The Next Time You’re Feeling Down…Write

I’m all about reading, but I’m also all about writing. Answers are not necessarily found in self-help books, in fixing everything that “is wrong with you,” or staring out the window thinking about how things could be better. Sometimes, our self-reflection seems centered on fears, regrets, and worries rather than positive things that could transform our lives. I have a novel (pardon the pun) alternative. Instead of trying to transform ourselves, instead of trying to fix ourselves, why don’t we give ourselves a break and move forward and be free of all the expectations we have for ourselves, all the mistakes, all the misfortunes, all the what-ifs, all the woulda/shoulda/coulda chaos our brains carry around all day long in the thousands of thoughts we have every day (researchers estimate that we have between 6,000 and 60,000 thoughts each day)? The answer and solution to our emotional distress and the key to our productivity is in our writing.

We all carry this heavy “I could do better” or “I’m not good enough” weight around with us. I haven’t met a person who does not (except for those sociopathic types I’ve unfortunately dated or worked with). We get these feelings because of the plaque buildup of emotional and intellectual scars, things that hurt us, scare us, or disappoint us. No matter how much self-help we try, we don’t eliminate these. We think we are dealing with them if we put them in the back of our minds and say they don’t matter, but the scar tissue is still there. Like scar tissue, they are not going away, no matter how much we want to “fix” them, how many seminars we take, how many self-help books we read, or how much philosophy or religious teachings we want to cram into our heads to override the noise, the scar tissue is still there. Acceptance is the answer. Being honest with yourself is the answer. What’s hurting? You don’t need to know where the feeling is coming from (though it helps), but recognizing simply the hurt is a great start. Instead of covering up, pushing down, vilifying, and becoming aware of what’s bothering us, accepting that we’ve got that scar tissue is the first step. The second step is writing about it. Plus, it sure beats spending a ton of money on books that sound good but do us little good. You know I’m right.

Do you want to be more productive and do more as a writer? Do you want to be known for something? Do you want to find “your voice”? Then, transfer those feelings into your work. Use writing to exorcize those demons. Instead of letting these negative feelings accompanied by your desire to override them dominate you, use them. Pour them into your writing. In doing so, you’ll help yourself, and you’ll also find your voice because these feelings are unique to you, and you’ll find a greater audience because these feelings are universal, though the way everyone gets them is individual. By putting your energy into writing and not into direct self-improvement, you’ll get more done and free yourself faster. I say I use my writing as therapy. It is talk therapy between me, the page, and the reader. Writers have a distinct advantage in that. We can get words, feelings, and thoughts down on paper cohesively. It’s a blessing and a gift. Use it. Grow from it. And, as a published writer, profit from it.

As writers, part of what we do is expressed through themes and symbols. We don’t need to know where they come from. Self-defeating thoughts and emotions are the same. We don’t need to know where they come from; we need to acknowledge that they are there. If we do know, good. It’s not mandatory, though, to use it in our writing and use our writing to get it out of our system. What I’m suggesting here aligns with organic writing. Get away from what you are supposed to write for the day and instead write, through your characters, what is bothering you. Your characters will become multi-dimensional, conflicts you didn’t see in your outline will emerge, characters will seem real, and simultaneously, you will be purged of demons you carry around, even if you don’t know what they are. Go freestyle and tap into that well of boiling emotions inside you.

All of this comes down to the simple concept that you can achieve the objective by a backend passage that can be productive and profitable. Don’t try to fix your problems; identify them, expose them through characters, let characters argue it out, and feel yourself purged. You haven’t gotten rid of anything - because you can’t get rid of that scar tissue - but you’ve used it; the characters have helped you see it for what it is, and readers are helped because, through the symbolism of what you write, they too are transformed. It doesn’t matter what you’re writing - fiction, nonfiction, poetry, plays, essays - it is the act of writing that will free you and your reader.

So, turn something you might label bad into good, helpful, productive, and valuable. Don’t search for answers. Write stories, characters, and poems. Your subconscious mind, the same part of you that created the scars, will put it all in order, and you’ll be healed while your output rises. Sometimes, people feel bad and can’t write. Instead, I propose that when you feel bad, write. Some of your best material may come when you explore your heart's deepest pains. You won’t find your hurts resolved in one sitting or one novel. These pains will reemerge throughout your collective body of work, and without your effort, your themes as a writer will be analyzed by those who follow your work. Those themes will become synonymous with you, like your fingerprint. Those themes and the collection of issues, emotions, and ideas in those themes will become your trademark.

Don’t try harder. Don’t villainize yourself. Use what troubles and hurts you. Share safely through characters or phrases of words. No one is going to think less of you. Instead, you’ll be lauded for your insight as a writer. And you, you’ll be transformed from a Nervous Nellie to a Sally Zen, as will your readers.

In my writing, I wake up in the morning and take a mental and emotional inventory of what bothers me. Whatever is bothering me that day bothers my characters. I find it easy to sit down, start typing, and watch them deal with it. At the end of the day, I have anywhere between 500 and 5,000 words to show for it. It’s deep stuff. A character did not do this or that but instead felt and thought this or that. This latter objective is the stuff of excellent writing because it is feelings and thoughts, not a linear progression of a character through time, that moves a reader.

Maybe this is rubbish to you. It works for me. It releases emotional weight that holds me back and wastes the productivity of my day. Instead of being paralyzed by what bothers me or what surfaces from twenty years ago, I lean into it, encourage it, embrace it, and let it free itself by writing the words on the page. Instead of writing as a job, task, or something to procrastinate, writing becomes freeing and something to embrace. Writing becomes something to look forward to. When you wake up in the morning, and you do that emotional and intellectual check, you can’t wait to grab your cup of coffee and get to work.

So, here’s my hope for you. Get to work. Not only in exorcizing the demons you’ve been carrying around, the fears you harbor about now or the future, the intellectual scars that have embedded themselves and made you who you are, the hurts and regrets that keep coming back to haunt you, or the disappointments and frustrations you feel about where you are now in your life, but in using all those unique and beautiful experiences of you to create literature that moves other people and frees you at the same time. Think of those past experiences as blessings, wells of material, not hindrances or pains.

Call me crazy, but I think you might find this a new way to increase your productivity and compassion, love, and understanding of yourself with each new word you write. Trust me. Get busy. Take inventory of what bothers or hurts you today, and let the words flow.