April Abundance: San Diego Writer's Festival and Tarot on the Balcony

Calling all writers and lovers of words! I’m honored to be teaching tomorrow, Saturday April 13, 2019, for the inaugural San Diego Writer’s Festival, a beautiful 100% free and open to the public event with over 60 make that 80 presenters offering workshops, panels and more such as: Highlights from the Memoir Showcase, Black Stories Matter, Stories from the Veteran Writers Division of So Say We All, Roustabouts Theater, Paul-Klee inspired WordArt Project for children, Children’s Face Painting, Spirituality and The Writer, Poetry Karaoke, and more. Whether you write poetry, memoir, romance, epic fantasy, fiction, ghost stories, children’s literature, or have a book or manuscript to pitch, or perhaps you have a child eager to write poetry and participate in the Children’s Poetry Slam, come on out tomorrow to the San Diego Central Library. Again, the program is free, every event! Here’s the link to check out all San Diego Writer's Festival events; come hear keynote speaker Piper Kerman (author of Orange Is the New Black) speaks from Noon-1, or catch her Q and A with Festival Founder Marni Freedman from 3:00-4 pm in the Neil Morgan Auditorium.

My workshop runs from 10 am-11 on the 5^th floor, Room 563, so come and write with me! Here's the course:

The Bold Poet - Finding Your Muse

Where do you find inspiration? Under a full moon or beneath a blazing sun in the desert? Out quietly paddling by canoe down the middle of the misty river? As writers, we draw on the wonders of the natural world around us, we use our five senses, and we let our imaginations run wild. In this workshop, we will explore the sources of wonder that surround us in nature, that we experience through the body’s fives senses, and that we follow by traveling the imaginary landscapes of the mind’s eye. Where have you been, what have you seen, and where will you take us? Join this poetry workshop to write your own five senses adventure poem. All level of writer welcome. 

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to order copies of my first poetry book, November Butterfly in time for the festival, but I will be bringing giveaway writing exercises to our class from my latest writing project, The Heart's Compass Tarot and Writing Workbook. Here's a link to a poem from one of my working poetry manuscripts; this one is from The Fool in the Corn (about an Illinois commune I lived on as a child) and was published by Tweetspeak Poetry and reposted here: Cooking Class, Mid 70s, Illinois.

Poetry Read and Critique

If you can’t make it to Saturday’s writing extravaganza, join me on Sunday April 14, 2019 for my monthly Poetry Read and Critique class from 10-12 at San Diego Writers, Ink at Liberty Station. I’ll be sharing poems from chapbooks and books from Portland’s AWP 2019. Bring a poem to share with us, a pencil, paper, and an open heart. Walk-ins welcome, or register ahead of time. 

Tarot on the Balcony at Yoga with Shawna

Question of the heart? A tarot reading provides sacred conversation and an overview of your present situation in which we look for possible next steps towards your highest joy. Together we formulate the core of your question and seek solutions in a loving, compassionate dialogue. I’m next in session in Imperial Beach at Yoga with Shawna during Reiki Clinic this coming Sunday, April 14, from 3:30-6:30. I'd love to work with you. Learn more about my approach to the tarot here.

San Diego Poetry Workshop, The High Priestess, and Poetry Prompts

San Diego Writers, Ink Fall for Writing 2016

Fall for Writing! We invite you! Come out for a beautiful selection of weekend writing workshops over at Liberty Station; I’m teaching poetry from 9-10:45 am on Sunday, November 16, 2016. Join me for a lively look at how to keep your poetry practice thriving by using themes and forms to challenge and inspire. You’ll do some writing in class with me and you’ll come away with handouts to use for the coming year.

Here’s the SDWI Fall for Writing 2016 line-up:

SATURDAY:

• Memoir with Marni Freedman
• Creating an Unforgettable Core Idea with Carlos de los Rios
• Social Media and Writing with Cathy Scott
• Humor with David Coddon
• Scriviner 101 with Kim Keeline
• Dialouge with Rich Farrell
• Exciting Exposition with Jennifer Silva Redmond
• Can(‘t) Touch this!:Tactile Prompt Writing with Kristen Fogle
• Blogging 101 for Writers with Kim Keeline
• Fiction Gone Wrong with Matt Phillips

SUNDAY

• Poetry with Tania Pryputniewicz
• Poetry to Visual Prompts with Jill G. Hall
• Setting with Tim West
• Poetry Read and Critique with Seretta Martin
• Fiction Read and Critique with Kirsten Imani Kasai
• Unblocking Tools Within The Artist’s Way with Kristen Fogle
• Point of View with Cornelia Feye
• Full Moon Writing with Lydia Real

Cost is $30 per session or $145 for the weekend. To sign up for the weekend of workshops:

Fall for Writing Conference

I’m also still teaching my monthly Theme, Set, Go courses on the first Tuesday of the month.  Next up in November: The Human Body.

• December: Nature
• January: Outer Space
• February: Love
• March: Weather
• April: Spirituality

Sign up here for:

Tania's First Tuesdays Theme Set Go Class

Tarot Dreamers: Make Your Tarot Deck Course 2: The High Priestess and her Gifts

I’m so proud and pleased to continue to offer Tarot Deck Making classes…we are having a beautiful time delving into our own symbol worlds right now. We are in the midst of making the Magician’s Aces. The process has been richer than I’d imagined as we explore how to translate the larger ideas behind each card into a vision card that works for each one of us given our unique histories and unique set of goals we hold dear for our future. 

Here's my in process Ace of Disks, the self poised mid-tree, learning to connect to sun in sky and the core sun in center of the earth through the internal sun or heartline in order to accept the role of body as a filament of sorts. By that I mean a filament or flame inside of a lantern, giving off light for the self to better see where next to step on the path fully grounded, secure, rooted, learning from the trees.

Want to step in and join us? Our process repeats in each course—exploring our relationship to the past, present, and future in relation to our dreams and the cards. The assignment of Major Arcanum card--our focus of Major and corresponding minor cards--is what changes.

The next six-week online course features the High Priestess. We start on November 7 and end on December 16. By completion of this course, we will have drafted a Major Arcanum vision card for the High Priestess and for her corresponding Minor Mentor cards: the Two of Cups, Two of Disks, Two of Swords, and Two of Wands.

Course Cost is $300. Course communication will take place over a combination of email, Zoom, and private online discussion forum. Prompts, feedback, forum, and Zoom provided; participants are responsible for materials for the art form they choose to practice for the duration of the course. To sign up, contact me through my contact page or visit my Wheel of Archetypal Selves Facebook Page.

*I’m sure I will offer the full series more than once, so please don’t worry if you miss a particular six-week course.

For More Information see the post below:

Tarot Deckmakers Q and A

A note of gratitude:

As I worked on my Ace of Disks card, I listened to a beautiful meditation by Tee Ming of the School of Flow. The name of the meditation is: "Money Tree for Soul Sourced Prosperity." I wanted to thank Tee Ming for the view of her beautiful garden and her words.

November Butterfly Poetry Prompts

In an effort to make November Butterfly useful to both writers of poetry and teachers of poetry, I’ve worked with Saddle Road Press to create writing prompts corresponding to thirteen of the poems in the collection.

We are offering the poetry collection itself as a Kindle for $4.99; when you purchase the Kindle version, I will send  you a free 15 page PDF, Thirteen Writing Prompts Based on the Power and Creativity of Iconic Women Designed to Help You Write New Work from Multiple Points of View. It is packed with visuals from the poetry movies, writing prompts and links to other resources to extend your understanding of persona poetry. For more information, read this post.

Tarot for Two

The Hermit fell for Mary last month; she beautifully connects the Hermit’s lantern to her ongoing work with EMDR. 

Mary writes:

 The face of the Hermit is featureless, turning to the side, and the hand is holding a diamond-shaped crystal lamp that contains a small glowing sun.  It’s that sun inside that little lamp, held by the hand in the rough center of the card, that seems to be the focal point of the card, and it was that lamp that I saw during the vision I had this month.

On my end, I struggled with having pulled the Seven of Swords. So I took a second card and was thrilled to pull The Wheel of Fortune. I write about both of my cards in the context of choosing to raise my children and work from home and the consequences of that decision as reflected in a soberingly low Social Security Statement.

Tania writes:

My poet friend said, “You take a pen to that Social Security statement: Next to all those so-called zeros, you write in what you were doing all those years! All those hours of time with your children! Make up your own Social Security statement. You’ve been investing in creating socially creative and responsible adults.”  

Read the rest of our post here: The Hermit, the Seven of Swords and the Wheel of Fortune.