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Learn more about Finishing School

I do two kinds of online workshops

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On Sundays I host a two-hour online Amherst Writers and Artists workshop on Zoom from 9am to 11am West Coast time, 12 noon to 2pm East Coast time (18.00–20.00 CET at my location in Italy). On Mondays I host a one-hour online Finishing School workshop on Zoom from 9am to 10am West Coast time, noon to 1pm East Coast time (18.00–19.00 CET at my location in Italy). The workshops are...

Finishing School: Guiding Principles and Practices

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In Finishing School we meet once a week to help each other finish creative projects, using the method outlined in the book Finishing School written by me and Danelle Morton. We work together in a structured way that protects individual creative freedom and supports personal insight. At our first session, we ask you to tell us about your dream. That is, we ask you to describe the project you are...

Finishing School: The story behind the workshops … and the book

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[Note: This is pretty much a literal transcription of the podcast.]–ct Good morning, or evening, this is Cary Tennis, it’s Thursday, April 29, 2021, and today I’m going to do things slightly differently because this is the story behind the workshops and the book, that is, the Finishing School workshops. So how it really began is like this: In 2004 I was finishing up an article...

Welcome to Finishing School. Let’s get started.

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In Finishing School people come together to help each other stay on schedule with creative tasks and get projects finished. And we always begin every new session by asking each participant to say a little about themselves and about the project. So this is a little online form to gather some information that will help us work together more efficiently when we start. That’s all we need for...

Praise for the Finishing School book

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“A must for every writer and artist of any kind, Finishing School belongs on the bookshelf right next to Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird and Stephen King’s On Writing. I can’t wait to tell every writer I know to buy it.”—Cole Kazdin, four-time Emmy-winning television news producer, writer, and performer “Cary Tennis and Danelle Morton accomplish something remarkable in Finishing School—an actually...

Do you have a project you need to finish? Is it driving you nuts?

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Wouldn’t you feel great if you finally got it done? Finishing School is a way to get things done when nothing else has worked. It doesn’t matter what the thing is. Finishing isn’t about the mechanics of the task. It’s about the process, or method, of finishing. It’s very simple. It is easy to learn. If you have tried scheduling, will power, time management, getting...

I thought I was so systematic but really I’m not at all!

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I found out how truly unsystematic I am by setting a schedule for myself and not following it. That happened because I invented Finishing School. I invented Finishing School because I wanted to finish things I start. I wanted to finish things I start because I feel crummy when I don’t. Crummy is a polite word. Also I’m too hard on myself. I had two therapists in one day tell me that...

Janine Kovac: “Top 10 Reasons to Love Finishing School”

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I’ll be the first to admit it–I have a love/hate relationship with Finishing School. But at the end of last month’s session, I had gleaned 10 great lessons from the experience. Here they are: 1) I increased my tolerance. I had a fairly clear schedule in April and I thought that I’d just sit down and write for six hours, because that’s the time I’d carved out in...

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