How and Why to Start a Writing Group

Living in a very small corner of Colorado, I often yearn for the life I knew in the city - mostly, a single part of that life: the ability to connect with other writers. Being part of a writing group or author's club gives you the chance to use your writing skills individually and together as a team, stretching your skills and constantly adding fuel to your inspirational fire.

Writing clubs get groups of people together to share their written works and to inspire each other to continue writing. On the surface, this can sound tedious but once you get started you will have so much fun with it that you'll look forward to the meetings.

Good writing groups also provide you with opportunities, or reasons, to write - some focus on writing for children, others on poetry, but the best groups always give you an outlet. That outlet might be monthly readings to children at a library, a self-published group book that contains hints and tips on getting published, or grand-scale projects like funding and placing poetry at bus stops. Your experiences in your club can be inspiring on many levels, and it's something that no one who loves writing should miss out on.

Steps to Forming a Writing Group

One of the greatest things about a writing group is that you don't need to have a lot of "tools" like some other clubs require. The main purpose of your group is to support, encourage, critique, and motivate yourself and your fellow writers.

If you don't have a writing group in your area, or you have ideas for something that is truly unique and can't be provided by the current groups out there, you can form your own writing group and invest in your creativity. The steps you'll need to take are pretty straightforward:

Step One: Planning - First, you need to decide what your group will focus on. There are plenty of groups out there that go general and say "We focus on writing, period." but it can give rise to a lot of problems. Besides, if you're simply interested in a writing group for the sake of a writing group, you would probably do much better joining one that is currently established.