Finish 2026 with success
Before the year draws to a close, make progress on your writing project OR writing process. Step into a welcoming space designed to expand your flow by aligning with your natural rhythm. Introducing:
Let's Write
Expand & Embrace
30 Days. 30 Ways. 30 Hours of Creative Connection.
A supportive, self-paced online course for writers of any style, genre, or experience level.
You're Invited...
Bring along the project you are working on and the intentions you have for it. I will provide a structure for you to work through the month to progress those intentions.
Let's finish 2026 strong.
Perhaps you have a story, a collection of poetry, a novel, a script or a family history waiting to find its way onto the page. But momentum is slow and lonely. Perhaps you’ve been pushing ahead but the tech-bro productivity hacks don’t consider your life; the caring responsibilities, working full-time, neurodivergence, menstrual cycles and the general ebb and flow that comes with creative practice.
This is not a place to grind.
Expand & Embrace is not about forcing your way through with raw willpower, rigid academic rules, or stressful deadlines. This course is structured with the seasons in mind, because as creatives we know that nothing blooms all year. There is joy in the darkness and energy in the rest.
...Come as you are
Expand & Embrace is a 30-day creative practice designed to help you:
Progress your current work in progress or start new work. Maybe it's 30 new poems, finishing that scripts, edits to your half finished novel or getting that family history written. You bring the project, I'll bring the motivation.
Expand your creative flow. If you've been trying to get more out of your creative time and connect with hat drives your creative flow then this is perfect.
Discover the needs of your current work in progress. Each activity can be adapted to look at the needs of your creativity OR the needs of your work.
Build a daily writing ritual that feels sustainable. I'm not a writer who writes every day. So I'm not going to tell you that you need to write every day - this is a thirty day challenge for a reason. A quick boost before the year end to get closer to those writing goals. BUT if you'd like to set some writing rituals to get writing more frequently this is a great place to start.
Make steady progress without pressure. Miss a day? Watch the replay. Miss the whole month? Watch the replay. This course is designed to highlight how our creativity ebbs and flows and shifts like the seasons so there is no way I will be hassling you for a deadline.
Finish the year feeling connected to your work again.
By the end of Expand & Embrace, you will have:
- Spent at least 30 focused hours with your writing project, whatever that might be,
- Moved through blocks without forcing or shaming yourself,
- Have a plan to move through 2027 with your writing goals,
- Reconnected with your natural creative rhythm and discovered it's seasons,
- Created new pages, fragments, scenes, poems, memories, or structural clarity,
- Learned how your creativity shifts through rest, play, momentum, and harvest,
- Shared the month with a warm global community of writers,
- Finished the year with tangible progress on a project close to your heart.
But remember, doors close soon.
The Journey
Uniquely designed by Dr Melissa Watts this journey teaches you to work with your natural creative energy in alignment with the natural world.
Over 4 weeks, we will have 30 daily activities and at the end of each activity you are encouraged to write for another hour on your project, or journal and plan your next project.
The activities are designed to journey together through the natural, cyclical flow of the seasons and their elements:
Week 1: Winter (Water) - Dormancy & Thaw:
We begin by honouring the quiet state. Rest and tapping into the sub-conscious mind plays a big part in creativity so we begin here. We acknowledge what has brought you to this point, and how to use the core values that you hold dear to expand your writing. In week one we gently thaw any creative blocks and begin on progressing our project OR examining your creative process as a whole.
Week 2: Spring (Air) - Rising Energy & New Shoots:
In week 2 we begin to move, analysing what our projects or process needs in order for it to grow, we will explore fresh ideas with light, breezy playfulness and might even discover a new approach to the project or practice.
Week 3: Summer (Fire) - Heat & Momentum:
By week 3 we are ready to stoke your creative passion, writing straight into the emotional heart of your project to build fiery volume and drive.
Week 4: Autumn (Earth) - Shed, Harvest & Root:
Here we acknowledge that the fire of summer can’t last forever and consider what we need to shed, and what we need to harvest. We finish with a plan that will keep you sustained for the following winter.
How the 30-Day Practice Unfolds
This experience is designed to fit seamlessly into your daily lifestyle, no matter where you are in the world:
Daily Inspiration: Every morning at 6:00 am AEDT, a short 15-minute video activity unlocks inside your private classroom portal. These activities are crafted to clear your mind and spark your imagination. They will allow you to reflect on a particular writing project OR your overall writing practice. If you would like to consider both you can re-watch the video.
You can access these videos at a time that suits you. I recommend trying to fit these into a time that you might like to continue writing in as part of an ongoing practice. See below for a sample activity.
60 Minutes of Writing: Once you’ve completed the activity step straight from the video into your own writing project. Spend an hour (or what suits you) letting your words unfold organically based on the morning's inspiration. You might like to come to the course with a specific project in mind, or you might like to reflect on your own writing process and use the writing time to journal on your own process.
Classroom Access: Melissa is available in the online classroom throughout the 30 days. This is a space to share your thoughts with the group, or via private message. You might like to publicly share your intentions each day, or you can keep it to yourself if you like.
Live Writes: There is an energy that rests in writing with a group. If you feel called join Melissa in an online writing session. The hours are spread throughout the month to cater for a variety of time zones. These are optional extras, please don't feel obliged to be live but replays will be available.
The Result: You will finish the 30 days with profound clarity on your creative state and at least 30 hours of actual, tangible progress toward your project. PLUS, you'll have the 30 activities that you can return to whenever you need a creativity boost.
12 months of access: At the completion of the month you can return to the classroom to re-watch the activities for 12 months.
This all sounds a bit woo-woo, arty-farty
Doesn't it? Using the seasons to map creative growth and potential is a bit out of the box. But also - pretty natural. Just as nothing grows all year, our creativity can't be on at it's fullest all the time. We need the Winters to take stock and assess. We need the Springs to generate those new shoots. We can't just keep in the maximum growth of Summer, the fire will burn us out.
I've been thinking about this course for a long time and I've been researching away and then recently I began to spend more time in nature as I began to get more frustrated with AI, Big Tech and generally how the world was being run. I thought perhaps now might be the time to share it.
So let me give you an example of what you can expect. This is not a list of writing activities downloaded from a bot. These are activities designed to get you to think about your own creative process, and also there a few movement activities as well - to get you thinking about the body too. So rather than asking you to take a character for a walk around the block, or write 500 words about what Winter means to you I will be asking you to tap into your own creative Winter and then continue on for the rest of the hour with your own project. For example:
When we sit in the dormant darkness we find an opportunity to rest and reflect. In the natural world, winter is the season of water, stillness, and deep inner reflection. On the surface, a winter landscape looks completely bare waiting for spring. But beneath the frost, a profound gathering of strength is occurring. The roots are anchoring deep into the soil. The seed is resting in the dark, building what it needs before breaking through the surface in the spring. Take a moment now to consider your own creative Winter landscape. Just as a tree doesn't grow without the right nutrients an artist doesn't exist without inspiration from others. Take a few minutes now to write down your creative influences and how they made you feel when you first discovered their music/art/film/poetry/novels. Next, consider the impact they have had on your work. Are there any similarities between the work? Next, consider what you would like to bring more of into your current work in progress OR your overall creative practice. Perhaps it's the anger of your favourite feminist poet, perhaps it's the use of silence in your favourite song. Finally, consider how you can re-connect with these works as you come towards Spring.
This is an example, but you get the idea. There will be lots of deep reflection either about your creative process, or about your work in progress - whichever you choose needs it the most.
I will also be asking you about your intentions, because this is another powerful way to expand your progress. A 2015 study by Psychology professor Dr Gail Matthews, recruited 267 participants from a wide variety of businesses, organizations, and networking groups throughout the world for a study on how goal achievement in the workplace is influenced by writing goals, committing to goal-directed actions, and accountability for those actions. Participants ranged in ages from 23 to 72 and represented a wide spectrum of backgrounds.
Dr Matthews found that more than 70 percent of the participants who sent weekly updates to a friend reported successful goal achievement (completely accomplished their goal or were more than half way there), compared to 35 percent of those who kept their goals to themselves, without writing them down. So I will be encouraging you to share your plans in this safe space because A - you will get better results (statistically speaking) and B - Sharing with other writers who understand the challenges is better than sharing with family members who have no idea.
What’s Included in Your Experience
30 Daily Activities: Deliberately designed activities to expand your creative project or process. These activities should take approximately 15 - 30 minutes. The videos are released daily at 6am to easily fit your schedule and spark your creative flow.
Opening & Closing Ceremonies (Day 1 & Day 30): These recordings will be longer than the other recordings, but they do contain activities. They are designed to help you finish strong and end strong.
Live Write Sessions (optional): For anyone interested in a live writing session these are at various times to allow for our global community. Simply log into the classroom and join the session that suits and write with a group.
A Vibrant Global Community: Connect with a supportive circle of fellow writers from all corners of the world in our private classroom chat. Share your milestones and celebrate each other's words. Melissa will be available here each day to answer questions or provide assistance if needed.
Extended 12 month Access: Because creativity can’t be rushed, you can access the videos anytime that suits your schedule. Once the 30 days are complete, you keep full access to the videos for an additional 12 months so you can repeat the process and revisit your favourite seasons whenever you like.
Meet Your Guide
Hi there, I’m Melissa. I am the founder of Nine Cups Writing. After spending a decade in corporate training for some of Australia's largest companies, I returned to university to complete my PhD in creative writing and history. During that time, while managing a busy family, running a business, and navigating heavy lockdowns, I learned first-hand the grit and determination it takes to stay committed to a creative project and how easily rigid structures can drain the life from creative practice.
I became obsessed with the art of creative practice; shifting my own paradigm to move away from rigid academic rules and productivity hacks and toward an empowered way of working which tapped into my desires, deep inspiration and rhythms that worked for me and my family commitments. I learned that writing can become more sustainable when we stop treating creativity like a machine and begin to see it as an expansion of the natural world.
I designed Expand & Embrace with the intention to remove the pressure of productivity and replace it with a cycle that mirrors the natural world to allow you to write more and bring your stories to life. But also, to provide enough structure to actually get something done - because sometimes waiting for the muse simply isn't enough
Is This Right for You?
Expand & Embrace welcomes writers of any style, genre, standard, or experience level. It is a space built deliberately for you if:
- You are currently working on a writing project: Whether it’s poetry, family history, memoir, a novel, a script, a thesis or blog posts this structure allows you to expand that project, while embracing a new approach to creativity.
- You are not currently working on a writing project: Perhaps you’re feeling blocked, or have so many projects that you don’t know where to start. If this is you, you will be able to consider your creative practice as a whole (e.g. what’s holding you back, what would you like to write). This will stabilise you ready to begin your next project.
- You are feeling the end-of-year pressure: Argh, this is me every year. I set big intentions around my creative work and begin to feel terrible towards the end, when I think I won’t be able to make it. If this is you, you are certainly welcome here. Let’s see if we can help.
- You crave a soft layer of accountability that fits with all your other commitments: I won’t be telling you that ‘we all have the same 24 hours as Beyonce’, I won’t be recommending that you set a daily word count, or get up at 4am. But I will ask you to share intentions (optional) and provide the structure for you to be accountable to yourself and your writing dreams, beginning with a consistent process that might just become a sustainable practice for you. I love intentions set and met.
This is not the right fit for anyone:
- Anyone looking for a high-intensity, competitive writing boot camp.
- Anyone looking to share work - this is about a private personal journey without the pressure to share.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the dates for the live write sessions?
We will be writing together:
Thurs Nov 7, 7pm AEDT
Tues Nov 10, 10am AEDT
Mon Nov 16, 7pm AEDT
Fri Nov 27, 12pm AEDT
I write poetry / family history / fiction. Will these daily activities work for my specific genre?
Absolutely. As an instructional designer and writer, I have intentionally created these 30 daily activities to focus on the universal creative process. They are designed to unlock your creative flow, emotional depth, and structural clarity for any form of writing.
What if I miss a day or fall behind?
There is no such thing as falling behind here. Creativity cannot be rushed, and I know that life happens. If you miss a day, you can simply pick up where you left off, or skip ahead to the current day. Because you keep full access to the entire classroom and all daily videos for an additional year after our month together ends, you can move through the seasons entirely at your own pace.
Do I have to share my private writing with the group?
Not at all. Your words are entirely your own. Our private global classroom chat is a space to share your milestones, celebrate your daily consistency, and talk about your creative state rather than post drafts of your work.
What happens if I can't make the opening and closing?
Both the Opening Ceremony on Day 1 and the Closing Ceremony on Day 30 will be recorded and uploaded into the class for anyone who can't make it live.
The live writes are at various times in the hope that they may suit everyone at least once.
You can access all the replays for 12 months.
How much time do I need to commit each day?
The daily morning ritual is approximately 15 minutes for the video activity, and 60 minutes for your dedicated writing. If an hour of writing feels too much you can adapt the times in a way that suits you.
When do the doors close, and when do we officially start?
You will have access to the classroom immediately after purchase to navigate your way around and introduce yourself.
The first session is on Sunday, November 1st, 2026 6am AEDT (and via replay)
I will keep enrolment open for a few more days (given the confusion with time zones) because you can always watch the replays.
Why do we start in Winter?
Most writing challenges demand that you show up on day one full of fire, ready to smash out massive word counts. But if you are already feeling stuck, trying to force immediate output only leads to frustration.
That is why this 30-day journey begins in Winter.
When we sit in the dormant darkness we find an opportunity to rest and reflect. In the natural world, winter is the season of water, stillness, and deep inner reflection. On the surface, a winter landscape looks completely bare waiting for spring. But beneath the frost, a profound gathering of strength is occurring. The roots are anchoring deep into the soil. The seed is resting in the dark, building what it needs before breaking through the surface in the spring.
We begin in the quiet of winter so you can reflect upon what has grown before, thaw any blocks and embrace who you are already.
What is your AI policy?
AI is not my thing. I will not be giving you prompts to feed to AI, and I will not be recommending that you upload your work.
Also, I have used my own experience to create this course - I will not be giving you a range of activities downloaded from AI.
What is your refund policy?
I am happy to issue a refund for 14 days after purchase.
Course Investment
Join Us
For 30 days use the natural rhythm of the seasons to create a steady creative practice to expand your process, embrace your project and get words on the page.
Finish 2026 strong.
