A Candle in the Dark
Azra and our founder, Becky’s mother - author Jane Houng - at the 2022 Rebecca Dykes Writers Memorial Workshop
This post was written by our 2022 Rebecca Dykes Writers Scholarship recipient, Azra Rahim.
The Writing to Empower Workshop offered by the Rebecca Dykes Memorial Foundation is a life defining, once in a lifetime experience.
Set in the idyllic environs of the Highlight Foundation, each participant was assigned a personal cabin - a writing sanctuary and safe cocoon all in one. There are acres to explore and hike, farm to table deliciousness at every meal accompanied by warm cookies every afternoon.
The workshop was well organized with a balance of structured lectures and presentations as well as free time. All lectures were extensively researched and presented by a diverse group of creatives. The participants were likewise a diverse group in various stages of their creative journey, some well-established in their craft, others just starting out. There was also an opportunity to schedule one on one time with established, published authors, book coaches and agents to talk shop about a work in progress.
There was morning yoga, invigorating dinner conversation and fireside hangouts to fan the flames of conviviality. One could spend as much or as little time making connections, the choice was left to each individual participant. Everyone – staff and participant alike found a community of belonging, powerful connections, and beautiful friendships during this retreat.
Given the raw potency of the topics we were holding and wrangling, the workshop built each one of us a safe container – a space free of expectations, devoid of pressure, full of dynamic conscious acceptance and inclusivity. One could share as much or as little as one wanted. Jane and the entire support team were warm and accessible. They were a supportive network of creatives that empowered us to honor ourselves, our journeys, and our rich creativity.
The most surprising aspect of my time at the retreat was the comfort I felt in the safety of the retreat. I had arrived nervous and armored. I had come prepared to deepen my craft and to write. What I had not come expecting but received was the gift of personal growth.
Gathering courage from the support of the group, I shared a fictionalized telling of my personal herstory of trauma. My legs were too shaky for me to stand for the reading and my voice cracked and waivered. I was heavily nauseated. It was the very first time I read out anything I had written. Ever. And I had never imagined I would read aloud words steeped in my pain, grief, and trauma. But I pushed through to the end. It was only relief I felt at first. The exhilaration did not set in till hours later when I was alone in my little cabin.
This seemingly mundane act of reading out aloud, brought with it an integration which I had not known was missing because I had never spoken words to my trauma before, never held accountable the perpetrator of the violence whilst I had been a child in a war zone.
Even as an adult, when I had the words and knew the labels, I remained silent - conditioned by the societal expectations of the ‘well behaved, quiet, woman’. Without conscious acknowledgement, I compressed my pain, dividing it into digestible pieces, perfectly portioned for consumption by my culture and society.
In finally speaking the truth out aloud, I liberated myself. I can empower others only by standing in my power. As a writer, I do this by having the courage to be wildly, breath takingly vulnerable and speaking words to violence, trauma, pain and grief. I willingly assume the risk of being seen as ugly, to bring a candle in the dark to someone who needs the light of my lived experience translated into black and white, on paper.
