The Therapeutic Effects of Writing

Writing is one of the first things we learned in school as kids. We were instructed to trace letters, write words through colored pictures, describe our surroundings through phrases and sentences, until we eventually learned to write coherent paragraphs.

As we grow up, though, we learn about things that go beyond the four corners of the classroom. As such, we learn to make use of writing for different purposes.

Many people resort to writing down their thoughts in black and white when they feel down or sad or desperate. Unintentionally, they are actually resorting to what is known as journal therapy.

Journal therapy is defined as the purposeful act of writing down our thoughts and feelings in an effort to further psychological healing and personal growth. Through therapeutic writing or journal therapy, a person is able to:

â—� cope with stress
â—� reduce physical symptoms of certain diseases
â—� foster self-awareness
â—� reduce anxiety
â—� and develop self-esteem

For the most part, writing is also an individualized process of personal growth. It is an effective distressing method which has the ability to settle the mind and release pent-up emotions. It also gives us an honest insight into our real selves. For Lyn Petit’, author of The Philosophy of a Thought, writing is a form of therapy.

Like most of us, Lyn also went through a lot of adversities in life. She made use of these personal experiences to put all her thoughts into writing. According to her, her counselor urged her to write her thoughts on paper as a form of therapy. To her surprise, her counselor’s advice worked, so much so that Lyn was able to publish her first book in 2007.

Through writing, Lyn was able to express herself more. At the same time, she was also able to give out advice to other people about simply putting both feet down and saying no, standing up for oneself, and not allowing people to take the rein of one’s life from one’s own hands. Lyn accomplished all of these, in spite of the fact that she is a dyslexic, a tad autistic, and a little deaf.