You probably know that writing has sustained my sanity and creativity for a long time now. And, it’s my mission to help people craft a writing practice that honors them and serves their writing dreams and goals.
I was poking around online recently to see what people were saying about a journaling practice. I found an article on the New York Times:
What’s All This About Journaling: One of the more effective acts of self-care is also, happily, one of the cheapest by Hayley Phelan
The following two paragraphs blew me away. I know the benefits of regular writing firsthand, and I have seen hundreds of people’s lives change as a result of the practice. But I’d never thought of writing this way:
“….writing is fundamentally an organizational system. Keeping a journal, according to Dr. Pennebaker, helps to organize an event in our mind, and make sense of trauma. When we do that, our working memory improves, since our brains are freed from the enormously taxing job of processing that experience, and we sleep better.
This in turn improves our immune system and our moods; we go to work feeling refreshed, perform better and socialize more. “There’s no single magic moment,” Dr. Pennebaker said. “But we know it works…”
(Emphasis mine; James W. Pennebaker is a social psychologist at the University of Texas at Austin who is considered the pioneer of writing therapy.)
The cool thing about a journaling or writing practice is that it can do so many things. We can write to refresh and release. We can write our way to clarity. We can write from our imaginations and for our work.
If you haven’t been writing, I invite you to pick it up today. Don’t do it ‘right’. Don’t do it my way. Do it your way and let your pen lead you closer to yourself and what you want for your life.
There’s still room for you in our online writing salon, The Devoted Writer. We’ve only just begun and already people are savoring the positive effects. Like Patricia Mauerhofer, who shared in our salon:
“I am soooo grateful and happy for being here and having signed up…7 days and my playful creativity juices are starting to flow again.I also became aware why writing just a little every day is good enough for now.”
Writing every day isn’t the goal; being connected to ourselves through a writing practice is our focus. Some people are working on projects, others are writing just for themselves.
Do you have a writing practice that honors you? Share in a comment below one thing that helps you connect to your writing practice.
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