The Life Stories Workshop:
The BIPOC Edition

A memoir-writing workshop for BIPOC folks with stories in their hearts

Is your life full of stories waiting to be told?

This workshop is for people of colour who want to escape the grind, nourish their creative souls, and write some of their life stories. We’ll use short writing exercises, supportive feedback, and lots of sharing to shake away our blocks, find our writing voices, and move some of our stories onto the page.

Here’s how it works:

This class has two main tools: memoir writing workbooks (PDFs) and group sessions.

Workbooks are 25-ish page booklets with a theme to write about, a bunch of ideas about how to start, and a writing tip that you can take or leave. They aim to be generative and open invitations to express our memories in new ways.

Group sessions will start with a little warmup write to get us moving, and then they’ll focus on hearing and talking about the pieces written.

These groups are kept small to ensure your work gets the time and space it needs. You can expect to leave each session with warm and supportive feedback and conversation to fuel your next steps.

We have an open version of this workshop for people of any racial background. This one is reserved for people who identify as Black, Indigenous or people of colour, including mixed race.

- Identify as Black, Indigenous, a person of colour, racialized or mixed-race.
- Want to write about their lives but aren’t sure where to begin.
- Want to integrate creative expression more deeply into their lives. (Most of your writing for this class happens between sessions.)
- Love the idea of a set of creative dates with themselves and a small group of others.
- Are motivated by the idea of sharing their writing in supportive settings.
- Feel aligned with our fundamental beliefs.
- One finished story per class, with more pieces started.
- Writing tools and practices to carry you forward.
- Writing tricks and warmups you can use anytime.
- Countless ideas about where your writing might go next.
- A clear sense of the story you want to write and the voice you want to write it in.
- Writing peers whose work you are invested in.
- Creative momentum.
- Critique or competition. We’re all about the love.
- Strict rules or guidelines on what memoir writing is or should look like.
- Pressure to write things you don’t want to write. We go where the joy is.

Details for Spring 2026:

On Zoom with Asifa (she/her)

6 Thursday evenings
April 16, April 30, May 14, May 21, June 11, June 25
7–9:30pm ET

Registration opens February 17th!

Cost:

The fee for this workshop is $560. If you prefer, you can pay in 4 monthly installments of $140. Tax will be added for Canadians in your local provincial rate. See our financial policies.

Four times a year, we give out bursaries for our programs to people with financial barriers. Check out our upcoming dates.

If you don’t have a credit card, let us know and we’ll gladly find a way to make it work.

Sign up here:

Registration opens on February 17th. Join our early bird mailing list for early access to future registrations or sign up for our newsletter.

Questions?

Your answer is probably on this page.

What clients are saying…

I never felt comfortable calling myself a writer. What I have learned through taking Firefly’s first Life Stories for women of colour, is that I have a voice, a story. One way I can share my story is through writing. This class took me out of my comfort zone. I began to judge my words less. Something magical happened each class. I connected with each of these amazing women and their individual journeys. I was inspired to turn the pain of my past into the poetry of the present. I laughed. I cried. I made peace with the stories in my heart by putting pen to paper. I highly recommend classes at Firefly to bring out the writer in you. Enrolling in this class is one of the best things I’ve ever done and it could not have come at a better time.

Gina Oades
Occupational Therapist, Co-Founder of Mixed in the Six
This wasn’t just a writing class—it was a returning to voice. Thank you for creating a space that allowed each of us to bring our tangled, beautiful stories to the surface. The resonance of this experience echoes beyond the page.

Jessica Singh
Author, Healing-Centered Creative, and Fundraising Strategist (LinkedIn)