The scenic route

Embark on a 6-week journey to discover what helps you to write consistently, sustainably, and happily — and along the way, get a whole load of writing done,

By the end of the course, you’ll have made significant progress on your writing project, and you’ll find writing in general much easier to approach and connect with. You’ll have:

  • more confidence beginning each writing task

  • more energy as you work through your project, and

  • more satisfaction with what you’ve created.

This is not a course teaching specific writing skills. It’s not about crafting delightful sentences, structuring your manuscript or finding just the right word.

Rather, this is a course that guides you to unpack, analyse and rebuild how you approach your writing practice, as well as gives you time and space to write. It’s about exploring what happens between and around your writing sessions — and it works no matter what you’re writing, what language you’re writing in, or how skilled you feel you are.

"I really, really got a lot from today’s session — I was so taken with your holistic approach and the empathy and curiosity with which you treated every participant and their writing issues. It was truly inspiring."

— LUCY

With each weekly group session, you are led to push the boundaries of your self-awareness as a writer that little bit further, to look at things from different angles and to test and explore what works specifically for you.

There’s community writing time too. Part of the weekly group session is dedicated to working on your project, and putting into practice some of the good habits you’ll learn along the way.

With regular group writing comes the benefits of having scheduled time for your project, plus accountability, community, goal-setting, stretching, etc.

Between sessions, you’ll receive gentle homework to help you go deeper in understanding what does and doesn’t work for you as a writer.

Are you ready to discover a different path — one that’s a pleasure to be on?

"Please keep up your positive spirit. You've somehow managed to identify the EXACT problem goal-oriented people face with writing and have the skill set to relax them and bring them to a productive space instead of an obsessive/perfectionist space. Working with you is truly wonderful."

— HELSINKI UNIVERSITY STUDENT

Course specifics

  • 6 x weekly group calls (1.5 hours in duration)

  • calls run 10:00–11:30 Helsinki time

  • weekly gentle homework tasks


 
 
 

FAQ

  • Yes, absolutely. Come as you are, with the skills and abilities you currently have. This course will focus on developing the framework or ‘scaffolding’ around your writing. You may notice that the quality of (and your confidence about) your writing develops as you go.

  • This course is ESPECIALLY for you! Go register now, this course will change your relationship with writing. :)

  • You will need to have some kind of writing project to get the full benefit from this course, in both the group calls and the homework tasks. But it doesn’t have to be a serious project, and it could be a great opportunity to do some writing just for fun.

  • Yes! All group communication and discussion will be in English, but the teaching will be effective no matter if you write in Finnish, Klingon, C++ or anything else. :)

  • Ideally you’ll join the 1.5 hour group session every week, plus make time for 2-3 writing sessions on your own (of any duration). However, this course is very much about the gentle touch, and understanding that our days, weeks, months even years will have fluctuations. In the end, how much time you commit is up to you. Even if you can only make the group calls for now, you’ll still learn some useful things that you can apply to your writing later.

  • Yes, the group discussion / teaching time will be recorded and available.

 

Your instructor

Jess Kelley has spent the last 20 years helping people tell their stories and share their expertise via the written word. She hosts regular online writing support sessions and has delivered retreats and workshops in Australia and Europe for academics, memoirists, creative writers, business writers, and people who don’t consider themselves as any kind of writer at all.

What others have said about This Course…

I want to thank you; the course has been immensely helpful for me and basically removed my long-lasting fear of writing!
— University of Helsinki student

This course took place during a critical writing project for which I had many fears and apprehensions. In the writing course, we considered the effects of our environment, pre-writing routine and general mindset regarding writing. I found it to be quite encouraging, and the experimentation with different considerations helped me to find a writing flow. At the end of the course I was almost done with the writing project, and I believe I will be able to carry some of these lessons through. It is a wonderful privilege to be able to write, and I hope that I can continue for the rest of my life!
— Job

I loved that I got tools to journal in a way that were actually effective and productive. What surprised me was the effect that the journaling had on me. It helped me with the most frustrating challenge I've had during my PhD, which is setting smaller goals for each day to feel closer to my end goal.
— Aada

It was really, really nice to pause each week and come together to talk about writing, hear from other's experiences, and do some actual writing (instead of just talking about writing, as some other 'writing' courses do!) is really precious and valuable. I loved to know of the diversity of ways of writing, and the teacher did a nice job of helping to bring all those things out.
— William

Very positive and I will try to continue with many of the tools/techniques this course has given me :)
— University of Helsinki student

Really helped me to find a writing routine and motivation for finishing up one of my papers. The techniques and exercises were helpful.
— University of Helsinki student

It helped me to become more mindful about my writing, and with that, I have been positively surprised to learn how productive short 30-minute writing sessions can be.
— University of Helsinki student

It has lowered my threshold to start writing, and thinking of writing time as clearly defined sessions has really helped me be more consistently productive. I have very much enjoyed this course and the gentle supporting atmosphere within it.
— Sanna

Thank you! I feel a lot more inspired to continue with my thesis than before this course :)
— University of Helsinki student

Jess is a very kind teacher, who designed the course in a way that everyone can write at their own pace. And I now believe I will feel happy and confident about writing in the future. Thanks a lot, Jess.

— Mengyi