Writing as Personal Therapy

I am an introvert by nature, and I suspect quite a lot of writers are. It’s easy for me to spend many hours on my own, planning and plotting for a novel and then writing scene after scene. I sometimes lose all track of time and place, and am shocked when I turn away from my computer to find it is way past time that I should have been thinking about cooking the evening meal or going to bed.

I have no trouble not speaking to another person for many hours, even days. I have been on many a silent retreat and found them refreshing, rejuvenating, and sometimes life- saving. So it’s no wonder that I find writing a form of personal therapy. The solitude and silence of my writing times are in themselves therapeutic as it gives me relief from all the voices around me, the noises and demands that are constantly a part of so much of our day to day life. Not only do I enjoy the silence and solitude but I find it essential for my well-being.

I also find that being completely immersed in another time and place, another person’s story, enables me to internally reflect on life’s issues; the consequences of actions and words, the meaning of life, the mental and emotional processes of dealing with forgiveness, grief, fear, pride, conflict, faith, love and all the other aspects of personal growth and relationships, which form part of my stories.

In doing this I also wrestle with these issues at a deep level for myself. As a psychologist, I listen to others in counselling sessions, as they deal with these things, and it’s obvious for a lot of people that reflecting with other people is very helpful. But I’m sure I’m not alone as a writer, in being able to do this through my writing, which becomes cathartic, challenging, revealing and inspiring for me.  

I think the creative aspect of writing is also very therapeutic. Words are precious, powerful and wonderful things. As writers we get to play with them, put them together in ways that describe something beautiful, or terrifying, or reflect a character’s feelings and thoughts. We can reshape and reconfigure words until we’re satisfied that they paint the right picture or reveal the right emotion. I love to plot a journey of growth and change, and then explore and experiment with words until they carry my characters along those paths, hopefully in ways that also carry the reader with them. It’s incredibly satisfying to have this creative outlet.

So writing nurtures my heart, mind and soul. I can think of very little that is equally therapeutic for me. I wonder if others have the same experience in their writing?

This week I will be in a chalet in the snow country with my family. (Not this one, but something like it) This will be a wonderful time for our family, but will also mean I have little contact with much of my usual world. I’m looking forward to this – as any introvert would - but it means I am unable to respond to any comments to this blog for a week or so. I will look forward to catching up with your thoughts when I return, so please don’t take my lack of response as disinterest.

 

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Writing as therapy

After the Writer’s Getaway this year my husband and I did some travelling around the areas in New South Wales where the ancestors I want to write about next, came from. I sat with some relatives I’ve never met, but had arranged to meet up with. I heard their stories and memories. I got a sense of their personalities.

Some of the small towns we visited; Lawrence, Brushgrove, Mororo, Midginbil, are places I’ve never been to before, and are probably smaller communities now than they were 150 years ago. It’s a strange and inspiring experience to wander in these places, to imagine the lives of  those who once lived there, and from whom I’ve descended.  

It occurred to me that researching for a novel is a fascinating journey, and also a very therapeutic one. Whether searching for facts about people, or historical events, or choosing an environment or particular era for a story, I’m sure we all, as writers, go on a very evocative journey, before we even start to write. 

We reflect on the ways people interact, how they change and grow, how they fall in love and develop relationships, how they cope with trauma and loss, how they achieve great things, and how God works in and through the lives of people. We try to step inside other people’s worlds; people who once lived or who are complete works of fiction, and we draw on our knowledge about how human beings function; what makes them do the things they do and respond to their world the way they do. We imagine ourselves in places and situations and relationships we may never have been, or we go back in our minds to what we have experienced and learn from it. Some may project forward to how things will be in the future, or imagine other kinds of worlds where love or hope or goodness may better be experienced.

Surely we can’t help but be changed ourselves by this process. These exercises of the mind and heart are not unlike those I would use in therapy with people who are stuck emotionally or relationally. Remember, imagine, re-construe. These can lead people to find release from the past, to find closure, to discover hope, and to make real behavioural changes in their lives.

This is surely what we offer our readers as well; an opportunity, not only to escape for a little while, but to imagine other lives, to discover new things about themselves, and hopefully to re-construe some parts of their own lives, and then to make real and positive changes; emotionally, relationally and spiritually.

So I think the writing experience from beginning to end, for writer and reader, is not only enjoyable, but also very therapeutic, a wonderful tool in God’s hands. One more reason to keep writing – as if I needed another reason to do what I love. 

There are three books available in my Turning the Tide series, for which I am doing this research; Mary’s Guardian, Charlotte’s Angel and Tangled Secrets. The fourth in the series, Truly Free, will be released in 2013

Forgiving Michael, an earlier novel, is available to read on blog http://www.carolpreston.blogspot.com

Suzannah’s Gold, my first novel, is available on e-book http://www.amazon.com/author/carolpreston

http://www.carolpreston.com.au