The “Creative Writing as Spiritual Practice" series uses readings from Jewish traditional sources and non-religious literature to introduce participants to ways of using language for spiritual exploration. Each class will include discussion of short assigned readings that highlight a particular form of, and use for, language, brief in-class writing exercises to practice that form, and take-home prompts for more in-depth explorations, some of which will also be discussed in classes.

This series consists of three Immersions. Join us for one, two... or the full series!

1) “I” and “You”: The Power of Pronouns in Establishing Divine-Human Relationships - SOLD OUT
Mondays, October 11, 18, 25 @ 2–3:30p.m. EDT

2) Telling the Soul's Stories: Spiritual Anecdote and Autobiography - SOLD OUT
Mondays, December 6, 13, 20 @ 2–3:30p.m. EST

3) Writing God - SOLD OUT
Mondays, March 7, 14, 21, 2022 @ 2–3:30p.m. EDT/EST

$300 for the series, $108 per immersion

“I” and “You”: The Power of Pronouns in Establishing Divine-Human Relationships
The Dutch poet Joost Baars said: “One opens oneself up to infinity when one places oneself in relationship with a 'you'. You become a place where change can happen.” Martin Buber’s classic concept of “I and Thou” describes the relationship between humans and the divine, and between human beings, and makes relationship central to human experience. In this generative writing workshop, we will talk about how “I” and “you” work in human relationships and in traditional prayer, how addressing a “you” changes what we mean by “I,” and how we can say “you” in ways that open ourselves up to infinity and make us places where change can happen. 

Telling the Soul's Stories: Spiritual Anecdote and Autobiography
Spiritual experience often feels private, isolating, uncommunicable. Spiritual autobiographies, from anecdotes to full-blown memoirs, use storytelling techniques to break down this sense of isolation, offering others glimpses of our own struggles and exaltations, and, more importantly, because readers interpret narratives by identifying with characters and projecting our own lives onto events in stories, turning our private experiences into stories through which others can recognize, reflect on, and be inspired in their own spiritual journeys. In this generative writing workshop we will look at examples of spiritual anecdote and autobiography, discuss the communicability and incommunicability of spiritual experience, and practice using midrash, haiku, and self-inventory to develop our own spiritual narratives. 

Writing God
When we think about God and divine-human relationships, we often feel powerless. But human beings have virtually unlimited power in terms of how we use language to name, invoke, and imagine the divine. We will examine a wide range of examples of this power in biblical and other traditional religious texts, and in modern and contemporary poems, and practice techniques we find there to learn to create language to reflect and extend our own sense of the divine.

All sessions will be recorded and sent to participants. We encourage live attendance for you to get the most out of the experience.

Joy Ladin is the author of nine books of poetry, including The Future is Trying to Tell Us Something: New and Selected Poems and Fireworks in the Graveyard, and two Lambda Literary Award finalists, Impersonation and Transmigration. Her memoir of gender transition, Through the Door of Life, was a 2012 National Jewish Book Award finalist. The Soul of the Stranger: Reading God and Torah from a Transgender Perspective came out in 2018 from Brandeis University Press. Her work has been supported by a Hadassah-Brandeis Institute research fellowship, a National Endowment of the Arts fellowship, and a Fulbright scholarship, among other honors. For 18 years she held the David and Ruth Gottesman Chair in English at Stern College of Yeshiva University. Links to her poems and essays are available at wordpress.joyladin.com.

About Ritualwell
Ritualwell is the most extensive online resource that curates original Jewish rituals for Jews and fellow seekers. We publish rituals, ceremonies, prayers and poems to mark sacred moments in Jewish life. Through creating and sharing rituals, hosting Ritualwell Immersions (online learning experiences), curating an online Judaica shop and hosting Rabbi Connect, Ritualwell fosters a supportive environment for Jewish creativity, spiritual growth and discovery. Learn more at www.ritualwell.org.

Ritualwell is committed to offering an accessible space to our community members. We commit to:

1. Providing participants with all the session materials ahead of time
2. Providing automated captions on all live sessions
3. Providing subtitles for all recorded sessions
4. Using the chat function and read it aloud during the sessions
5. Asking for participant accessibility needs and doing our best to accommodate them. Please feel welcome to contact us at ritualwell@reconstructingjudaism.org.