Writing about your difficult experiences can help your wellbeing. Here’s how to get started!

Discover the power of putting your feelings on the page, along with advice to help you find the words Have you ever penned a poem or scribbled a short story inspired by something hard you’ve been through? Maybe you’ve written a personal essay exploring your emotions, or found solace in the pages of your journal. As a writer, difficult times regularly inspire me. Sometimes, I’m drawn to write articles that take my experiences of illness and disability to help others and to give a voice to things that aren’t always spoken about. Other times, it’s jotting down my thoughts into poetry that I will likely never share, but gives me the space to reflect and pour out my feelings onto the page. The power of writing “Writing about our difficult experiences can help us to understand and process them,” counsellor Beth Roberts tells me. “It’s very difficult to get complete closure in this complicated life, but writing does offer a greater opportunity for some closure, and to be able to carry on after difficult experiences without such a heavy burden. “It can help us to self-validate what we felt or are feeling. It can be a huge relief to be able to say: ‘After what happened, I understand why I feel the way I do.’ It can help us to see things from a different perspective, or recognise growth that’s arisen from a situation. Writing down our thoughts and feelings is practice for talking to others about the difficult experience, so it can help enable connection and support.” Researcher Suzette Henke came up with the term ‘scriptotherapy’ to describe how writing about difficult experiences gives people a sense of authorship over what’s happened to them. When I think about being unwell, I think of how scary it was to feel that way, and also to have a lack of control over my own life. Being able to write about it gives me a sense of ownership – it is my narrative. Different forms of writing Nonfiction, such as personal essays, memoirs, or articles, is an obvious choice as a […]

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