Unleash Your Story
Welcome you wondrous creature. You with your story caught in your throat, on the edge of your lips, tingling your fingertips into sharper prints. You who knows words=medicine. You who can’t wait a moment longer to use and loose your voice—that wild, astonishing music that belongs to you alone. May you and your story find sanctuary here.
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Affirmation Station
Rhonda Abdurahman
Jen, I adore you. Plain and simple. You find the words that are lost in space and in my heart when I can't find them. You ask the best questions and I LOVE your writing prompts.
I came to the Story Watch Retreat because I knew there were some words that needed to be teased out and nourished. That is exactly what I got, plus your undivided attention and love. You make it easy to tell the story or sentences that want to come out because of your playful heart and the generosity that oozes out of you.
From the Blog: Story Water

Studies in Silence #1: Listening isn’t Reacting.
I’m studying silence right now, or maybe it’s studying me. Schooling me. Honing me. Regardless, I’m paying attention to silence. How I crave it. How I loathe it. What fear it can hold. What balm it … [Read More]

Vinegar and Frosting Don’t Mix
So I made this cake last Sunday to share with the Joy Search Party gathering in my apartment on Monday. It was a white cake with chocolate chips, and the first thing I’d baked since the car accident I … [Read More]

All the Way Here
As an aside, I mentioned the little toe on my right foot to Amy, my ND, at our appointment two weeks ago. She was about to do cranial sacral work on me, and I’d shared what seemed pertinent within my … [Read More]
About Jen
Jen Violi is the author of Putting Makeup on Dead People, a BCCB Blue Ribbon Book, finalist for the Oregon Book Awards, and shortlisted for the PNBA and Oregon Spirit Awards.
As a mentor, editor, and facilitator, Jen helps writers unleash the stories they’re meant to tell, from blogs to websites to award winning books.
With advanced degrees in theology and creative writing—devoted to creating sanctuary for stories and their humans—for twenty years Jen has facilitated retreats and workshops and mentored and nurtured hundreds of writers as they find their voices, hone their manuscripts, and take creative leaps and plunges.
Jen is a columnist and regular contributor for Sweatpants & Coffee and has been a featured presenter at The Louisiana Book Festival, Wordstock, the Antioch Writers’ Workshop, A Frock-alicious Life is Calling, and the Saints & Sinners Literary Festival.[ Read More ]