About

Guided by the belief that building creative confidence is a pathway to self-actualization, Sheila (she/her) cherishes the privilege to work with people’s stories and delights in the process of bringing what is stored in the heart onto paper. She understands, too, that this is not necessarily easy, and the meaning we may be searching for might present itself in unanticipated forms. Undeterred by difficult subjects, Sheila perceives iteration and revision to be a way of life.

The Write Magick is rooted in a period of upheaval that began in 2016, when personal, professional, and political combined to derail the way that writing had always supported her. Through the practice of meditation and plant spirit medicine ritual, Sheila learned, un-learned, and re-learned the tools of speaking lovingly into her nervous system. She began, continues to begin, to more intentionally disrupt and soften impulses of shame and hypervigilance to return her to intuition and creativity.

Replacing judgment with curiosity, beginning right where we are, enjoying the pleasures of playfulness, and believing that your story is powerful medicine, Sheila is ready to hold your writing with tender encouragement and expert development. 

More on Sheila’s background

Award-winning poet, editor, and educator, Sheila McMullin is the author of daughterrarium selected by National Book Award recipient Daniel Borzutzky for Cleveland State University Poetry Center’s First Book Prize. An Arts for Los Angeles Arts Delegate, she advocates at the intersection of civic participation and local artist resources. With a dedication to continual learning, currently she is studying under Stacy Sims, founder of The Well, and developing mindful embodiment facilitation skills. She holds an MFA in Poetry from George Mason University.

As a literacy and story coach, she co-edited The Day Tajon Got Shot, the Black Lives Matter novel-in-stories written by middle school writers from the Beacon House Community Center in NE Washington DC, and Humans of Ballou, the non-fiction collection of high school students living in Anacostia who know a different side of Washington DC, both from Shout Mouse Press. 

As a youth mentor, she coaches middle and high school students on persuasive writing and call-to-action speech delivery to advocate for social issues about which they care deeply. Every fall semester she supports high school seniors in brainstorming, outlining, writing, and revising college personal narratives. Sheila’s students have been accepted into Stanford, the UC’s, UPenn, Boston University, University of Maryland, NYU, Howard University and many HBCUs.

As a writing coach, she provides boutique manuscript development and writing services for aspiring authors, academics, and seasoned professionals. She facilitates creative and professional writing and somatic workshops for all ages.

Sheila apprenticed under Marysia Miernowska and completed 140 hours of herbal training through the Gaia School of Healing & Earth Education in California. Continuing her herbal education, she is studying herbal medicine for women under Dr. Aviva Romm, renowned Yale-educated M.D. and midwife. 

After earning her Teaching English as a Foreign Language certificate (TEFL), she taught English at the Shandong University of Science and Technology in China and continues to support English as a Foreign Language creative writers based in the U.S. 

She currently works within the traditional lands of the Chumash, Kizh, and Tongva Nations with gratitude to this home that supports us and the people past and present who have and continue to steward it.