One hour with the block you keep working around
You sit down to write. You have the time, the open document, and a fairly good idea of what happens next.
And still, nothing moves. You reread the same paragraph. You answer an email instead. You close the laptop and tell yourself tomorrow will be different.
A Story Breakthrough Session is a 60-minute, Brainspotting-informed coaching session for romance writers who suspect the block isn’t about craft.
What Is a Story Breakthrough Session?
A Story Breakthrough Session is a 60-minute one-to-one coaching session held over video. You bring the block—not your outline, not your word count, not a plan for fixing it.
Rather than analyzing your plot or telling you what to write, we’ll slow down and listen to the part of you that’s struggling to move forward.
Using Brainspotting and Parts Work, we’ll explore the thoughts, emotions, physical responses, and protective patterns connected to the block.
What Can We Explore?
Your block may be connected to:
- Burnout or creative exhaustion
- Imposter syndrome and self-doubt
- Fear of failure—or fear of success
- Difficult reviews, rejection, or criticism
- Visibility and being seen by readers
- Perfectionism and pressure to perform
- Money fears connected to publishing
- Grief, divorce, or a major life transition
- Losing confidence after a difficult release
- Returning to writing after a long absence
- Feeling disconnected from your voice or creativity
Some blocks really are about craft, time, or a schedule with nothing left in it. This one-hour session is for those blocks that feel more like fear, shame, resistance, or freeze.
What This Session Is & Isn’t
What This Is
This is personal and creative coaching for the emotional and protective patterns affecting your writing.
What This Isn’t
- Plotting or story-development coaching
- Developmental editing or manuscript feedback
- Productivity coaching
- Psychotherapy or counseling
- Treatment for trauma or a mental health condition
I won’t tell you how to fix your book. We’ll focus on what may be making it difficult for you to access your own ideas, trust your voice, and return to the work.
How Brainspotting Supports the Process
Brainspotting is a focused approach based on the idea that where you look can affect how you feel.
During the session, I may invite you to notice where your eyes naturally want to rest while you remain aware of the thoughts, feelings, or physical sensations connected to your block.
You remain in control throughout the process. You don’t have to explain every detail, uncover a dramatic memory, or arrive with a perfect understanding of why you’re stuck.
Sometimes your mind doesn’t have the words for what’s getting in the way. Brainspotting gives us another way to listen.
How Parts Work Supports the Process
Parts Work helps us approach the block with curiosity instead of judgment.
The part that procrastinates, overthinks, or avoids the manuscript may not be trying to ruin your career. It may be attempting to protect you from disappointment, exposure, criticism, pressure, or pain.
Instead of fighting that part, we’ll work to understand what it believes could happen if you began writing freely again.
When protection no longer has to shout quite so loudly, creativity may have more room to return.
What to Expect During Your Session
Bring the Block
We’ll start with what actually happens when you try to write—not the whole history, just the piece that’s in the way today.
Find the Brainspot
I’ll invite you to notice where your eyes want to rest while you stay connected to the block. That eye position becomes the place we work from.
Let It Process
Your own system does the work. My job is to hold steady, focused attention while you follow whatever comes—thoughts, images, sensations, or quiet.
Ground
We’ll come back to steady ground and name one small, doable next step toward the page.
This May Be for You If…
- You have a deadline, and one stubborn scene is standing between you and it
- There’s one scene you keep skipping, and you’re running out of book to skip it with
- Something changed recently—a move, a loss, a new contract—and writing hasn’t felt the same since
- You’ve been “about to get back to it” for longer than you want to admit
- A review, a release, or a hard year changed the way writing feels
- Opening the document makes your chest tighten
- You’d rather work through something layered an hour at a time than in one long sitting
- You don’t have three hours to give right now, but you have one
You don’t need to arrive knowing exactly what’s wrong. “I don’t know why I can’t write anymore” is enough of a place to begin.
I Know What It’s Like to Lose Writing
Before my divorce, I was earning four figures a month from my romance writing. Afterward, there were months when I was fortunate to earn low two figures.
It was hard to write about love while my own relationship was ending. That block stayed with me for years.
Discovering Brainspotting changed the way I understood what had happened to my creativity. I created this offering because I wished something like it had existed when I was the writer staring at the page, grieving what I’d lost, and wondering whether the words would ever return.
Scheduling and Investment
Story Breakthrough Sessions are 60-minute virtual coaching sessions, booked one at a time.
Current pricing, availability, and booking information can be found on the scheduling page.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need to know why I’m blocked?
No. You don’t need a clear explanation or perfectly defined goal. We can begin with what happens when you try to write and follow the process from there.
Is one hour really long enough?
Long enough for what an hour can reach, yes. Brainspotting doesn’t need a long runway so much as focused attention, and a specific block often moves inside a single session. Something older or more layered can be worked at this pace too—it just takes more than one hour, across more than one session. If you’d rather do that work in one uninterrupted sitting, the three-hour Author Breakthrough Intensive is built for it. Either way, with enough time and attention, you will get there.
How is this different from an Author Breakthrough Intensive?
Pace, not depth. An intensive gives us three uninterrupted hours to follow something longer in one sitting. A session gives us one focused hour, and whatever is still moving continues in the next one. Some writers prefer that rhythm. Some simply don’t have three hours to give. It’s the same work either way.
Will I have to discuss painful experiences in detail?
No. Brainspotting doesn’t require you to recount every detail of an experience. You decide what you share, and you remain in control throughout the session.
How many sessions will I need?
A session can stand alone. Some writers come once. Others return to explore different layers or keep a standing hour in their month. Some book when they stumble upon a block and need a little extra support. There’s no predetermined number of sessions that an individual should need to move past a block. Your brain determines that pace, not us.
I’m ADHD or autistic. Is this a good fit?
You’re welcome here, and you don’t have to mask to do this work. Fidget, stim, move around, keep your camera off, take breaks. Let me be straight about what this can and can’t do, though. Brainspotting works on activation—the charge your nervous system is still holding around something. Executive function isn’t activation. It’s how your brain is built, and no amount of processing changes that, so this won’t help you initiate tasks, hold attention, or manage time. What it can meet is what has grown on top of it: the shame about a missed deadline, the dread before you open your editor’s email, the years of being called lazy when you weren’t. That’s often the heavier half and we can work with that in Brainspotting.
Can I book a session if I already work with a therapist?
Possibly. Coaching and therapy must remain separate, with the session focused specifically on your creative life. If you’re currently struggling with significant mental health symptoms or need to process trauma, your licensed therapist is the appropriate person to support that work.
Is this therapy?
No. A Story Breakthrough Session is personal and creative coaching. It isn’t psychotherapy, counseling, medical treatment, or a substitute for care from a licensed mental health professional. It doesn’t diagnose or treat mental health conditions.
You Can Start With 15 Minutes
You don’t have to understand the block before you bring it, and you don’t have to be in crisis to deserve the time.
If you’re ready to stop pushing past it and start listening to what it’s been trying to protect, a Free Discovery Call may be your next step.
Sparks & Swoons Coaching provides personal and creative coaching. It is not psychotherapy, counseling, or a substitute for care from a licensed mental health professional.