Class Title: Grab Life by the Writing Gusto: Finding Your Life Theme Instructor: Giulietta Nardone Class Term: We are not accepting any more enrollments for Giulietta's class; the class has started. Synopsis "You will recognize your own path when you come upon it, because you will suddenly have all the energy and imagination you will ever need." —Jerry Gillies As children, we enter the world instinctively following our life theme. We spend our young days bursting with aliveness, following the scent of curiosity. Then we head off to school, where our unique life theme gradually gets replaced with a generic one. The majority of us, leave school divorced from our true selves and become adults following a path not of our choosing. Life never feels quite right to us, but we've lost the energy and imagination to question it. To make it feel right, you need to reconnect with your life theme, get back on your rightful path of purpose. Class Description During this enlightening and insightful five-week writing journey, you will strip away the layers conformity and artifice to reveal what feeds your life energy and enthusiasm. At the end of the course, students will be able to discover their life themes. Instruction will be delivered via Yahoo Group, email, and one conference call during week four. Instructor comments extensively on each student's weekly writing submission in order to coax your life theme out of its hiding place. The stories are posted on the site and sent to all students via Yahoo's automatic email process. Students will see and be able to comment on each other's work. I encourage student commenting and provide links to relevant writings and books. All reading is optional. Outline Unit 1: Familiarizing yourself with life theme. Unit 2: Returning to your childhood mission. Unit 3: Hurling off your cloak of conformity. Unit 4: Sharing your sense of life adventure. Unit 5: Introducing your life theme to the world. Student Skills, Equipment, and Time Required All writing levels welcomed. No matter how much writing you've done, you can provide other writers with valuable insights on finding life theme. Students will need access to a word processing program for the writing assignments as well as access to the Internet, an e-mail address and a phone to call in for the conference call. An attempt will be made to make the call time convenient for everyone in the class. Time Commitment: On average, students spend 1 to 3 hours per assignment. Reading assignments are encouraged but optional. Tuition/Fees for this course SCN members: $160. Non-SCN members: $200. Instructor Bio Giulietta Nardone's stories have been published in Flashquake, The Christian Science Monitor, The Boston Globe, Skirt! Magazine, Underwired Magazine, The MetroWest Daily News, Writer's Digest, Common Ties, and on NPR. She describes herself as an "inspirational rebel" whose transformative life shops enable middle-agers to take back their power, their lives, and their selves. She lives in Ashland, Massachusetts, with her husband, pinball machines, and two playful cats. Visit her website & her blog. Praise for Giulietta's Classes Writers usually need to spend more time with their choice of titles and Giulietta Nardone offers a helpful class on this neglected subject. She always gives positive, constructive feedback with lots of suggestions. I've taken three of her courses and have never been disappointed. —Betsy K., Granite City IL I couldn't believe how much I learned in such a short time (4 weeks). In that time Giulietta Nardone helped me shift my focus and discover the "Joy of Blogging." —Samantha W., Ashland MA Giulietta Nardone provided valuable and supportive input throughout the course: intructional materials, creative prompts and questions to help get our juices flowing; quality reference material, books, blogs, useful templates; helpful, honest and insightful feedback to make us better writer; and checked in regularly with students to make sure we were kept on track. Two courses taken with Giulietta have been invaluable gems for getting me in the writing spirit again. Hope to take more, as needed, in the future to keep making progress! —Teri C., Lawrenceville NJ I learned how to spice up my blog posts in Giulietta Nardone's blogging class. She inspired me to trust my own voice as she gave gentle suggestions for better writing. And now I know how to edit out those adverbs that end in -ly that weaken my prose! —Trudy E., Clarkdale AZ I would recommend Giulietta Nardone's course to any writer. Great instructor, helpful information and comments, a real challenge to inspire better writing! —Betsy K., Granite City IL Giulietta Nardone's classes are helpful and positive. She gently pushes the writer and work to dig deeper and add clarity to make the writing stronger. —Kira H., Wimberley TX This class exceeded my expectations. I feel extremely confident about my writing now and will continue taking courses from SCN and from Giulietta Nardone. —Jacki W., Falls Church VA I found it illuminating, energizing and revitalizing. It helped me to reawaken my creative muse and get the juices flowing again, heal my soul and put me in touch with some of my deeper feelings and family connections I hadn't thought about in years. Giulietta Nardone's comments and insight were enlightening and gave me more to think about. She provided good examples and additional resources for future reference. The group dynamics of openness and sharing also were helpful. —Teri C., Lawrenceville NJ If you are fearful of taking the plunge into the writing pool, start with Giulietta Nardone's Juicy Writing Class. She can help anyone crawl out from under their turtle shell and slowly walk them through writing assignments that help your writing blossom. By the time you finish the course you will not only written juicy pieces, but you will definitely feel more confident about your writing skills. I plan on taking more classes from Julie as soon as they are available. —Jacki W., Falls Church VA Giulietta Nardone is a sensitive and encouraging teacher. She helped me to see my own potential as a writer. I appreciated her thoughtful comments, insights, and suggestions. I plan to take her personal essay class which she's teaching through SCN in the Fall. —Joanne R., San Francisco CA Giulietta Nardone was a great teacher! Her lessons were clear and concise and helpful. Her assignments were, also. I learned a lot. —Narcy H., Highlands Ranch CO For those who feel hesitant about blogging, Giulietta Nardone offers a tremendous amount of helpful materials. Her feedback on assignments is positive and encouraging, with lots of ideas and suggestions. I would highly recommend this course! —Betsy K., This class infused new life into my writing and sharpened my skills as a blogger. Giulietta Nardone brought much enthusiasm along with very useful experiences and resources about blogging to the course. She provided comments that were precise, supportive and encouraging. She also gave me lots of ideas for future posts. I really appreciated how engaged she was in my topic. —Teri R., It was a great class and helped me understand what it takes to be a blogger whom people want to follow. Giulietta Nardone was very responsive to any question & replied quickly with her comments. I would highly recommend this class & instructor. —Pat K., Giulietta Nardone gave us so much to think about, with all the additional materials and blogs to check out and ideas how to expand on what was written. I feel I will be working on this course for several more weeks as I keep on checking on all the materials she told us about. She also helped with her comments and her ideas and the guidance she gave on each assignment. Now to practice what I learned and to keep on following her suggestions given during the course. —Betsy K., Granite City IL Giulietta Nardone's comments were insightful, in depth, specific, and very helpful. The materials and additional readings were closely related to the topic, illustrative, and helpful. Definitely an easy and enjoyable way to go deeper in developing essay writing content and technique...The class was much better than online classes I have taken from a large, reputable, local community college. —Carol N., Leawood KS Very insightful and caring personality. Giulietta Nardone put a great deal of time and thought into her comments and suggestions. Found her to be helpful and encouraging. —Anne R., Berlin MA