Therapeutic writing

[The Bluestocking]

After my doggie passed away, I wrote a short vignette featuring her in my story world (which happens to be the Afterlife and has Reapers etc and the Rainbow Bridge).

My heart felt a little better after that.

 

[Jay Greenstein]

“You can fire your secretary, divorce your spouse, abandon your children. But they remain your co-author forever.”

~ Ellen Goodman

 

[Guillermo Stitch]

I find the idea of writing as a therapeutic behavour suspect, though please let me stress that I say this respectfully and mean it with respect to myself. Others' mileage will certainly vary.

I think I've done my best work when I've written in as near to an egoless state as I am capable of - when it's all about the reader, and seems almost to have nothing to do with me.

 

[Phyrebrat]

I rather find my therapy comes passively from writing as opposed to actively trying to ‘heal myself’ through what I’m writing.

‘They’ say sci fi is about society and horror is about the body/individual, so as a horror writer, I’m probably starting from a self-reflective place anyway. I think any kind of self-reflection tends to be a learning process and thus therapeutic anyway.

I don’t think I’ve sat myself down and thought ‘how can I deal with this x-mental health issue/stress/etc’.

pH

 

[Joshua Jones]

I find the idea of writing as a therapeutic behavour suspect, though please let me stress that I say this respectfully and mean it with respect to myself. Others' mileage will certainly vary.

I think I've done my best work when I've written in as near to an egoless state as I am capable of - when it's all about the reader, and seems almost to have nothing to do with me.

I understand where you are coming from here. I don't think we necessarily write well when we write to process something (though some may). For the people I work with, the therapeutic element is merely in expression, regardless of what that expression looks like. It is a place where they can say what they want, however they want, and take as much time as they want without someone getting impatient or critiquing how they express themselves. I actually encourage them not to worry too much about how it comes out, because they aren't writing to be seen by anyone else. In that context, I have found some benefit.

 

[Guillermo Stitch]

I understand where you are coming from here. I don't think we necessarily write well when we write to process something (though some may). For the people I work with, the therapeutic element is merely in expression, regardless of what that expression looks like. It is a place where they can say what they want, however they want, and take as much time as they want without someone getting impatient or critiquing how they express themselves. I actually encourage them not to worry too much about how it comes out, because they aren't writing to be seen by anyone else. In that context, I have found some benefit.

Yes, I can see this - particularly the value of having the space to be uninterrupted. A lot of life's ball breakers, it seems to me, can be characterised as interruptions of one sort or another. Whether it's being interrupted mid-sentence and being stymied that way, or having some long term dream or plan interrupted by reality...

So you seem to be talking about writing as a strategy arising within the context of therapy. I was more coming from the idea of therapy arising as a goal within the confines of writing.

Perspectives.