Cathy Rentzenbrink

As the year winds down, I’m offering three workshops that sit a little outside the usual markers and are a little different. I envisage these as reflective sessions focused on using writing as a way to explore and steady ourselves. I’ll offer ways of thinking, prompts, and short exercises. We’ll write together, but we keep the writing private. And although these workshops are reflective, they’re not bleak: I fully expect we’ll have some fun and probably a laugh or two along the way.

You’re very welcome to come to one, two, or all three.

We will be recording these sessions and will send out the recording afterwards to everyone.

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2. Writing at the Winter Solstice: Letting Go and Welcoming Light

Sunday 21 December, 2pm–5pm (UK time)

In recent years I’ve found myself instinctively turning away from the imperatives of the social and commercial calendar, and paying more attention to ancient, quieter rhythms of time. The winter solstice has become a day I cherish. It’s the shortest day, but also the point at which things begin to brighten again.

This workshop is an invitation to mark that hinge in the year. We’ll look at what we’re ready to lay down and what we might want to welcome as the days lengthen. Nothing particularly mystical or elaborate, just an afternoon where we gently opt out from the pressures of the 21^st century and seek to connect with something more fundamental. All with the comfort that the days are lengthening from here.

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3. A Gentle New Year’s Eve: Say goodbye and gently wave hello 

Wednesday 31 December, 2pm–5pm (UK time)

I stopped drinking alcohol in 2017 – hurry! – and have always found New Year’s Eve the hardest night of the year to be sober as the whole world seems keen to thrust a glass into your hand. Funnily enough, I didn’t like it when I was a drinker, either, as the weight of expectation was impressive.

This workshop is an alternative. You don’t have to be sober to come, but it will be a sober-friendly space: quiet, steady, and free from the fizz-and-confetti energy that so often leaves people feeling worse rather than better. We’ll use writing to release the old year and make a gentle hello to the new one. We’ll create a bit of room inside ourselves so the new year can approach without us bracing against it.

If you’d like to softly cross into 2026 with a bit more ease and a bit less noise, do join me.

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And then in 2026 we’ll be meeting for monthly Sunday Sessions, detail here. I’m very much enjoying writing the cards to go with these. You can request Christmas or non-Christmas when you order.

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