INKspiration

Celebrating 40 years of journal INKspiration!
Join my anniversary celebration! When I taught my first journal workshop 40 years ago, I knew the intersection between writing and healing was my life's work. To celebrate four decades of amazement, I've gathered 19 top journal experts for a Zoom workshop series. Once a month, May-Sept, we'll offer four pioneers/teachers/ authors in 90-minute sessions for an all-day experience you'll never forget.
Don't miss this once-every-40-years opportunity!

--Kay Adams LPC, Center for Journal Therapy & Therapeutic Writing Institute, author of 14 books

When we think of personal journaling and writing, we most often think of them as private and solitary practices. In this session, we'll explore how writing in community can be both transformational and inspiring. Discover how Writing Alone Together can foster creativity, compassion, and connection in meaningful ways. You will also learn the four key elements of writing with others, as well as a framework to host a journal writing circle of your own, if this calls to you. I believe writing in community can be a peace-keeping practice that offers healing and renewal individually and collectively. And it's powerful medicine for times like these!

Lynda Monk, MSW, RSW, CPCC, is Director of The International Association of Journal Writing (IAJW.org), an inspirational and educational community for journal writers worldwide and a sponsor of INKspiration. Lynda is known for her profound insights into the therapeutic and life-changing power of journaling. T Lynda is the co-editor and co-author of several books including Affirmations for Self-Love – A Guided journal; The Great Book of Journaling; Transformation Journaling for Coaches, Therapists and Clients; Writing Alone Together, and she is the author of Life Source Writing. Lynda is a Registered Social Worker and Certified Professional Life Coach, with 30+ years’ experience teaching, speaking, and coaching in the areas of burnout prevention, self-care, wellness and writing to heal. She is currently writing her adoptee memoir as well as a healing journal for adoptees, to be published this December.

We connect deeply with ourselves and with others when we listen and when we express. During this time of challenge and often unwanted change, it is crucial that we look for ways to be steady and be present. In this workshop we have an opportunity to listen to a poem, discuss it in community and then reflect on our own thoughts through writing prompts. We will also hear others and reflect on what touches us in the moment. In this simple but profound process we are invited to presence. We will manifest a field of creative connection. It is in this field that restoration and beauty blooms.

Wendi R. Kaplan, LCSW, CPT-CM is a psychotherapist who specializes in relational, integrative, and biblio/poetry therapies. She has a private practice in Alexandria, Virginia and provides consultation to mental health providers, physicians, and other professionals. As a poetry therapist and mentor/supervisor she also teaches the theory and process of biblio/poetry therapy and word arts. Wendi is a poet and writer and creates poetry events in all kinds of places! She was poet laureate of Alexandria, Virginia (2016-2019). Wendi has been meditating since 1974 and incorporates meditative and mindful practices into all her work.

In this workshop, we'll take a deep dive into the wonders of the unconscious with one of its most intrepid explorers. Not many people know that Carl Jung had a serious journaling habit, which became the basis for his entire psychological legacy as the great mapper of the human soul. He was also funny, eccentric and highly inventive. We'll be looking at the lighter side of Jung as a way to connect with our deepest selves and to take a peek into the great treasure chest that is the collective unconscious. Bring your metaphoric snorkel, mask, a waterproof notebook and your best underwater pen!

Jon Sayers is a London-based poet, transformational coach and journal facilitator with a particular interest in the ideas of Carl Jung. He qualified as a life coach with Animas (accredited by ICF), has trained extensively with (and now is on the faculty of) the Therapeutic Writing Institute. He has delivered workshops on Jungian psychology and poetry in the US, UK, Hungary and Spain. He has facilitated writing for wellbeing sessions for diverse populations, ranging from inmates of His Majesty’s Prisons to members of local church congregations. Jon enjoyed a long first career as a copywriter and creative director in advertising and branding. His expressive writing course ‘Because You’re Worth It’ explores the persuasive tricks and techniques of advertising in relation to the self, aiming to boost self-awareness and confidence. He can be contacted through jon@everypencil.com

What’s Written in the Cards for Trying Times provides images and poetry as evocative divining rods to help us plumb our depths when “the world is too much with us” and we may feel alone. The picture on a card and words in a poem have ekphrastic* resonance that can inspire our journal or poetic responses based on our unique ways of perceiving. Sharing our writings, if desired, invites insights and possibilities of belonging that are so helpful during difficult times.

*Ekphrastic writing is done in response to an image or piece of art.

Peggy Osna Heller, PhD, LCSW-C, PTR, social worker, clinical poetry therapist and master certified mentor, began her expressive arts career as staff biblio/poetry therapist at Psychiatric Institute, Mt. Vernon and Dominion hospitals She has taught poetry therapy in universities and as co-director,with the late Kenneth Gorelick, MD. of the Wordsworth Center for Growth and Healing. Peggy is author of professional journal articles and co-author of chapters in Life Guidance Through Literature and The Healing Fountain. She co-edited with Carol Thayer Cox Portrait of the Artist as Poet. Her poetry therapy memoir, Word Arts Collage was published by Pudding House in 2009. A member of Potomac Village Community, she tutors fellow elders in computer skills. Peggy practices psychotherapy and poetry therapy in Potomac, MD.

Sometimes it's hard to approach the deeper truths of our lives because there is the inherent risk of overload, regret, discomfort, emotional difficulty and other unwanted experiences. Yet writing craft elements, such as writing "in scene," can bring emotional clarity to "what happened." Writing scenes is a powerful way to inhabit the body/mind of who you were at another time and place. In a scene, you relive your truth as you speak in dialogue and interact with other characters, allowing you to fully embrace your desires, needs, and decisions in that moment. You, the writer, become a witness to your former self, a powerful healing and integrative technique.

Linda Joy Myers, founder of the National Association of Memoir Writers (NAMW), is the author of award-winning memoirs Don't Call Me Mother and Song of the Plains, and two books on craft The Power of Memoir, & Journey of Memoir. She co-authored Breaking Ground on Your Memoir and Magic of Memoir & has co-taught the Write Your Memoir in Six Months course with Brooke Warner for 14 years. Linda also teaches memoir and craft with Carla King. A memoir coach for 30 years, she helps memoir writers find their voice and get their story into the world. Linda has recently ventured into novel writing land, and her first novel, The Forger of Marseille, a WWII historical fiction novel won four awards in historical fiction and is published by She Writes Press. http://namw.org. http://lindajoymyersauthor.com

Mary Reynolds Thompson is the founder of Live Your Wild Soul Story, award-winning author, internationally acclaimed speaker, and a facilitator of poetry and journal therapy. A pioneer in the spiritual ecology movement, she explores the transformative power of landscape archetypes and nature-based metaphors to help us rediscover our soul’s purpose and restore our sacred relationship with Earth. Her books include The Way of the Wild Soul Woman and Reclaiming the Wild Soul, a 2015 Nautilus Award-winner, and her work has appeared in numerous anthologies and publications. Mary’s own wild soul was awakened in childhood, riding a pig named Ramona along the dusty trails of Southern Italy. Since then, she has trekked the globe, finding in nature a lifelong ally in her decades-long recovery from alcoholism. Find her at www.maryreynoldsthompson.com

"If we opened people up we would find landscapes’."

– Agnes Varda.

In these difficult times, many of us struggle to stay above water. What if the simple act of writing about "place" could help? The late depth psychologist Dr. Ira Progoff, widely regarded as the original journal therapist, developed the Steppingtones writing technique for life review. In this workshop, we will apply the Steppingstones concept to the landscapes you have known. Listing and then exploring the landscapes of your life supports a rootedness and stronger relationship with your story. This can help you re-possess your past and ground yourself in the present. We will use the language of the imagination and sensory memory in guided exercises to help you will find yourself in the world again.

Kate Thompson, MA, was educated at Cambridge University, England and trained in London and Denver. She is an existential psychotherapist, a supervisor and a journal therapist. She is a Registered Psychotherapist in the State of Colorado and is accredited by the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy. Kate has over 20 years of clinical experience in private practice. She is the author of Therapeutic Journal Writing and co-editor (with Kathleen Adams) of Expressive Writing: Counseling and Healthcare and (with Gillie Bolton and Victoria Field) of Writing Works and Writing Routes.

Discover the transformative power of combining art and journaling in this immersive workshop. When you engage both visual and verbal expression, you unlock hidden dimensions of your inner landscape that neither medium can reveal alone. Break through creative blocks, accelerate personal insights, and experience profound "aha" moments as images reveal what words can't express—and words clarify what images suggest. Join us to map your inner world and return with treasures from its depths.
Please bring simple art supplies: A box of crayons or colored pencils, or a smll tin of water colors, or a magazine or two and a gluestick if you might like to collage.

Evie Lindemann, ATR-BC, ATCS, LMFT is a board-certified art therapist and credentialed supervisor, a licensed marriage and family therapist and certified archetypal pattern analyst. She has taught at Albertus Magnus College,Yale University, and currently teaches at the Portland Institute for Loss and Transition and the Therapeutic Writing Institute. Evie has exhibited nationally and internationally as a printmaking artist. She has contributed chapters to several collected works on the applications of art therapy for grief, hospice and pediatric medicine. She receives personal guidance from her spiritual teacher, Meher Baba, an Indian mystic who maintained silence for forty-three years.

Writing a memoir from your journal isn’t a matter of simply cut-and-paste. Rather, it’s more of a curation, a rendering of certain of your life experiences along with your thoughts and emotions into a story that will resonate with readers. It’s a translation of your private voice to your public voice. This means shaping open-ended, unfiltered, raw journal entries into a story arc that hews to a theme. We do this by borrowing some of the techniques of fiction writing. In this workshop, we’ll play with some of those techniques, using material from our own journaling.

Judy Reeves is an award-winning writer and teacher who has published four books on the writing craft including A Writer’s Book of Days and Wild Women, Wild Voices, and a memoir, When Your Heart Says Go–My Year of Traveling Beyond Loss and Loneliness. She previously taught at the UCSD Extension and is a member of the International Association for Journal Writing (IAJW) Council. Judy leads private workshops and retreats, teaches at writing conferences internationally, and at San Diego Writers, Ink, a nonprofit literary center she cofounded. She lives and writes in San Diego, amid bulging bookshelves and an ancient Underwood typewriter that claims its own social media fan base. Her website is www.judyreeveswriter.com

Join me for a creative, exploratory and powerful journey into the green spaces of our cities and the wild landscapes within! Engaging with nature-based prompts in urban settings can be a deeply healing and restorative act-one that brings us back to ourselves while tuning us into the living world around us.In this workshop, we’ll explore tree-inspired journal prompts Whether you’re writing under a city tree or imagining your way into a forest, you’ll discover how nature, especially trees, can become mirrors, guides, and grounding forces in your creative and writing life. We’ll pause, listen, and write with the trees, inviting their intuitive wisdom to help us reflect, reconnect, and rewild our words.

Jackee Holder is a London-based executive coach, author and speaker who promotes the health and well-being benefits of journaling and nature wellness. She has also published two illustrated nature-themed journal writing maps, Writing with Fabulous Trees and Re-Widing the Page Writing Maps, along with the Inner & Outer Nature Self-Discovery card deck. Jackee’s writing has been published in several anthologies including The Big Book of Journaling and Transformational Journaling for Coaches, Therapists and Clients. A regular podcast guest, Jackee pens a monthly column, “Write To Flourish,” for Psychologies Magazine, the UK’s best selling emotional well-being magazine. She sits on the Journal Council for the International Association of Journal Writers (IAJW).

Sandra Marinella, MA, MEd, is an award-winning writing teacher, author and founder of The Story You Need to Tell Project. She has taught writing and story-sharing to thousands of students, professionals, veterans, and cancer patients. When she faced cancer, she wrote The Story You Need to Tell, an acclaimed guide on transformational storytelling. While teaching at Integrative Health at Mayo Clinic, a study documented the effectiveness of her writing methods to reduce stress/pain and to dramatically improve moods/well-being. She speaks and gives workshops on story sharing and personal writing that can lead to renewal and resilience. Learn more at www.storyyoutell.com.

Nancy Scherlong, LCSW-R, SEP, PTR/CJT-CM is a poetry and journal therapist, a psychodramatist, university professor and corporate wellness educator. She is the founder of Change Your Narrative, where she provides psychotherapy, coaching and poetry/journal therapy training. Nancy is Past President of the International Federation for Biblio-Poetry Therapy (IFBPT) and is core faculty at the Therapeutic Writing Institute (Center for Journal Therapy). She has contributed chapters to many publications and was the wellness contributor for Journal Therapy for Overcoming Burnout by Kathleen Adams. In 2026 Nancy will release two poetry chapbooks, The Exchange and Yesterday’s Coffee.

Writing to Awaken is an inspirational investigation of the self through expressive writing, guiding you along the path of awakening through radical truth-telling and self-inquiry. With targeted and revelatory questions, you’ll be prompted to explore your own personal narrative—to write honestly about your deepest wounds, greatest challenges, hidden gifts, yearnings, and opportunities for growth—in order to discover a deeply authentic understanding of yourself and move toward a more liberated, truthful life.

Mark Matousek is an award-winning author, teacher, and speaker whose work explores personal transformation through writing and self-inquiry. He has written eight books, including the international bestseller Sex Death Enlightenment and Writing to Awaken, and his essays have appeared in The New Yorker, O: The Oprah Magazine, and Psychology Today. A former senior editor at Interview magazine, Mark brings decades of experience in memoir, journalism, and spiritual inquiry to his teaching. He leads workshops worldwide and is the founder of The Seekers Forum, an online community dedicated to conscious living.

Deborah Ross is a Certified Journal Therapist. She retired from private practice psychotherapy and refired into teaching journaling in healthcare, meditation and community based programs. A core faculty member and supervisor at the Therapeutic Writing Institute, Deborah is the co-author with Kathleen Adams of, Your Brain on Ink: Neuroplasticity and the Journal Ladder (2016, 2nd ed. out 2026) and was the neuroplasticity conributor to Adams' Journal Therapy for Overcoming Burnout. (2022). A keynote speaker at the Brain Injury Services conference, she is a featured presenter at the annual Expressive Arts Summit.

In this workshop you will discover both how mindfulness is naturally part of journaling and how mindfulness can be purposefully developed in your journal. We will define mindfulness clearly and practice ways different capacities for awareness grow through writing techniques. Some exercises help focus particular consciousness states, and some writing techniques are designed to remove obstructions to inspiration, such as self-judgment and obsessiveness. No power is more important in our times than holding an accepting awareness, and your journal is a base for building and refining attunement to the present.

Life hangs on a narrative thread, a braid of stories that define who we are, what the world is like, and how we make our way. Words are how we think: stories are how we link. Story is how we make meaning out of life’s raw experiences and this personal narrative is the foundation for resilience and engagement in these times. As we “stand in our own stories” we discover how to withstand/stand with the larger story. Christina will work participants through her innovative tool: The levels of story, and illustrate how the facility to move from one level to another allows us to maintain equilibrium and help others around us stay in connection.

Author Christina Baldwin is a pioneer in the field of personal writing, a decades-long teacher of journal and story. Her titles related to this work are: One to One, Life’s Companion, The Seven Whispers, and Storycatcher. For 25 years she taught the skills of circle practice across North America and around the world. Her titles related to this work are: Calling the Circle and The Circle Way. In 2024 her debut novel, The Beekeeper’s Question, Love and Honey, War and Reckoning, a Novel of WWII, was published and she is deep into the ongoing love work of book promotion. She continues to contribute to her bodies of work through online presence and personal appearances, blogging, and community service. She lives on an island north of Seattle with author/educator, Ann Linnea.

Jamie Pennebaker is Professor Emeritus of Psychology at the University of Texas at Austin. He is known for his discovery of expressive writing and and its links to health. More recently, he has pioneered ways to study people’s personalities and behaviors through the analysis of their language use. His text analysis program LIWC is used across disciplines. Author of over 300 scientific articles and 8 books, his research has affected our understanding and treatment of mental and physical health of people dealing with upheavals in their lives.

The diary devices in The New Diary can be shuffled and arranged to create a workshop on anything! In this workshop we will play "five easy pieces," exercises, to move from feeling stuck, afraid or resentful about a problem to seeing it as the next step in your life plan. The devices are orchestrated to combine knowledge from your feelings, intuition, intellect and judgment to approach the future. Our goal is to move from acceptance of the Problem to a Plan for addressing it, even if that amounts to only an internal movement in perspective. At the same time, you might go as big as you want with this workshop – visualizing a path for your gifts in re-making our broken world.

Tristine Rainer has been a pioneer in the fields of journal writing, memoir and women-focused television movies. In 1978 she published The New Diary that envisioned journal writing evolving into the dynamic field of study it has become. In 1997, she published Your Life as Story that shares the secrets of story structure and narrative craft for memoir writers. She has coached dozens of memoir authors to successful commercial publication. In 2017 she published her own autobiographic novel Apprenticed to Venus about her relationship with famed diarist Anais Nin, circling back to where her passion for diary writing began. Tristine now lives in Carpinteria, CA, a small surfer town south of Santa Barbara.

Kay Adams is one of the most respected voices in the field of therapeutic writing. A psychotherapist, bestselling author, and educator, Kay has dedicated her career to exploring and teaching the power of writing for healing, growth, and change. She is the founder of the Center for Journal Therapy and its professiosnal training division, the Therapeutic Writing Institute, where she has trained hundreds of practitioners through a curriculum that blends psychological and emotional depth with practical tools for building a career. Kay has authored or edited 14 books, including the widely acclaimed Journal to the Self and the textbook, Expressive Writing: Foundations of Practice. Known for creating deep and connecting spaces, Kay brings a rare combination of visionary leadership and grounded expertise. As the planner and closing presenter of this event, she brings it all full circle—with heart, wisdom, and now 40 years of experience guiding the way.

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