How to “Write What You know”
Finally! The instructions on how to implement this infamous writing advice!
When: Monday, July 27, 2026
4-5:30 pm Mountain, 6-7:30 pm Eastern
Where: Live 90-minute workshop on Zoom
What: The Unmentionables Lab, hosted by Juliane Bergmann, and guest expert, author Emily Gindlesparger, are teaching a workshop on how to actually “write what you know” - an infamous piece of writing advice that rarely comes with instructions on how to practice it.
Two problems we consistently run into (as do most of our writer friends), are figuring out how to access this (often deeply buried) inner knowledge and then how to express it with courage and integrity in the face of potential backlash from friends, family, and the public.
Scroll down for details on the class content.
This workshop will not be recorded. The class includes an optional sharing portion, and we feel that the group is better served by holding the space for each other live, without having their words recorded.
Please bring a journal and a favorite pen so you can write by hand instead of typing.
Cost: $47
Note: If you have an annual Sparkler membership, you get one class a year for free. You also receive early access and priority acceptance for any classes and workshops. Email Juliane at [email protected] with the subject line “Emily” to claim your spot.
Hi,
I’m Juliane
I started the Unmentionables Writing Community and am a bestselling ghostwriter and editor for non-fiction books published by Simon & Schuster, Macmillan, and Penguin Random House. I've worked with Navy SEALs, Apple Executives, and Ironman athletes. I freelance for HuffPost, Wired, Insider, and The Rumpus.
EMILY GINDLESPARGER
Guest Expert
Emily Gindlesparger is the author of the memoir Please Make Me Love Me and a bestselling ghostwriter, editor, and book coach.
She's coached over four hundred authors in writing, editing, and publishing their life's work, spanning psychology, sex ed, entrepreneurship, psychedelics, finance, and futurism. She knows the fears, joys, and struggles of “writing what you know” because she's walked this path herself and alongside hundreds of clients. In this class, she will pass on her decades of experience and knowledge.
You can find Emily out biking and hiking in Tucson, alone or with her partner and dog, playing the piano or guitar and singing, and on the floor with a mess of acrylic paints.
Why this workshop?
"In the writing program I took in college, we were constantly given the advice to write what you know. These well-meaning teachers asked us to draw creativity from the deepest parts of our experience. But they left us completely to our own devices to discover how we could know what we know, and how we could get brave enough to share these deepest, most vulnerable parts of ourselves with the world.
I believed those skills to mine our history and experience for gold could not be taught—that they were innate, and you were either an artist, or you were not (in which case you should get better at math).
It would take me many years—decades, even—to discover that tapping into my inner wisdom could be taught and learned, and so could practicing the bravery to risk sharing my inner world with the outer world.
Whether you write directly about your own life or use your life as inspiration for your fiction, this 90-minute workshop will use guided meditation, breathwork, body scans, dynamic memory exploration, and journal prompts to excavate your inner knowing and bring it into your writing.
Come mine for treasure with us."
- Emily
What's Going to happen in Class?
What I know:
The first half hour of the workshop will teach you how to practice embodied writing, how to access the tangible, specific wisdom inside of you, and how to excavate it onto the page.
We will guide you through a meditation, breathwork, and a body scan to find a small knowing inside your body, ask it how it wants your body to move, and then journal on what this knowing is.
What I learned:
The second half hour of the workshop will surface a transformational moment when something inside you shifted, you learned a profound lesson, picked up or put down a belief.
We will utilize a guided meditation to access a memory with Emily's framework on exploring the fluid nature of memory, and then writing the memory through your body.
What I need to say:
The third half hour of the workshop will address the fear of being seen and witnessed, and the dread over backlash from family, friends, and the public.
We will guide you through a practice calling up a person you'd be afraid to share your words with and then write a story about what you'd say to them if you didn't care what they thought.
How to “write what you know”
$47