The worst habits you learn in writing workshops and how to unlearn them

Scott and I just got home from teaching the Viable Paradise writer’s workshop, and boy am I tired. (I have a covid test cooking right now, as has become the Way of our People after any kind of a large event, even one largely masked and/or out-of-doors. Just in case it is More than just Le Tired.)

It was a brilliant week, and I’m so honored to still be teaching there 17 years or so (and fifteen workshops, because of the Covid Interregnum) after my first VP. It’s also 10 days of travel, uncomfortable beds, and being flat-out for 16 hours a day… it’s sort of a running gag that I always bring my laptop, just in case, and never wind up opening it.

Of course we roll out again on Sunday to visit family and attend WFC. I’m already ready to be home for a while….

Anyway, one of the bits of the VP ethos that I feel sets it apart from many workshops is the idea that we’re not here to fix any particular story—we’re here to build a toolchest that will help with every story throughout a writer’s career. And that led me to thinking about the bad habits one can learn from writing workshops or just from being over-critted.