Life Journal Workshop – The healing power of writing

Welcome to this week’s life journal workshop lesson. Last week we focused on doodling and why we need to doodle more. Today I want to talk about the healing power of writing and how it can transform our mood and ultimately your life. Last week I talked about being a life-long doodler but I am also a writer. I have always kept a journal. Although I may not always be consistent in my journaling, I know it’s there when I need it. My writing has changed over the years, it’s more mature; fewer juvenile stories of mishaps and heartbreaks fill the pages. Yet why I write has not changed. I write to heal my wounds, to share my story or to just make it through a rough patch in my business or marriage. Sometimes I simply need a safe place to pour out my anger, sadness or frustration. Does this sound familiar? Perhaps you kept a diary as a young girl or teen, pouring your dreams and goals onto the blank pages then carefully locking the diary and hiding the key. Do you make time to write in a journal as a busy adult? Our lives tend to be so full of family and work that we often forget to tend to ourselves. We often fail to put ourselves on our own to-do list – letting our hair get too long and our clothes worn out because we are just too busy to take care of ourselves. Journaling can change how we look at ourselves and at our lives. It can help us gain perspective and remind us that we are worthy of being number one on our own to-do list from time to time. I can hear you now: I don’t have time, that’s so selfish, my kids come first, my job keeps me so busy, I am so tired at the end of the day… We are brilliant at making excuses. In fast, if we spent more time writing than making excuses we would all be happpier, more fulfilled and eager to meet each new day. Sounds like an extreme promise, doesn’t it? But it’s not!

The healing power of writing

I was reading this wonderful article by Donna Johnson in Shambala Sun magazine this morning titled “Outside the Tent.” Johnson was raised under a tent, a gospel revival tent, the daughter of an organist and stepdaughter of a famous preacher. She left this community at age 17 to go to college and start a new life. Writing was ultimately her way to heal her past and fully engage in her present but it took her many years and her daughter’s tears to realize she was shut off from feeling her own story. Here’s part of the article: “We tell the story, and over time the story begins to tell us: who w are, who the were, what they did. I began to embody the story of abandonmet. I abandoned my dream of finishing school, of becoming a writer. I abandoned integrity and spirituality. I abandoned relationships, one after the other. Finally, I abandoned my own daughter, not physically but emotionally, hiding behind chemically induced numbness. I was there, but I was not there. I wrote the story. I lived the story. But I could not, would not, feel the story, and that somehow kept me outside of it. Here’s what I did not know: Stories have a way of brushing up against the present, a way of whispering their secret, twisted narratives until even those who are willfully deaf are forced to listen. Once day I came upon a self-portrait my daughter had drawn for class. I recognized her braids, the carefully outlined freckles. A tear rolled down each cheek. Under the drawing she had written: This is me.” How many stories are you holding inside and refusing to feel, as Johnson says? I am not suggesting you write a memoir, publish or share your stories in public – unless you want to. What I am suggesting is that you allow your stories to flow out of you, onto the page where they can be reviewed until you begin to see patterns or know they can be laid to rest, unable to haunt you any longer. None of us have lived perfect lives. We have all been impacted by stress, sadness, tragedy. As a group,   human beings are survivors. For me writing is about HOW I choose to survive. I don’t want to live my life feeling numb, shut down or closed off from the people around me and especially not from my husband and children. I recently realized that I have some stories I am holding onto too tightly: stories around my relationship with my weight and my relationship with my mother. They are inextricably tied together and both are weighing me down in an unhealthy way. I need to write the stories and lay the feelings to rest so that I can move on. I will do this in private, on the pages of my journal, the blank page and my curious cat the only witnesses to the healing taking place. I don’t need to share this healing, although it may show up in a memoir some day. For now, I turn to writing to save myself. I don’t want to see the tears on my daughter’s self-portrait.

Life journal lesson for this week:

• Be gentle with yourself this week. Take some time to write in your journal and focus on what IS working in your life. It can be very healing to remember everything you have to be grateful for.
• Practice writing parts of your story: who are you angry at? what sadness are you ready to release? Write in short 15 minute spurts. If it feels to hard, shut the journal and walk away. Call a friend or hug your child. Bring yourself back to the present.
• Remember that no one will read this but you. You journal is your safe place to write it all down and release the tension that may have been lingering for years.

This post ended up being more serious than intended. I also write because it is fun for me and I love exploring my relationship with myself and others. I often sit down to write and just allow whatever wants to come out, come out. Sometimes it surprises me. Thank you for listening and being here with me. If you find that you want to share your stories and need a safe place to share, to grow and create a new vision for your life than what you are currently living, I have a 90-day coaching program just for you. I work with women who realize that they need to make changes in their life or their business but need a clearer roadmap to make that happen. The women I work with are creative, passionate and love serving others but aren’t doing a great job of serving themselves. Does this sound like you? Let’s talk.