Make THis the year you transform your writing
Writing Mentorship: A Yearlong Intensive Program with Nadia Colburn, Ph.D.
Write your book.
Heal your story.
Integrate writing into your life.
Claim your full creative voice.
welcome!
Join a small group of writers with personalized support from me.
This is a one-of-a kind program!
This writing mentorship program brings together the best of one-on-one coaching, so that you get personalized support and lots of editorial feedback, with the best of group teaching and coaching, so that you have a cohort of other writers to learn from and with and a supportive community of peers to grow and enjoy the writing process with!
Like all of my teachings, this year-long program will...
✦ Integrate keen intellectual and editorial guidance with holistic practices including meditation, mindfulness, embodied practices, and more.
✦ Look at both craft and process, at writing as art and spiritual exploration, so that you grow both as a writer and person.
✦ Encourage you to write–and finish–pieces that you love, and to approach your writing from a place of wholeness and integrated vision.
If you have a book you’ve been dreaming of, this is the time to write it!
If you have an idea that wants time and attention, this is the time to lovingly give it that attention.
In this program, with support, you will set your own goals, get lots of coaching, heal your story, write your best work, learn how to integrate your writing into your life and professional offerings, find a new inspiring community of other writers to make long term connections with, determine the best way to publish and share your work for your own personal goals, and achieve a new level of spirituality and fulfillment.
I absolutely love the work I do with my one-on-one clients and love the relationships I develop with them and the growth they have in our work together. People in this program will be my only one-on-one clients this year (with the possible exception of writers who have already published several books).
I’ve been coaching and teaching writing for 25 years, and this is the method that I believe is the most effective way for writers to make real progress on their work, bringing together that one-on-one work with a group component.
Think of it as a writing mentorship—a close-knit community, coaching, editing, and birthing process—all in one. :)
An Intimate Writing Mentorship Experience
The program will be intimate and unlike other writing programs!
Participation in the program will be by informal application, so that I can be sure it’s a good fit for you—and that the cohort is a good fit for one another. There will also be time to meet with me before making a decision.
It’s an honor to know you, and I look forward to supporting your writing—either in this program or in other ways.
One-on-One Writing Mentorship and Coaching
The word, “coach,” comes from a Hungarian town that made high-quality carriages. In the early 19th century, the word started to be used for tutors at Oxford, who would help “transport” their students from one place to another through personalized learning.
Unlike the standard American education system, where students all take the same classes, read the same books, and are taught in groups, at Oxford and Cambridge, students have tutors or coaches who help guide students, often through self-led learning.
In my coaching, I work with students to set their own goals, based on their interests and specific needs, establish their own reading lists, and come up with their own schedule. You’ll get lots of accountability, and I will be there every step of the way for your writing project–from development through completion.
I’ll be there reading your pages, working with you on big picture ideas and structure, going behind the scenes with you to excavate the issues in your life that your writing is touching on, helping you integrate writing into your life, offering you support and accountability, and more!
In my group courses, I encourage students to develop a relationship with their own voice so that they don’t depend on constant feedback from a teacher. But at a certain point, even as you develop and deepen that relationship with yourself, it can be essential to have an outside reader whom you trust who can help you build a larger project and offer specific feedback on how your writing is working on the page.
It can also be essential to healing to have the witness of a skilled, compassionate coach who can help you get through and process the difficult parts of your story so that you are not alone with them.
All writers need readers and editors (I also work with a writing coach). We all get to that point where we need a trusted eye and ear on our work–and sometimes a trusted shoulder to lean on when self-doubts arise.
A writing coach is there to bolster both your skills and your morale. I will have your back every step of the way, be your biggest cheerleader, offer constructive feedback, push you to grow, and celebrate you!
Kathy Goldblatt · Author of Our Ghosts Wait Patiently and Psychotherapist. RI
When I first met Nadia, I had little trust in my ability as a writer. Through our time together, I’ve grown in confidence and can see how much my creative writing has developed. Nadia has a great editorial eye and ear, and I can see how working with her, I’ve developed my own inner ear. Because of our work together, I’ve written a whole collection of poetry that I’m proud of and is now published, something I never could have done on my own. I’ve gone from being a novice to having poetry be at the center of my life.
Group support
In my work as a writer and teacher, I’ve seen both for myself and for my students how transformative it can be to have a group of inspiring peers.
We also know that people take on new habits and change the most when they are surrounded by a community of people who are growing and changing in similar ways.
As members of this community, you will learn from and encourage one another, and be part of a common, collective endeavor, even as you focus on your own individual goals.
→ In addition to our one-on-one coaching each month (with breaks for two catch-up months each year), we will gather as a community to go over common themes, struggles, and successes that members are experiencing.
In my teaching, I’ve seen the same challenges come up again and again–in our group coaching, I’ll offer resources that will be helpful for these common issues. Being in a community of peers and watching others work through issues is also itself a wonderful learning tool.
It’s often easier to understand and get over blocks when we see them in other students; group coaching is a place to develop more perspective and compassion for our own challenges in our writing–and to cultivate strong, trusting relationships with other writers.
→ Group coaching will be a time when I offer group resources, meditations, and embodied practices. In these monthly meetings, we’ll also take time for discussions, small group connection, and much more.
→ There will also be a private, members-only online space where the small cohort of writers in this community can connect, share resources, and inspire one another, so that you have continued support throughout the weeks and months of the program.
→ We’ll also have a library of recordings of group coaching sessions, clips from individual coaching sessions, and more resources to guide and support you.
→ Unlike other intensive writing programs, you will not be required to do extensive sharing of your work with other members, nor will you be expected to do extensive reading of other members’ work.
I’ve found that feedback on student writing in traditional workshops can often be as confusing as it is helpful, and students usually end up focusing on other students' work more than their own.
In this intensive program, sharing of writing between students will happen, but in minimal, highly thoughtful ways so that everyone benefits from that sharing and so you have more time to focus on your own growth while also benefiting from the community!
Writing Mentorship Program Structure
The program is a one-year commitment with monthly one-on-one coaching sessions and monthly group coaching, teaching, and activities.
Unlike MFA programs, which often have narrow, standardized approaches to writing and prioritize reading and commenting on others' work, this program offers a holistic approach, personalized support, and deep dives into each participant's own project.
Louise Dunlap, Ph.D. · Author of Inherited Silence: Listening to the Land, Healing the Colonizer Mind
I came to Nadia with a book manuscript I’d worked on for ten years and revised twice. I needed a firm opinion of the whole that I could trust. Though I’d taught writing myself for many years, this book was a new direction for me—about my family’s history rooted in colonialism and climate change. I was trying to sort out the trauma that keeps people like us quiet about white supremacy and what is happening to our earth. As I wrote, the world was waking up, and new voices arose with kindred ideas. I needed wise help about how to finish so I could get my book out into the mix.
Working with Nadia was a pleasure. She understood my needs, read the manuscript quickly, sent me her notes, and we spoke on zoom about it. Her feedback helped me see small and larger things I could do to make the text more readable. I was able to revise and send my manuscript off at the end of the year, and the book is now published. I appreciated Nadia’s blend of experiences, her wisdom, and her professionalism. I will highly recommend her to other writers at various stages in their writing process.
One-on-One Coaching and Editorial Feedback
✦ Participants will have 9 one-on-one coaching sessions with me.
✦ Coaching sessions will be 60 minutes long; participants will send up to 20 pages of writing for feedback so that I am accompanying you every step of the way in your writing process.
✦ Feedback will be tailored to the appropriate stage of the project, with developmental feedback, close readings, line edits, etc.
✦ Coaching sessions will also cover the writing process. I bring to each session decades of experience both as an editor and teacher of writing and also as a life coach and meditator. My one-on-one coaching will guide participants to write their best, most authentic and powerful work and feel good about the creative process.
✦ Writing often brings up deep life issues and old limitations and wounds. Our time together, both in our one-on-one coaching and in the group coaching, will be an opportunity to work through those parts of yourself and come into greater healing, fullness, presence, and power.
✦ Participants will be given personalized homework and action steps, which include writing prompts and ideas, reading picked just for you, journaling, and holistic practices, where appropriate.
Group Coaching and Group Activities
✦ The program includes 11 2-hour group coaching / learning / deepening sessions with a cohort of 5-8 writers. Occasionally, throughout the year, these sessions will be longer and more intensive.
✦ Participants are encouraged to join these sessions live, but they will also be recorded for convenience and so you can return to them again and again. :)
✦ Group activities will include discussions/practices on: goal setting, writing practices, embodied practices, meditation, mindset, healing and growth through writing, and skills and tips for the writing life. We may have sessions with guest speakers, too.
✦ Participants will receive personalized assignments tailored to their needs.
✦ A library of coaching videos will be provided.
✦ A private group space to connect 24/7 with other members in the group to ask questions, share resources and, when appropriate, to share work.
✦ Smaller accountability groups within the larger group.
✦ Some writers who inspire me that we might be learning from in our group coaching: Thomas Berry, Tara Brach, Lucille Clifton, Ross Gay, Annie Ernaux, Elena Ferrante, Carol Gilligan, Thich Nhat Hanh, Judith Herman, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Maxine Hong Kingston, Peter Levine, Lewis Mehl-Madrona, Alice Miller, Mary Oliver, Rainer Maria Rilke, Leo Tolstoy, Jesmyn Ward, Tara Westover, etc.
Also included:
Year-long membership in my larger community, Align: Mindful Embodied Writers Collective, is also included with this intensive program. You’ll benefit from extra community sessions – with group writing coaching and bonus inspirational lessons and writing prompts–as well as communal writing times, and the opportunity to connect and share work with an even larger community if you want.
Tuition and Payment Options
The program will be a fraction of the cost of a traditional MFA program, which can range between $20,000 and $40,000 per year.
This year-long intensive program, which offers a certificate in mindful writing and can be added to participants’ resumes, costs only $9,987 with the option to pay in installments and through affordable payment plans.
The cost for one-time editorial feedback on a manuscript is typically at least $4,000, making this intensive, ongoing program a much more effective and cost-efficient option. In this program, you’ll have my support and keen editorial eye from the beginning of the writing process to ensure the book makes sense and is well-structured, and coaching, community, and one-on-one feedback throughout the year–as well as manuscript editing!
How to apply
This is a life-changing program–a time to come into creative and personal alignment, draft (or finish) a book, or realize your full voice and creative power.
I’d love to explore whether this is the right program for you! Click the button below to apply to join the program.
If you’re interested in learning more or have questions, you’re welcome to email me at nadia@nadiacolburn.com.
Cynthia Bargar
author of Sleeping in The Dead Girl's Room
I was drawn to working with Nadia because not only is she a writer and writing coach, but she is also a yogi with a spiritual practice. Her guidance led me to a door through which my own writing and clarity about my project was waiting. Nadia’s approach is about consciousness and compassion, including self-compassion. For my creativity to flourish and my writing to flow, I need to stay tethered to these concepts, which Nadia helped me do.
Working with Nadia makes me love both the process and the product! Nadia has supported my staying focused and provided excellent editorial input so that there is, in fact, a great product: a published poetry collection that came to fruition as a result of my work with Nadia. I'm now deeply involved in the poetry world and my life is very different from when I started my work with Nadia.
About Nadia Colburn — Writing Mentor, Author, and Teacher
I’m the author of two books of poetry, The High Shelf, published in the fall of 2019 with The Word Works Press, and I Say the Sky, published in January 2024 with University Press of Kentucky and winner of the 2024 American Bookfest Book Awards for Best Poetry Book: General and Best Poetry Book: Nature.
I hold a Ph.D. in English from Columbia University, where my studies were supported by a Mellon Fellowship and a Jacob Javits Fellowship, and where I won the Bunner Prize for Best American Essay.
I also hold a B.A. from Harvard where I graduated magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa.
I’m a certified Kundalini yoga teacher and an Order of Interbeing aspirant in Thich Nhat Hanh’s Plum Village Tradition.
My poetry and creative nonfiction have been widely published in more than eighty national publications including The New Yorker, American Poetry Review, Spirituality & Health, Lion’s Roar, Truthout, Slate.com, American Scholar, Grist.org, Literary Imagination, Boston Review, Kenyon Review, Harvard Review, Yes! Magazine, Yale Review, Southwest Review, Boston Globe Magazine, Conjunctions, Colorado Review, Denver Quarterly, Women’s Studies Quarterly, LA Review of Books, Volt, Columbia: A Journal, The Sun, Appalachia, and Tiny Buddha. My writing has won numerous awards, including a PEN/NE Discovery Award in Poetry, and my essay “Listening to My Body” appears in the anthology The Anatomy of Silence: Twenty-Six Stories About All the Sh** That Gets in the Way of Speaking About Sexual Violence.
I’ve been a professor at MIT, Lesley, and Stonehill College, where I was a visiting writer, and have been a writer-in-residence at Northeastern's Center For Spirituality, Dialogue and Service. I have extensive professional editorial experience and was the Editor of the scholarly publication Auden Studies for many years and a founding editor at the spirituality and social justice magazine, Anchor.
I’ve given popular workshops and talks on such topics as creative writing, integrating the mind and body, claiming our full stories, healing and re-imagining trauma, and women’s power at The Copper Beech Institute, Grub Street, The Muse and the Marketplace, The Mass Poetry Festival, Om Namo Yoga Center, The Harvard Divinity School, Boston College, Omega Institute, and many other places.
As the founder of The Nadia Colburn Writing School, which has a community of over 30,000 mindful writers, I’ve worked with thousands of students as a writing teacher, developmental writing and book coach, and life coach. My unique approach to teaching writing brings together the best of craft and process, and integrates mind, body and spirit. My classes often bring together meditation, yoga and writing and explore how writing can be a form of both personal and social transformation.
I’m passionate about helping my students achieve their full creative potential, freedom, and empowerment. It’s my belief that craft and healing go hand in hand, that art is a human birthright and a spiritual medium, and that in today’s world, we need strong, insightful voices that can guide us forward with truth, compassion, and a greater sense of possibility and connection. It’s my great delight to help my students write their best work and unlock their full creative voice and vision.
You can learn more about my background and teaching journey on the About page.
If you’d like to explore whether this writing mentorship is right for you, click the button below to apply and I'll be in touch. If you have any questions, you’re welcome to email me at nadia@nadiacolburn.com.
“I started writing my first memoir on my healing chronic pain and after writing 70 pages, I knew I needed help. While I was looking for a writing coach, what I did not realize is that Nadia would play a significant role in my healing journey as well. She helped me get the project moving forward with some much-needed guidance. Her encouragement and calming nature allowed me to trust my natural writing instinct. She got the book off the ground and got me grounded. Her support over zoom calls allowed me to clarify thoughts, explore emotions, and share my story authentically. Her impact went well beyond the pages of my book. I am forever grateful.”
Michael J. Murray · Author of: My Pain-Body Solution; A Journey to the Other Side of Suffering
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