I’ve been teaching Creative Writing for Social Work at the University of Iowa School of Social Work since 1999, exploring the use of creative writing as a tool for personal transformation and social activism. Writing offers us a way to make sense of what happens in our lives, and it can help us to imagine … Continue reading Journal Writing Workshop for Caregivers
words on words
cli-fi – creative writing with a mission
Writers Workshop: Saving the World One Word at a Time; Writing Cli-Fi

Sierra Writers Conference Feb 10-12 - Stories that Matter; (Re)Imagining Past and Future
Writing Magic in Minutes
Our most creative and original writing is often spontaneous and intuitive. Responding to writing prompts within a limited time frame can help you to write without over-thinking. This is why I offer fifteen minute writing prompts in workshops and classes.
Writing to Heal
We are the stories we tell ourselves. Image by Sabine Van Erp The stories we live become the stories we tell, and the stories we tell become the stories we live. What stories do you tell yourself? Are they reinforcing beliefs that no longer serve you? Writing can help us to heal by transforming the … Continue reading Writing to Heal
Write Now
We create the stories we live by, and live by the stories we create. We can’t change the past, but we can transform its influence on us with creative writing. It turns out, writing can have side effects. Happiness is complicated. Write to heal. Find out more at http://www.ellenszabo.com
Love and Apocalypse – Externalize Your Inner Apocalypse with Creative Writing
Available on Amazon. This book is for anyone who wants to use creative writing to feel better by externalizing their inner apocalypse. Using 25 writing prompts with evocative photographs, readers are encouraged to make meaning of their life experiences by discovering, emphasizing and illuminating changed perspectives. Every character and every story we write, is autobiographical. … Continue reading Love and Apocalypse – Externalize Your Inner Apocalypse with Creative Writing
taking leave
How and why we take our leave from a place can define who we become - and it can make us unreliable narrators of our own lives. ebszabo Write the character who has lived here, beginning with the moment they walk away. Capture the ways in which memory (back-story) is influenced by their reason for leaving, … Continue reading taking leave
co·nun·drum
In great story, the beginning starts in the middle, and the ending is in the beginning. ebszabo Writing Prompt: Demonstrate this truth, with a story from this photograph.
frozen
A metaphor is an implied comparison between two things that are unlike each other but have something in common. When used with restraint, metaphor is an economical way of conveying depth and complexity without ‘telling’ your reader what to think. Think about how an eggshell conveys fragility, an icicle conveys chill, or a shredder conveys … Continue reading frozen