaphorically), and which we are going to let wither. It’s a time of looking at whether we’ve done enough to make it through winter or whether there is more to do.

It’s time to harvest, but it’s also time to preserve the harvest. How can we set ourselves up for future success? Mabon is an opportunity to turn inward and reflect on what is working and what isn’t.

Because of this, we have to think more seriously about how to prepare for winter. Mother nature is getting ready for the season: seeds are dropping, leaves are changing, and fruit is coming ripe. These are all signs that we, too, should be thinking about how to get ready for the cold.

When we look around us, we can see the trees letting go, telling us to do the same. As the wheel turns this time of year, we are in a prime position to let go of those things that have not served us, give thanks to those things and let them fall away to make space for next year’s growth.

Mabon Correspondences and Symbolism

Mabon is a celebration of the sunny side of fall. It’s a time to honor the beauty that comes when the sun begins to wane: autumn leaves, mushrooms, late summer flowers, and the abundance of the garden. All of these make excellent symbols of the season.

Any of these correspondences and symbols can be used to decorate your workspace, as your desktop or phone background, or even as something to wear. You might pull some of these correspondences into your Mabon altar, your desk, or the colors of pens you use.

Colors of Mabon

The colors of Mabon are the colors of autumn: red, gold, orange, brown, and a deep, dark green. This is one of the times when the earth is screaming out in the colors of the season, bursting with the hues of a setting sun. You only need to look out your window this time of year to decide which colors you can use to celebrate Mabon. Bring those most beautiful fallen leaves inside, decorate your home and yourself with the gilded forest.

Foods for Mabon

Berries! Apples! Grapes (And wine!)! In fact, a whole cornucopia. No, actually. Cornucopias are symbols of Mabon too. This is the height of the harvest season. Everything is coming ripe. Apple pies, cider, berry cobblers, any kind of food that uses what’s coming ripe in the world around you would be a perfect celebration of the season.

Crystals for Mabon

You might have guessed that many of the crystals that correspond to Mabon also correspond to fall colors. Yellow citrine, amber, tiger’s eye, ruby, and jasper can all be used to honor this time of year. You can connect with these stones by wearing them, or setting them on your writing desk or on your altar. Sometimes a little bit of sparkle that catches your eye can be a powerful recurring reminder of what you are trying to cultivate this season.

Mabon Rituals for Writers

There are quite a few writing-oriented ways that you can use the energy of the autumn equinox to further your writing practice, and especially to hone your craft as an artist. It’s a great time to practice gratitude, take stock, let go, and set yourself up for the rest of the year. Here are some ideas for Mabon rituals that can also support your writing and creativity.

Get balanced. Take some time to think about the balance (or lack thereof!) in your life. Do you have a good balance between your creative life and your practical life? Do you have balance between time to work and time to play? How can you bring more balance into your writing practice? Make a plan to make it happen.

Take stock. What had you hoped to harvest by this time of year? What have you harvested that’s unexpected? What worked well and what didn’t help as much as you’d hoped? Take some time to journal for Mabon reflecting on what you are harvesting, what you still wish to harvest, and how the direction of your writing might have changed.

Let go. Autumn reminds us that there is beauty in letting go. What do you need to let go of so that your creativity can thrive? Have you been holding on to fear? Excuses? Bad habits? Write about what you want to let go of. Write key words on leaves and burn them in a fire. Let your own leaves turn as bright as you can and let them go.

Clear out your writing space. Just like spring, fall can be an excellent time for a general clear-out. While you are letting go of what you don’t need, you can also spruce up your writing space. Clear out that desk so you have room for new ideas. Make your space cozy so you can get yourself ready to dig in for the winter and get writing. Making a writing space that’s your favorite place to be will draw you to the desk as winter starts and put you in the mood for creativity.

Finish Projects. (This one is particularly hitting me this year, as I am trying to finish a book by Mabon!) It’s time to tie up loose ends before winter. How can you get the most from the next harvest? How can you finish the year strong? Which projects can you complete and how can you re-apply yourself? Which projects might have to wait for another time? Get clear on what you want your writing life to look like and focus on that.

Make a writing simmer pot. This one is especially for all of you who are writing at the kitchen table. Fill a soup pot with some water and your favorite scents. You can use apple, cinnamon, and/or sage for seasonal scents. You could use creativity-boosting scents like lavender or lemon. Or any essential oils you like. Write your writing wishes on bay leaves. Simmer the water and scents on low and let the steam send your wishes to the heavens.

Host a literary feast. The autumn equinox is a time for celebration and gratitude. What better way to honor all the things you have to be thankful for than a thanksgathering with your nearest and dearest? Invite your friends and family to bring wine and something to share—maybe the piece of writing they feel most grateful for.

Mabon Writing Prompts

Here are 30 Mabon writing prompts to help harvest your ideas. I have created these prompts to be interpreted in many ways, so don’t worry about “what it means.” Just let yourself write and see where your creativity takes you.

Many of these fall writing prompts are intended as inspiration for creative projects like poetry, short stories, or memoir. However, I’ve tried to leave them open-ended enough that they can also function as autumn equinox journal prompts. How can you explore yourself through these lenses? Have fun with it!

Savor your favorite food. Treat yourself to your favorite food and eat it slowly, paying particular attention to the details of what eating it is like. Write about it in detail. Make it our favorite food, too.
Write about gratitude for something unexpected.
Write about something gained by letting go.
Go on a nature walk and collect what sparks your interest: acorns, pretty leaves, even human-made debris. Write a piece in which one of these features prominently.
Write about a child being held in the underworld.
Write about the longest sunset.
Create a recipe for getting through winter.
Write about using the first artificial light.
Write about what’s hidden under the fallen leaves.
Choose one of the crystals associated with Mabon. Research its properties. How is it formed and transformed into the stone it is? Write a character undergoing the same transformation.
Write about harvesting a forbidden fruit.
Write about being stuck in the middle.
Mine your memories. Think of a time when everything felt in perfect harmony. Start your story there.
Write about something blossoming too late.
Write about a god making their exit.
Find a place with a lot of fallen leaves and explore in the detritus. Write about what you find.
Write about the takeover of pumpkin spice.
Write about a harvest that’s not enough.
Research a mushroom. Use its properties to develop a character personality. Is it deadly? Beautiful? Parasitic? Psychedelic? What would this mushroom be like as a character? What would they do? How would they act?
Write about someone tilting toward the dark side.
Find several colors of one kind of leaf and order them from newest to oldest. Describe the change that the leaf goes through in detail, from the perspective of the leaf.
Check out the Justice tarot card (if you don’t have your own deck, here are a ton of images of the Justice card). What is the story that you see in the picture of this card? What is the meaning? Show us how this relates to balance, to equinox.
Write a story about perfect timing.
Write about the biggest blessing of the year.
Write about something that needs to be preserved, and how to do it.
This photo by Mohammad Gh on Unsplash.

This photo by Dmitry Vechorko on Unsplash.

This photo by Phil Hearing on Unsplash.

This image from Providence Doucet on Unsplash.

This image by Annie Spratt on Unsplash.

The sun is setting noticeably earlier, which also means there’s more chance of seeing the aurora borealis. We are using the lights more, and seeing the stars more. There are plants that need to go outside and will die, because it is clear they are not going to fruit. There are plants that need to come inside and will be nurtured, because I can’t get through a winter without greenery.

If we can live in the harmony and the balance of the present moment, we can see just how beautiful the cycles of the seasons are. The way each one can leave us with new fruits and new wonders. But there’s also a call to look inward, to prepare yourself and your writing for the changes to come. There is so much to be grateful for, so much to preserve, and still so much work to do.

28 Creative Writing Prompts to Celebrate Imbolc and Inspire Your February

January 28, 2022January 14, 2024 Jaclyn3 Comments

Can you feel it in the air? It’s the depths of winter, but there’s something stirring. Even as the snow is still coming down, the end of winter is in sight. Even here in Alaska, the birds have started singing.

It’s Imbolc! Imbolc is the halfway point between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, and it’s a great time to start new projects. In celebration of the day, I’ve created 28 creative writing prompts based on the sabbat.

Imbolc is the first day of February, and in the year this post is written, it is also a new moon and the lunar new year. So, the number 28 is no accident. Try one writing prompt for each day of February, if you feel inspired. Or, you could think of it as one prompt for each day of this Snow/Storm Moon. A moon’s worth of writing prompts. Write your way out of winter, and start your lunar new year off right!

What is Imbolc?

Imbolc is a traditional Celtic holiday that falls halfway between Yule (winter solstice) and Ostara (spring equinox). It’s the day the tide changes in favor of spring. The world is waking up from the slumber of winter’s darkness. The sunlight is coming back in a way that’s actually noticeable and though the world is still covered in snow (at least here!), the earth is beginning to awaken with the light. We are now closer to the balance of the equinox than we are to the drastic darkness of the solstice. It’s a time for hope and preparation.

It’s also celebrated as Candlemas, St. Brigid’s Day, or February’s Eve. Imbolc honors the goddess Brigid, especially in her roles as the goddess of the hearth, of fertility, and of creativity. It’s traditionally a fire festival, a time when baby lambs are on the way, and when there is the promise of spring and new life.

Imbolc is, to me, one of the most underappreciated pagan holidays. One of the things I love about Imbolc is that it is really a time for a fresh new start. Imbolc is a recognition that you need a period of rest and readjustment after the busyness of the winter holidays. It’s hard to start fresh the day after New Year’s Eve, especially if you’ve been out celebrating. If you are already falling down on your New Year’s resolutions, never fear! Imbolc has your back. It’s time to start anew.

How to Celebrate Imbolc as a Writer

Imbolc is an especially powerful holiday for writers. Why? It’s Brigid’s day, and Brigid, in addition to being the goddess of hearth and home, is also the goddess of poetry. This means that anything we do to boost our words and our creativity will be supported.

There are lots of ways to use the Imbolc energy to move your writing forward. It’s a great time to start a new project, to daydream and to plan. It’s the original spring cleaning. Here are some ways that writers can observe Imbolc to support their writing practice:

Spring Clean your Writing Space. Out with the old, in with the new inspirational space. Imbolc is a great time to declutter, rearrange, and create a space that will inspire a new year of writing.
Start a new habit. It’s a great time to start something small and daily that could have a big effect in the long term. Read a poem a day, start a new writing habit, start a new hobby, pick something new to learn about, journal, or pull a tarot card each evening. Find something small and manageable that will help support your writing.
Set some new writing goals, or spend time daydreaming about your vision. It’s time to focus on the new year and this fresh start. Now that the hustle and bustle of the depths of winter is over and we can finally see the light again, it’s a useful time to make a new vision board, or create goals for the new year.
Create a new writing ritual. Especially if you (like me) are the kind of person who has trouble getting in the mood for writing, a little ritual to start you off could be just the thing to connect you with your muse. Put on some music, light a candle or some incense, do a meditation, wear your sassiest lipstick or cozy up in the sweater that makes you feel like your best self. This is the time to think about how the small actions you take can be seeds that grow into a new way of being.
Spend some time writing outside. It’s not always easy to get outside this time of year, but Imbolc is a great reminder that it still does the soul good to be out in the trees and under the sky.
Try something new. Imbolc is a time of new beginnings, and sometimes the most refreshing thing you can do for your writing is just to try something new and get out of the same-old-same-old rut. You could do this with your writing (take a playful stab at a new genre, or a new voice), but I also think trying any kind of new thing can revitalize our writing. Go ice skating, go to a new park, or try a new activity. Anything that can give you a fresh perspective also helps make you a better writer.
Start a new project. See below for prompts to help with this one!

Creative Writing Prompts for Imbolc

Celebrate Brigid with some poetry. Use the Poetry Foundation to find one line of poetry that really speaks to you, and start there. You could create a poem, a story, or even nonfiction. Use the line of poetry that spoke to you as the starting point for your own writing.
Write about something waiting to be born.
Write about someone who meets the goddess Brigid.
Go outside and see it with new eyes, and ears, and… Use synthesia to describe what you see. What do the colors taste like? How does the sky smell? Bring us there by mixing all your senses and letting your metaphors run wild.
Write a story about a character who finds something magical while cleaning out their home.
Use this Image, from Tiffany Laura Danyelle on Unsplash.

“The world has been still. But something has started to stir underground…”
Write about what happens when the snow starts to melt.
Check out the Ace of Wands tarot card. This is the card of new growth and emerging to a new state of being. Use this card as the jumping off point for your writing.
What happens when St. Brigid and the Goddess Brigid meet?
The nuns of Kildare, the monastery founded by St. Brigid, were tasked with keeping an eternal flame. Write about keeping a flame alive.
It was rumored that if a man crossed the hedge of the Church of Kildare, he would be cursed or be driven insane. Write a story about a man who crosses the hedge and goes insane.
Clean it out! Do an erasure poem of the wikipedia page of Imbolc. (Or another related page of your choosing).
Use this image from Foundry Co on Pixabay.

Write about making a bed that never gets slept in.
Write about a girl made of reeds who comes to life.
Do a meditation. (You can find Imbolc-specific meditations here.) Jot down the images that come up and create your work from there.
“It’s time to burn it all down. She lit the match…”
Write a story that begins with an initiation.
Find three things that need to be cleared out of your house. Use those three things to describe growth, without using the word growth.
“When I looked into the water of the well, it was not myself looking back at me…”
Write about something that has died within you, thank it and lay it to rest.
Winter is ending, and this means new beginnings are on the horizon. Write a story that begins with an ending.
Write about something unexpected “in the belly.”
“The serpent awakens…”
Write a story that takes place at the exact moment between seasons.
Write about starting a small new habit that changes the character’s life (or yours!).
Use this image, from Annie Spratt on Unsplash.

As always, if any of these prompts inspire you, I would love to read what you create. Drop a link below or send me a message. Truly, nothing makes my heart happier than helping people create, and I can’t think of a better way to celebrate this special time of year than to write new possibilities into being.

Enjoy!

For more writing prompts, click here.

Shelter and Write Prompt 8: Find the Helpers

April 19, 2020February 25, 2022 Jaclyn3 Comments

Mr. Rogers said: “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’” Find someone who is helping and write about them. It could be someone doing something big on the front lines, or someone doing something small in your neighborhood.

Who is this person? They could be someone you know, someone you saw on the news, or even a character that you imagine. What are they doing that is helpful and who are they helping? How did they start helping and why?

Why is the thing they are doing important? How does it connect to the larger picture?

This post is part of a series I am doing that includes 30 prompts for 30 days of sheltering at home. You can read more about my reasoning and also find other prompts here. I would love to see what you come up with. Feel free to share here or to tag your work #shelterandwrite.

Shelter and Write Prompt 7: The Windows

April 18, 2020February 25, 2022 Jaclyn3 Comments

What is outside your window right now? Sit in front of the window for 30 minutes and record everything you see. Describe the cloud passing by, the way the shadows are falling. Tell us about the birds that pass by and the movement of the sun and the wind. Are there cars passing, or people? Try to paint the picture just outside your window in as much detail as possible.

As one of my mentors used to say, “notice what you notice.” What do you notice about right here, right now? Why are you noticing those things? What thoughts are spawned by what you see? How is this window also a window into your thoughts?

Shelter and Write Prompt 3: The Setting as a Character

April 3, 2020February 25, 2022 Jaclyn4 Comments

Where are you right now? Describe it in detail. Think of both the small setting, like your house, and the bigger settings: your town, your state, your country, your world.

Think of the interplay between you and your setting. Settings often shape stories. How is your setting influencing your experience? What are the different factors at play? What are the connections between your experiences and your setting?

Imagine your setting is a character in the story of your experience of the current events. How do you interact with each other? How are you affecting your setting? How is your setting changing you? Is your setting your antagonist or your ally?

How would your experience be different if you were somewhere else?

For a fictional alternative, create a story that is heavily influenced by the setting. How does the setting create conflict and lead to crisis? Does the setting influence the resolution? Or does the resolution change the setting?

Shelter and Write Prompt 2: Our Children’s Stories

April 2, 2020February 25, 2022 Jaclyn2 Comments

Think about the current time through a child’s eyes. It could be your child, a child you know, or even a fictional child.

You could write from the child’s point of view, or you could write about the child from an adult’s point of view.

How old is the child? What do they sense? What do they know? What do they see? How do they understand what is happening around them?

Then imagine this child in the future. How will they remember this time? What are the stories that the child will tell when they describe this time to their own children?

#shelterandwrite

This post is part of a series I am doing that includes 30 prompts for 30 days of sheltering at home. You can read more about my reasoning and also find other prompts here.

Shelter and Write Prompt 1: Create a Written Collage

April 1, 2020February 25, 2022 Jaclyn7 Comments

Create a Written Collage: Think of ten small, concrete things that are different in your life because of COVID-19. You want to choose some things that you can experience with your senses, and that you can describe in exquisite detail.

It could be empty hand-sanitizer bottles, a work project left unfinished, an unused plane ticket, the pile of books you now have time to read, etc.

Describe each one in as much detail as possible. How has this thing changed in recent weeks? What specifically has brought about these changes? How have you noticed this thing in a new or different way?

Arrange your descriptions to create a written “collage” of current life. Look closely at the small differences around you. Together, they tell a story. What’s yours?

This post is part of a series I am doing that includes 30 prompts for 30 days of sheltering at home. You can read more about my reasoning and also find other prompts here.

#shelterandwrite

Shelter and Write: 30 Journal Prompts for a COVID-19 Quarantine

April 1, 2020February 25, 2022 Jaclyn72 Comments

I don’t know what quarantine has been like for you, but I have spent the last several weeks huddled under the covers, unable to look away from the news, and sanitizing my child like crazy. There has been a great grief, a great helplessness, and the overwhelming feeling that I should be doing something — anything — other than just staying home. I understand that I’m doing my part by hiding under the covers. But it also seems like I should be doing a lot more.

There have been a lot of tears. I might have gotten in a non-verbal argument with my toddler. And the things I say to my plants these days makes me wonder if they think I am crazy. The anxiety is real. And I know it would make me feel so much better to do something for others, to connect with others.

Are you feeling this way, too? Both paralyzed by anxiety and seized with the need to do something useful, something helpful?

Maybe your situation isn’t right to make masks or adopt a grandma, but you do want to do something. I have been wanting to write. I have dealt for years with feeling like writing is selfish, and in this age of unease, it only seemed more so.

But still, I felt that nagging feeling deep in my chest that begged for me to write. Maybe you have been wanting to write, too. Maybe you have been feeling like writing is a luxury right now and something you shouldn’t be spending time on. But I want to push against that idea.

I personally could really only do the work that was absolutely necessary in the past few weeks, and that was teaching. So I started thinking about how I could be useful to the writers taking my course, which also led me to think about how we could be useful as writers.

As my students returned to our little online portal after an extended spring break, I asked them what would be useful for them as writers right now. Overwhelmingly, they wanted to journal about this time and overwhelmingly, they wanted prompts.

I wanted to make prompts that would really be helpful for my students. Prompts that encouraged them be present, to look at the little things, to imagine a better future. But also prompts that allowed them to voice their fears and stare down their anxieties. I wanted to make prompts that they could connect over, draw insight from, and use to document what they saw and experienced. Basically, I wanted to make prompts that were helpful in making my students helpful.

And I thought, maybe it will also be helpful for others, too. So I wanted to share it with you.

Here is the thing: you can help. You can help by writing. Think of all the ways that the writing is useful.

On the most basic level, it is important to have a historical record of this time, and multiple perspectives will be important to get the history right. We need to know what nurses were doing, what patients were doing, what it was like to go to work, and what it was like to stay home. The more information and perspectives that can be gathered will help those in the future see what worked and what didn’t, and how the world changed in response.

Also, taking care of your own mental health is helping. I can’t stress this enough. Look, no one is going to be served by letting anxiety, depression or any other mental health issue take over. Practicing isolation and social distancing are terrible for all kinds of mental health disorders, from anxiety to eating disorders. If writing is making you feel better, you should do it. If it helps you get through the day a little kinder or with a little more ease, it is important, and you are helping others by doing it. It’s also a great way to ease the sense of isolation (see below!).

Think about all the reading you are doing. We are all trying to make sense of what is going on right now. There are numerous conspiracy theories, constant live news updates, and people sure that this will change life as we know it forever. All of these things exist because people are trying to understand a situation so unlike what most of us have experienced. Writing about it is trying to make sense of it. Sure, you might not figure out the answer to the pandemic, but even coming to one little way of thinking about it that is helpful to you might be also helpful to others.

And if you aren’t writing about the pandemic, but are writing something totally unrelated, like ancient alien dinosaur erotica or whatever, you are helping too! People are looking to artists for distraction, for escape, because we can’t exist on high-alert all the time.

This brings me to a last way you can help: share your writing.

Share your thoughts and the ways in which you are dealing with it. There is a need for connection right now, and one of the ways we can connect and still be socially distant is to share our thoughts in writing. So share your writing. Even if it doesn’t have anything to do with COVID-19, it could help someone find a few moments of calm and connection. Maybe you send your mom a letter with one of your journal entries that you think she would like, maybe you share it on Facebook, maybe you share it completely anonymously on a forum. But let other people learn from your thoughts, and allow them to connect back with you. You will both be helped by it.

So this is my small way of sharing with you. You can use this with #NaPoWriMo or #CampNano or on your own, day by day, or when you feel moved. I hope you find this helpful and I hope you also know that you are helpful.

These are some of the prompts that I created for my students. I’ll post a prompt a day and you’ll find a little sneak peak below. I hope that you can use them to be helpful, to yourself and to others. I hope that you can use them to share your fears, your hopes, and your thoughts. And most of all, I hope you can use them to connect.

Thank you for connecting with me by reading this <3

#writethepandemic

Writing Roulette Results

January 26, 2014February 25, 2022 Jaclyn11 Comments

She came dressed in nothing but the dust from butterfly wings and had dragonflies in her hair. She shimmered with a silvery arctic sheen that barely covered her skin. He wondered even if it was her skin. He’d been in the mental hospital for so long that he wondered if humans had evolved this way, perhaps the climate was changing so much that people on the outside were developing ashen skin, burning in the sun until they came off on your fingers when you touched them. He wanted her on his fingers like that, burned or not.

“I’ve been waiting for you,” she said. When she spoke, bumble bees came out of her mouth, whispering against his cheeks and wrapping him in honey. They rested on his shoulders and chest, pollinating his skin. He was hooked immediately.

“I’ve been here for years.” He looked around to see if other people noticed her. He didn’t trust his own eyes any more.

“You should have come sooner.”

“Why are you here?”

“Don’t you recognize me?” Her hair was white, long, silky strands, stronger than steel and he was caught in it. Her eyes fluttered. The bees which swarmed him tugged at something in the back of his mind, but she was too strange. Her tongue curled and he was sure she was part insect.

Suddenly, her poetry came rushing back to him.

“Callie.”

Yesterday I posted a prompt about using various plot generators. I wanted to share with you a little taste of what I came up with. This came from one of the 5.1 million plots that Big Huge Thesaurus generated. It was so inspiring as a prompt that it’s become a much, much larger (and still unfinished!) project. I’ve shared the beginnings of it with you. Has anyone else used any of these prompts? What did you come up with?

Creative Commons love to Mr. Greenjeans on flickr for the amazing artwork. Thank you!