Shoes I’ve Worn: The Life-Changing Magic of Writing Prompts (and Community)

A recent experience of a boring writing prompt + invitation to come write with me

I still remember the glow of my white Mary Janes against the scarlet carpet. The easy shallow stairs up to the entry hall that was lit by by floor-to-ceiling windows. The way the dogwood trees outside would bloom bridal-white flowers for an entire month, their sickly sweet perfume drifting inside and mixing with the musty scent of Bibles and dust and old people. How we kids would run outside after Sunday school and pretend the fallen blossoms were snowflakes in the early, lengthening light of summer.

For me this was a safe place. So much of what I knew and loved was here. Mr. Kenny and Mrs. Anderson, who told endless Bible stories in Sunday School—the widow of Zarephath, the tree-climbing Zacchaeus—the pages of their Bibles lapping like a gentle tide as they turned.

But above all it was the stability. The stasis of this place, how it never seemed to change. How it was one of few things in my life I could count on remaining fixed.

🙤

I wrote this little passage in response to a twenty-minute writing prompt: “shoes you have worn.”

I began with the memory of my first pair of dress shoes—white, patent-leather Mary Janes that pinched my three-year-old feet in a way that felt painful but very grown up. From there, I worked outward to describe the Baptist church my family attended in my earliest years, which is where I most often wore them.

Perhaps these few paragraphs would mean little to anyone else, but to me they are nearly magical. Like stepping back in time to a place that no longer exists.

By grade school, my family had moved on from that church. It dissolved a decade or so later, and the building has since been repurposed into a mosque. No one in my current life ever went there.

Yet writing these words felt like touching something sacred—something raw and unfiltered that had long been lost inside me. The place and time in my life when I first came to know something of God’s constancy.

That’s not how it started, though. When I first saw the prompt, I inwardly rolled my eyes. Shoes I have worn? Boring. I figured I’d write about my first pair of running shoes. Or the hiking boots that fell apart at the top of a mountain in the Swiss Alps, forcing me to hike down barefoot and bloodied, but barely noticing, because I was young and HIKING IN THE SWISS FREAKING ALPS.

But as my fingers hovered over the keyboard, my mind skipped past those obvious memories, landing somewhere older, quieter, and deeper.

That, to me, is the miracle of writing prompts.

They often start out frustrating, boring, irrelevant. They spin a web of inner resistance. At first glance, they rarely seem to be beckoning you to the places you want to go as a writer.

But when you set your conscious goals aside and step into the exercise with a spirit of play and curiosity, you sometimes stumble onto exactly what you needed to write all along. It may not be a polished piece. It may not lead directly to something publishable. But it almost always brings you closer to a corner of your wise, creative self you would not have accessed otherwise.

This kind of writing is a little like athletic training: it’s not glamorous. It’s not flashy. You won’t get a medal for it. But you will build strength, endurance, and the good old fashioned stick-to-it-iveness deep creative work requires.

And it’s a whole lot easier—and more rewarding—when you do it alongside others.

People who are slogging through it just like you. People who will listen when a prompt brings forth something magical for you. People who will turn their own seemingly useless prompts into something so alive that it rekindles your wonder all over again. People who will laugh with you when a prompt flops, and delight when a new one glistens with something real.

Does any of this resonate with you?

Join us! The next round of my weekly writing circle starts this Thursday, May 1. More info here.

Just about every week of the year, I host a weekly writers’ circle for women writers of all skill levels and genres. We meet for an hour of gently energizing creative prompts—rotating between shorter and longer ones to keep things lively. Everyone adapts the prompts to their own genres: fiction, poetry, memoir, spiritual writing… But we all sit and write.

Afterwards, those who can stay a little longer share what they’ve discovered—lines they’re proud of, lessons they’re learning, what writing is teaching them lately.

We encourage one another. We applaud each other. We leave breadcrumbs behind, helping one another find the way through the wild landscape of nurturing creativity in an increasingly dizzying world.

If you’re looking for an inviting, supportive space to nourish your writing life, consider this your warm invitation.

Our next 12-week gathering begins THIS Thursday, May 1, and spots are still available!

About the writing circle

• Time: Thursdays, 10AM - 11:30 AM Eastern

• Dates: May 1 - July 24 (NO session the week of July 3 for Canada Day and US Independence Day) = 12 sessions total

• No critiques, no deadlines

• Drop-in friendly! You will receive notes on all prompts tried in the group even when you can’t make it, and there is nothing to review or fall behind on.

I take care of all the admin and gentle moderation so that all participants stay supported and in the loop. All you have to do is show up and write (and chat if you want!).

I’d love to see some fellow Substackers in the group! Check out the program page to learn more or register, or write me here with any questions.