Highlights of Our Africa Writing Retreat

Travel offers an extraordinary opportunity to transform and renew as we experience the world in all its mystery and beauty. Join other women writers as we travel to Africa, a place rich in history, unrivaled scenery and heart-stopping wildlife adventure.

"Transformation Through Words, Wisdom and Insight", a writers retreat is planned for March 2020. This is a unique opportunity to travel an exclusive, personalized experience in Africa. I'm excited about leading this writing retreat with Sonia Marsh, a writer and Africa travel expert with Holden Safaris.

In this post you can read about more highlights of our time in Africa. And here's the first leg of our trip and the full itinerary.

Please note that the early bird special ends April 30.

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After two days absorbing the history and culture of Johannesburg, we’re off to Victoria Falls, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the largest curtain of falling water in the world.

Our scheduled flight leaves Johannesburg at 10:50 a.m., and arrives at 12:15 p.m., where we will be met and transferred to the Ilala hotel, where we can enjoy lunch and relax before our sunset evening cruise on the Zambezi river. There we’ll soak up the last rays of the African sun as we gently drift along the Zambezi River, above the Falls, with a gin and tonic or other beverage of choice and enjoy delicious appetizers and snacks. Look out for elephants, hippo, crocodile, magnificent birds and other wildlife. (Watch the video below.)

The Majestic Victoria Falls

Ilala Lodge

Victoria Falls is one of the most spectacular, awe-inspiring waterfalls on our planet. It is located on the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe, on Zambezi River. Also known as Mosi-oa-Tunya - The Smoke That Thunders. The mist from the waterfall can be seen from far away and sustains nearby rainforest. Victoria Falls is considered the largest waterfall, based on its combined width (1,708 m/5,604 ft) and height (108 m/354 ft), even though it is not the highest or the widest. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

After breakfast on March 8th, we gather for a two-hour writer’s workshop. Working off writing prompts from famous authors and poets who have visited Africa, we will write for an hour after breakfast and then share for an hour before lunch. After lunch, we will enjoy a tour of the Rainforest surrounding Victoria Falls accompanied by a qualified guide who will give a brief history of the Falls, as well as detailing the flora, fauna and other points of interest. At the lookout point along the way, we can marvel at one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World.

Shopping at Elephant Walk is right next to our beautiful Ilala lodge, and you can peruse and explore the local crafts during our spare time. Watch out for next week’s blog post where we share the wildlife excursions, and what you can expect to see in Botswana.

Critique and Going Further With Your Writing

The value of critique, as one of our writers noted on Saturday, is that it offers differing perspectives. While many offer up the same intelligent criticisms of a piece—this needs clarifying, this requires more detail or better writing—some see no need to change this or that. Others in the critique group do.

I suppose this is why creativity is an individual expression. The ultimate decision rests with the writer.

Critique leaves the writer with much to chew on and digest when it comes to revising the piece. It is up to her to pick and choose which comments best serve her purpose.

But, perhaps, the biggest challenge and benefit that comes out of a critique is when writers encourage another writer to dig deep; what Natalie Goldberg in Writing Down the Bones, calls “going further.”

“Even if you have pushed yourself and feel you’ve broken through, push yourself further…ride that wave as long as you can. Don’t stop in the middle,” Goldberg writes.

So many writers—myself included—can stop short. As Goldberg jokes, we all know the writer who proclaims,” And then I woke up!” as a way to end the story.

Whether you’re writing fiction or memoir, taking it further is both risk and reward.

How do we do go to the next level?

One way is to believe in your voice. Another is to have a strong understanding of what your story is about. Even silly entertaining novels like the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy had a strong theme and the author knew her intention and her audience. It is surprising, especially in memoir, that writers learn along the way that what they are writing is a fiasco. The original idea or intent bears no resemblance to what they learn later along the journey that the real pull of a story, the real reason they are writing, is to bear witness to something. This always comes as a surprise. I was not who I thought I was…It brings them plummeting down to earth. It required breaking out of habitual thinking and tackling a subject or a life event, or a person who deeply affected them, in a new light  and with new eyes.

We live in a weary world, too much is happening. It's easier not to threaten our "status quo" thinking. That's where curiosity kicks in and the writer begins experimenting with expression, voice, a unique way of telling her story and shedding the old preconceived notions of right and wrong, good and bad. 

If that quest, that curiosity, that willingness to break old patterns of thinking doesn't happen, the story meanders, peters out. Going further just became a threatening task, upending the "safety" of the person's habitual thinking.

Seeking out the deeper meaning that goes beyond ourselves and into the universal human journey is the creative writer's ultimate quest.

How else do we tap into our story and go further?


Relax and find a place to write that is perfect for you. Believe in yourself and your willingness to make a difference in the world with your writing. That takes courage, a leap of faith, right there.
As I sit here at the kitchen table, a gray and azure April morning sky frames the yellow and lime green forsythia and lawn. A shaft of brilliant sunshine breaks through the clouds. I feel on the brink of something new… a new story, a reflection, the next chapter in my life. And here I sit, writing away.

Of course, a writing group offers invaluable feedback on your work, as long as the feedback is honest. There is an accountability and intention to meeting with a group, setting a date to discuss your work. This is the work of our Women's Writing Circle.

How about you? How do you go about the task of "taking it one step further'?

Highlights of the Writers Retreat to Johannesburg, Victoria Falls and Botswana

Dear Writers and Travelers,

As you know our Women's Writing Circle, in coordination with Holden Safaris, is offering the trip of a lifetime—a writers retreat in Africa. 

The magic and allure of Africa have inspired many great writers from Ernest Hemingway to Isak Dinesen. But whether you journal, want to write a book, or just long to see an amazing part of the world with like-minded travelers, this trip is an opportunity to "change it up" and move out of your comfort zone in the safety and security of an expert Africa travel organization.

Our tour leader, Sonia, Marsh, an author in her own right, offers this history and some highlights of our trip.

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Upon arrival at Johannesburg airport on March 5th, our friendly staff will escort you to the Peech hotel, a boutique property with rooms spread across lush gardens. There you’ll have time to rest, freshen up, have a massage or, if you prefer, jumpstart your writing. Susan Weidener and Sonia Marsh will toast the start of our adventure together and brief you on the week’s activities, during a sumptuous dinner.

After a night of rest and recovery, we depart after breakfast with our guide for a day of exploration. We start with a tour of Soweto, an urban settlement or 'township' in South Africa, southwest of Johannesburg, with a population of approximately 1.3 million.

Soweto was created in the 1930s when the White government started separating blacks from whites. Blacks were moved away from Johannesburg, to an area separated from the white suburbs. Soweto became the largest Black city in South Africa, but until 1976 its population could have status only as temporary residents, serving as a workforce for Johannesburg. It experienced civil unrest during the Apartheid regime. There were serious riots in 1976, sparked by a ruling that Afrikaans be used in African schools. The riots were violently suppressed with 176 students killed and more than 1,000 injured. Reforms followed, but riots flared up again in 1985 and continued until the first multiracial elections were held in April 1994.

Our guide will take us to the top three sites in Johannesburg starting with the Apartheid Museum. The Apartheid Museum allows visitors to experience the racial segregation that occurred during apartheid by separating them by racial appearance classified by the width of the nose, the kinks in hair, skin pigmentation, and size of lips.

We then visit The Nelson Mandela National Museum, commonly referred to as Mandela House, where Nelson Mandela lived from 1946 to 1962. Mandela came back to the house after his release from prison in 1990, despite suggestions from government officials that he find a safer home. At a rally welcoming him home to Soweto his opening words were, "I have come home at last." However, after 11 days back at the house he moved out again.

An authentic Soweto lunch will be served at Sakumizi's restaurant located on the same street as Nelson Mandela’s house in Soweto. Another famous museum: the Hector Pieterson Museum is located two blocks away from where Hector Pieterson, a South African schoolboy, was shot and killed during the Soweto uprising.

We return to the Peech hotel to freshen up and enjoy sharing our experiences over dinner.

Next week we'll feature another highlight of this trip.

Here are all the details of our Africa retreat: http://www.susanweidener.com/p/eversince-i-was-twenty-one-years-old.html

Spring: Writing Through Life’s Transitions

As many times as I have led a group of women sharing their stories, I am always touched when the writing leads to uncovering the emotions that lie deep within the transitions of a life.

Whether it is the death of a parent, the loss of career, the marriage of a son or daughter, or becoming an “empty nester,” the writing taps into that experience and in doing so, the writer understands where she came from and, hopefully,—eventually—where she is going. The writing offers keys to the “portal”...unlocking the door to the “next chapter” with awareness and confidence.

This, of course, was the theme of my memoir Morning at Wellington Square…a woman searching for passion and renewal after the death of her husband and end of career. It is a memoir about transitions—moving out West, working in the nonprofit sector, finding new friends, until she comes to the conclusion that, ultimately, writing her memoirs and becoming a published author was the "next chapter."

Now, once again, writing leads me through another transition. This time—the woman alone. I write:

I thought of you today when I looked at my hands. The skin wrinkles like wax paper, a reminder since last I saw you of the passing of many years.

I thought of you today when I met Alex for lunch. He is your son in all ways from his gentle and kind disposition, to a man who understands the meaning of honor. If not for you, this wonderful person would not be with me; and in him, you are with me. 

I thought of you today when Daniel stood tall in our kitchen. Your son's unsparing eye for what is fair and unfair in life and love brought you home to me.

I thought of you today when the afternoon passed in a haze of sunshine. The forsythia, just last week weighed down with its burden of white, waits patiently. Now, its brown branches are tinged with the first hint of gold.

I thought of you today when spring embraces hope that someday I might see you again. I dreamed of you last night. We were young and made love. I woke up and I thought of you and where the journey ends—with you by my side.

Sometimes when we write, we choke up. Overcome with emotion, we seek, if you’re like me, that quiet space to reflect. We owe it to ourselves to shut out the distractions of the outside world. Let the pen flow, do not censor yourself, don't edit. Save the editing for later.

Sometimes, these moments of awareness that we are on the cusp of transition are read aloud in a writing group. The group’s safety and support promises this: the writer can trust in others. Why? Our journeys are often so similar. We can laugh together, reminisce and remember. Spring, after all, is a time of renewal and rebirth; the perfect season to write through life's transitions.




How about you? Can you share a transition you have written about and how you felt when you wrote it?

Women's Writing Circle : Africa Writing Retreat and Safari: March 2020

Women's Writing Circle : Africa Writing Retreat and Safari: March 2020: Ever since I was twenty-one years old and boarded a Pan Am flight to London by myself, I have been captivated by travel and what seein...

Writing Brings Contentment in Time of Despair

Most people recognize that depression has become the overwhelming “malady” of our times. Suicides are on the rise; opioid addiction poses an epidemic. What is the root cause?

Notably, the idea that nothing we have is ever enough or ever good enough. This mindset sets us up, not just for depression, despair and a pervasive sense of malcontent, but estrangement with others. We are always comparing ourselves to others, or they to us, in what amounts to a combat of competition. This creates a depressive mood in everyone.

I remember when I joined the staff of the Pulitzer Prize winning Philadelphia Inquirer. I had gotten there because my work as a reporter had been noticed. But once I got there, everyone’s work had been noticed and now, not just one of us, but all of us, were good reporters and writers. 

No matter how much you achieve, you are an underachiever. There is always going to be someone smarter than you, who writes better than you. This provides the recipe for depression and despair.

These aren’t new ideas, in fact, they’re not even my ideas, but the subject of recent talks by theologians and college professors during this Lenten season that I’ve had the privilege of hearing during what they call “this time of polarization.” Churches are focused on this moment in history—this political strife. A good thing, too, because it sets up the perfect segueway to talking about God who leads us to reconciliation and a place of unconditional love.


What does this have to do with writing? Writing allows us to forge intimacy with others—to forge relationships. By sharing our stories and the meaning of those stories, through one life, or many lives, writing puts us in service to others. A universal picture emerges over time. We experience much the same things. Our stories form a collective. We are all in this together.

This is why I’m staring a women’s writing circle at my church this week. Relationships, intimacy, sharing in the collective journey, offer antidotes to despair.

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Poets have written about despair...“winters of despair” yet with the hope of spring. In this lovely poem "Snowdrops" by Louise Gluck, which I recently used in a teaching seminar, she writes:

Do you know what I was, how I lived? You know
what despair is; then
winter should have meaning for you

I did not expect to survive,
earth suppressing me. I didn’t expect
to waken again, to feel
in damp earth my body
able to respond again, remembering
after so long how to open again
in the cold light

of earliest spring–

afraid, yes, but among you again
crying yes risk joy

in the raw wind of the new world.

"Open again in the cold light of earliest spring.” That line, what we call in the circle, a "read back line," resonates with me. It offers such hope.

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So, what is the answer to depression—to this pervasive lack of “joy” plaguing our times? (Joy is almost always intangible, at least in my mind. Happiness is probably the better word.) Contentment. Contentment with the ordinary life.

I have enough. My house is enough. My car is enough, I don’t need more possessions, more accolades, I have many wonderful reviews on Amazon and more would be nice, but I don’t need them. I don’t care if I’m traditionally published or self-published. The great thing—I have written a book/books out there for others to read.

I fell in love once and he with me. This is enough for one lifetime. I am content. I long for what I have, to quote Dante.


Writing brings us “home” to the ordinary life, to something in the here and now, not lofty or detached, but intimate and meaningful.

Home is where the windows and the doors are open. Windows let us look outside. Doors let us get out. Doors let us reenter. We have moved on and come back to the relationships, the shared vision that offers contentment. Home is not twenty-five or thirty years ago in some nostalgic mindset that has no bearing on reality. We can go back to that street where we grew up, see children playing and say to ourselves, “This is not home. I don’t feel at home in this place anymore.”

Write about that special moment of coming home. Like the Himalayan blue poppy, its bloom is beautiful, but fleeting.

As poet Mary Oliver concludes in "Such Singing in the Wild Branches":

Are there trees near you,
and does your own soul need comforting?
Quick, then––open the door and fly on your heavy feet; the song
may already be drifting away.

Criticism, Clarity and Voice Along the Writer’s Way

Whenever I hear a writer say she stopped writing because of a mean comment, a lack of encouragement, or, worse, the spiteful jealousy of another who questioned just who she thinks she is to say she is a writer, I feel her pain. It is years before she again picks up the pen, attempts to put thoughts on paper—or takes the courageous step of coming to a writer’s group to read her work aloud.


The inner child has been wounded, but, interestingly, the flame to write is never totally extinguished. It’s like breathing, something she has to do. When she does become a writer, however, there is a powerful freeing, a transformation of spirit and mind. Of saying, ‘I don’t give a damn. Let them judge. Who cares?'


In memoir, too, there is often this disclaimer from new writers. "I’m not writing this to hurt anyone." Or this: "I worry about being too preachy." There is a fine line between being 'preachy' — a fit of rage, let’s say—and clarity of thought. There is a fine line between intentionally hurting someone and writing with honesty and insight. I also remind women to ask themselves when was the last time they heard a man say he was worried about being ‘preachy’—worried about hurting someone?


I admit that even for me, a seasoned writer, I can spend hours, days, coming back to a piece, rewriting and revising, angsting over whether the lesson, the insight is clear and transcends just me and my own little world and offers something to the reader. Almost every week I blog, I submit my work for publication, am working on a new memoir. I am always writing, teaching writing, always working at my craft. Still I must ask myself: Have I avoided the rehashed reflection, the side trips that slow down the narrative, the clichés?

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The writer thinks about elevating what she writes to the “literary.” I quote Chekov, “Don’t tell me the moon is shining. Show me the glint of light on broken glass.”


We are painters, appealing to the reader’s sense of poetry and literary prose. I like to think this comes with practice and it does, but sometimes—just like prayer and just like poetry—that perfect metaphor, that turn of sparkling phrase that entices and invites the senses—appear when you least expect it, a gift, otherwise known as divine inspiration.

There are many critics out there. Some have agendas. For centuries, men were loath to cede the literary pantheon to women. Your mother might have been one of them, too, when she told you not to write. It wasn’t about your talent, it was about her not taking the risk herself to write, to seek out her voice. Taking criticism to heart is self-defeating, a sure way to kill the muse, to give up and go back to watching television or dabbling in a useless pastime.

Time spent writing is never time wasted. Sure, it’s hard. Maybe because everything we write is a conscious choice, meaning we chose this word, not that word, this phrase, not that phrase, this truth, not that truth. We write despite those who tell us it is a waste of time, caution us to be more 'circumspect', humiliate by saying it is beyond us to ascend to that lofty perch and write.

Give yourself the freedom to say things in your own way. Welcome the dialogue, the comments, the work others put into answering the writer’s questions. What is missing? Did this resonate? Listen and learn. Store, don't hoard, criticisms—good and bad—to ponder along the writer's way.

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