Lapidus Events

“There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that’s your own self.” Aldous Huxley

Writing Coffee and Conversation—a welcoming event for anyone interested in self-reflective writing, journaling, poetry and creativity in all its forms.

Our focus is on self-discovery and self-improvement.

We meet at selected bespoke cafés and places of interest across London, using these inspiring venues as a jumping-off point for our writing.

We will meet at Tate Britain in May and write in response to selected paintings from 1500’s – 1800’s. The Tate Britain is the national gallery of British and International modern art. The main British collection spanning The Renaissance age through to the present day remains at the Millbank.

You don’t need to worry about spelling, grammar, style, or having any background in expressive writing. Just bring your curiosity and willingness to connect, reflect and experiment with words in a friendly and supportive environment.

About the Facilitator:

Charmaine Pollard is an experienced Certified Poetry Therapist, Counsellor and Coach with a passion for leading writing for wellbeing workshops with a particular focus on confidence and resilience. Her fusion of contemporary coaching with poetry therapy techniques have helped people from all walks of life, find self- compassion, contentment and success.

She is author of Writing for Resilience, a workbook designed to improve your resilience and well-being through poetry and expressive writing.

“In a dark time, the eye begins to see …” Theodore Roethke
Let this poem be a hand upon your shoulder, consists of workshops that can help you explore feelings, and build your resilience as you connect with others in these challenging times.

The theme for the workshops was inspired by a poem written by Deborah Cooper.

The workshops will take place online, in a closed group on Zoom.

We will use carefully selected poems as a springboard for writing, reflection and conversations.

The workshops are for anyone who wants additional resources, in these unsettling times. It is for those who enjoy creativity, journalling, writing for personal or professional development.

No prior knowledge of poetry or expressive writing is required; you simply need to be willing to share, reflect and experiment with words in a supportive environment.

Charmaine Pollard is an experienced Certified Poetry Therapist, Counsellor and Coach with a passion for leading writing for wellbeing workshops with a particular focus on confidence and resilience. Her fusion of contemporary coaching with poetry therapy techniques have helped people from all walks of life, find self- compassion, contentment and success.

Charmaine Pollard has written an inspirational work book Writing for Resilience. You can find the book here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0942FWMN8

Take time to pause and create – giving voice to parts of yourself that often get overlooked, and building self-trust in yourself and your creative process.

Sessions work at your pace – with multiple ways in through writing, image, sound, and movement. There is also the option to include Emotional Freedom Technique and guided visualisations.

Nurturing and shaped entirely around your needs and interests.
Currently available fortnightly on Tuesday mornings, or weekly on Thursdays and Fridays – online via Zoom.

In this 60-minute reflective writing workshop, we explore how personal experience — especially experiences of loss, transition, and emotional strain — can be approached through metaphor.

Rather than writing directly about “what happened,” participants will experiment with writing around their experience: through objects, spaces, textures, and embodied imagery.”
This is a reflective group workshop facilitated by Dr. Ananya Mahapatra (M.D Psychiatry).

Event details:
Online Via GoogleMeet
Date: June 7th 2026
Time: 2:30 pm – 3:30 pm (BST) / 7:00 pm – 8:00 pm (IST)

Ananya is a psychiatrist from New Delhi and a writer. Her interest lies in exploration of the inner life through therapeutic reading and writing practices. Her short fiction and creative non-fiction have appeared in numerous anthologies and magazines, including Readomania, Kitaab International, USAWA Literary Magazine, Quillmark Magazine, The Best Asian Short Stories 2018, the Bristol Short Story Prize 2022, The Deodar Literary Prize 2024, and The Hemlock Magazine.

A friendly and supportive online space to explore, create and express yourself through words.

This is a pressure-free creative space where we use poetry, prose and images to explore, create and express the self through writing, sharing (always optional) and reflecting. No experience of writing or poetry is needed.

Join us in using creative writing to explore our relationships to local rivers, at this time of ecological crisis.

In this series of 4 online workshops, participants will be invited to focus on a river of their choice and to spend time with their river in between sessions. Using playful prompts, we will weave our riverly discoveries into our words, writing to and from the perspective of our chosen rivers.

We will meet weekly on zoom, between 6 and 8 pm, on the following evenings:

Monday 8th June
Monday 15th June
Monday 22nd June
Monday 29th June

All writing levels are very welcome. There will be opportunities to share your work in the group but there is no obligation to do so. The emphasis in these workshops is not to perfect our writing practice but to use writing as a tool for expression and curiosity.

Places are limited to 8 participants. To ensure group cohesion, please be clear you are able to make all 4 session dates before purchasing a ticket.

Tickets are offered on a donation basis at a suggested value of £30 in total for all sessions. All donations will go directly to the Totnes Climate Hub.

If you have any questions please email Tamzin at hello@apple-barn.com

Tamzin is a writer and gentle activist, and she holds an MSc in Creative Writing for Therapeutic Purposes. She is passionate about using writing as a way of being present to our ecosphere.

‘The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and the realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction’ – Rachel Carson

Take a mindful pause in your week and join us for Write Here, Right Now — a calm, supportive online space for Lapidus members to come together and write.

Hosted once a month on a Wednesday lunchtime, this hour-long session offers a simple structure: a warm welcome from a Lapidus facilitator, a chance to briefly connect with fellow members, and then uninterrupted self-directed writing time. Whether you’re journalling, reflecting, or working on a creative project, writing in the quiet company of others can bring focus, motivation, and a sense of shared purpose.

We meet on Zoom. No pressure, no prompts — just you, your words, and a community that understands the power of writing for wellbeing.

Event details

This edition of Write Here, Right Now takes place on Wednesday 17th June 2026, from 1pm –2pm BST (UK time).

The facilitator will be Kate Poll.

Please send any questions ahead of the event to membership@lapidus.org.uk (responses on Tuesdays & Fridays).

Joining the event

There is no need to reserve your space — simply turn up on the day using the Zoom link below:

Joining link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83527292998

Meeting ID: 835 2729 2998

Join the monthly Weekend Reset: a 90-minute Writing for Wellbeing workshop.

During the Weekend Reset, you will experience:
• a guided visualisation, mindfulness or breathing exercise to help you settle and centre
• therapeutic creative writing exercises and prompts designed to support your well-being
• spacious moments for reflection, discussion and optional sharing
• how writing can gently unlock insight and self‑connection

So why not join the Weekend Reset in The Wellness Writing Room, to pause, reflect and reconnect with yourself, as well as connecting with others?

About the founder of The Wellness Writing Room
I’m Fi Humphries MSc and I am a Creative Writing Therapeutic Practitioner. After completing my MSc in Creative Writing for Therapeutic Purposes with the Metanoia Institute, I founded The Wellness Writing Room to facilitate workshops using creative writing as a self-care tool for reflection and renewal. For more details of what I do, please visit my website at www.thewellnesswritingroom.co.uk.

Summering Writing Circle, a gathering for those drawn to life at full bloom and full burn. What is ripening in you this summer? Together we’ll explore the season’s full spectrum: its blazing energy and its long, liquid evenings, the vibrancy of living at full capacity, the heat that purges what no longer serves us, and the cool water that washes us clean. Come write from the harvest of your inner life.

This circle opens on the Summer Solstice and closes at Lammas/Lughnasadh (the ancient festival of first harvest), honouring the arc of the estivation season from its most luminous peak to its first, golden turn toward autumn. Along the way, we’ll write into the themes that summer holds: ripening and burning, letting go and gathering in, the full blaze of colour and brightness, and the quieter wisdom of harvest, of taking stock, drawing in, and beginning to look toward what comes next.
The circle gathers twice in live sessions: on 28th June and 1st August (90 minutes each, online), with a slow, nourishing exploration winding between the two through email prompts and a shared Signal/WhatsApp group.

This in-between space is an invitation to write at your own pace, in your own time, held gently by the group.
No prior writing experience is needed, only a willingness to sit with the season and see what it stirs.

About the Facilitator

María Ortega García is a Poetry Therapy Practitioner and therapeutic writing facilitator based between the South East of Ireland and the North of Spain. Working at the intersection of language, creativity, and healing, she brings a trauma-informed, feminist lens to her practice, drawing on poetry, personal narrative, and expressive writing to support self-expression, identity, and transformation.
María works with individuals and groups to create spaces where words can soften what aches, restore connection, and open new ways of understanding the self. Her approach is holistic and culturally responsive, rooted in the belief that authentic voice is a vital force for healing, both personal and collective.
The Summering Writing Circle reflects her deep interest in seasonal rhythms, embodied experience, and the generative power of writing through life’s transitions.
Find out more at mariaortegagarcia.com

Tuesday evenings, 7-9 pm UK time (BST) – 2nd-23rd June

Compassion Journalling uses two-pen dialogue, visual mapping, poetry, and mindfulness to help you develop a genuine relationship with your own compassionate voice – not as a performance of self-care, but as a felt, creative resource.

Drawing from Compassion Focused Therapy and self-compassion research, this four-week course offers practical tools for responding to yourself with curiosity, care, and honesty.

What You’ll Explore
Week 1 – Foundation and attuned listening Week 2 – Developing your compassionate voice Week 3 – Fierce compassion and self-nurture Week 4 – Integration and sustaining practice

What’s Included
Four live sessions via Zoom (link sent the day before the course begins)
A 58-page Compassion Journal Companion to support your practice beyond the course
Invitation to monthly Compassion Circles for graduates

What Participants Say
“I came away feeling lighter and much more aware of the need for compassion to be present in my life – for me. I also loved writing the joint pantoum with our small and lovely group.” – Alexandra Harrington

“These sessions were the best kind of disruption I have experienced in a long time. It takes someone special to be able to hold this kind of space.” – Poonam

“The way you listen and engage with us is so warm. You’re very skilled at taking what we say, honouring our truth and adapting it to suit the rest of the group, while still honouring what each person said.” – Saskia

Not sure if this course is the right fit for you now? Get in touch – kate@self-centred.com

We are all born with a wild imagination. It is through this unlimited resource that we can access the unconscious, connect with our intuition, develop a greater degree of self-awareness and expand our sense of possibility. Fire Your Wild Imagination will be a chance to explore this vast inner superpower through the Jungian-inspired process of depth writing – a transformational practice aimed at nurturing depth of connection with self and world via the depths of the creative psyche. It will take place the beautiful cork woods of Portugal’s Alentejo region under the gentle guidance of Dr Rachel Newsome.

Who is Fire Your Wild Imagination for?
The focus of Fire Your Wild Imagination is on process, rather than outcome, and on what comes up in the writing, rather than craft. This retreat is for writers, creative & therapeutic practitioners and those on a journey of self-discovery who are curious about how writing & imagination can be used to support transformative growth and who are comfortable with diving deeper.

What will we be doing?
There will be two daily writing workshops on each of the three full days of the retreat. The morning workshops will be a chance to fire your wild imagination through attuning to your curious inner child, your sage inner guide and the wisdom of nature. In the afternoon you’ll have plenty free time to explore the cork woods or relax by the infinity pool. The day will finish with a reflective workshop focused on exploring your experiences of the morning session and any insights arising from it more deeply. Both sessions will include guided writing prompts as well as sharing and discussion.

A note about care
Throughout the retreat you’ll be invited to take responsibility for your experience by taking from the material what you need and working with it at a level that feels right for you. You’ll also be invited to practice CARE – confidentiality, attention, respect & empathy – with others. For those who have a writing or other creative practice, depth-writing can be used as an adjacent activity to support, deepen and expand your projects. Wherever you are at, this retreat is a chance to fire the creative, healing superpower of the wild imagination which courses through all of us.

Cost (includes accommodation, vegetarian meals & writing workshops)
Luxury room single use: 1,000 Euros
Luxury room sharing: 850 Euros pp
Budget room single use: 650 Euros
Budget room sharing: 550 Euros pp
Deposit: 150 Euros
*The deposit is refundable up to May 1st 2026. Outstanding payments are due by July 31st 2026.

Getting there by plane: The nearest airport to Monte da Japonica is Lisbon. A pick can be arranged from the airport direct to Monte da Japonica for 50 Euros per person. Alternatively, you can get the bus to the nearest town of Redondo or a train to the nearest city of Evora. There is a small charge for a pick up from Evora. Pick up from Redondo is free.

About Dr Rachel Newsome
I’m a writer, speaker & creative guide with Jungian arts-based PhD in writing-as-inner-work. I have a background in both the media and academia and now run a programme of depth writing courses and workshops throughout the year aimed at nurturing depth of connection with our deep creative self. I’m a Seed Talks expert speaker, serve on the Editorial Team of the London Arts-Based Research Centre and am co-Editor of forthcoming Routledge publication The Creative Psyche: Between Self & Spirit. I write about my travels between worlds on my Substack, Dreaming Awake. And, as you can probably tell, I love to dive deep.

https://rachelnewsome.co.uk/
https://drrachelnewsome.substack.com/