The Healing Power of Writing

can you

see my smile this is the town

where i lost my smile and at that time

i thought i would never get it back

it was valentine’s day 2009

when i learned that the man i loved the

man

i had only just married was going to die

that day was a beautiful day the sun

shone bright

and the air was sweet with the fragrance

of frangipani

and the view outside the hospital was a

postcard

it was the sun that had caused the

melanoma

to form on my husband’s head

the sun that makes the world a happier

place

had brought darkness to our lives

that afternoon i did two things that

helped to save my own life

first i tipped the gin down the drain

and then i went out and i bought myself

a pocket-sized

journal the idea i wish

to share with you is that that journal

became

my life saver it was as if i had

my own personal therapist in my pocket

available to me 24 7 free of charge

and it can be your life saver too

because you don’t have to be able to

write well

or even to spell in order to benefit

from the healing power of writing

that afternoon when i instinctively

reached for my journal

i didn’t know that there exists a body

of research

that confirms the therapeutic benefits

of personal writing all i knew was that

as a teenager i had

drawn great comfort from writing a dial

diary

this time i was crossing a different

kind of threshold from

newly married to newly widowed and i had

idea what came next i was in free fall

and writing gave me a sense of being

able to hold on to the pieces of myself

as i was falling apart

and as all of our carefully made plans

for a life together

fell apart just like that you see

it was the eve of our adult gap year i

had long service leave from my academic

university position

our bags were packed and we were ready

to fly to south america in a week’s time

we never boarded the plane we never

danced the tango in buenos aires

and we never climbed machu picchu

instead

my husband johnny went on

the journey of no return and i

went on the most important journey of my

life

the inner journey the year was 2009

and smartphones were still in their

infancy so the only thing i had in my

pocket to distract me

was my little diary and in my

desperation to get away from my

pain i took up swimming and running

i turned into forrest gump i ran like my

life depended on it

and we’re all familiar with that feeling

of wanting to run

away from our emotions and of wanting to

numb

our pain in fact right now during the

global pandemic

guess what’s booming liquor stores and

netflix

and i’m sure some of you here just like

myself will have contributed to that

boom

in fact when i tipped the gin down the

drain i did actually keep a bottle of

red wine

because i couldn’t imagine doing this

without

numbing myself but at the same time i

wanted to be

present to the tsunami of emotions that

was coming

my way

the idea i want to share with you today

is that

writing by hand is

a way of slowing down so that you can

become

present to your own story as it is

unfolding

because in the end we cannot outrun

our emotions they will always eventually

catch up with us

writing is a way of bearing witness to

your own story

and the blank page is a safe space where

you can show up

authentically to speak your own

truth and that is life changing

we’re all narrative beings in fact our

identities

hinge on the stories we tell about

ourselves

think about it how do you introduce

yourself to a stranger

at a dinner party and how does that

differ from the way you would

introduce yourself to a new work

colleague

but sometimes we forget that we are in

charge

of the stories we tell about

ourselves and when things are really

difficult we tend to cling

to the victim narrative and we say poor

why me and life is so unfair

and yes life is unfair

a year later valentine’s day

2010 i was in townsville in a motel room

by myself

and i had been in that room every

evening for three weeks

as my husband slept in the hospital

and that evening i found out something

that broke

my heart into a thousand pieces

my husband johnny had been unfaithful to

since our wedding day

and if that hadn’t been enough three

short weeks

after the funeral i was asked to

evacuate my home

ahead of a category 5 cyclone

cyclone yasi the largest cyclone in

australia’s

living memory devastated mission beach

and suddenly an entire community was

grieving

and my inner devastation was mirrored

back at me

in the devastated landscape

and i knew that this was a very

dangerous moment

where i could easily go down on my own

journey of no return

i was standing in a flattened banana

field holding my phone into the breeze

trying to get connections that i could

call my mother on the other side of the

world

when it suddenly hit me that it was up

to me to write a new story for myself

and to bring the smile back to my face

you see my mother was born on the eve of

world war

ii in nazi germany and my grandparents

were

too poor to send her to school and my

mother has remained

trapped in that victim narrative all of

her life

and she’s told herself the story of how

she is the dumb one in the family

the one unworthy of an education

and it breaks my heart that she held

herself

back from stepping into her true

potential

i didn’t want to follow my mother’s

example

i wanted to be the hero of my own story

and writing showed me that the difficult

times

the moment you cross the threshold of no

return

the obstacles to be overcome

those are the important turning points

in our lives that shape the arc of

our personal stories

in order to become the hero of my own

story

i had to forgive my husband and so i

wrote him a letter

that he would never read but the act of

writing that letter

freed me from the story suddenly the

pain

the anger the hurt were on the pages

of my journal and my heart was becoming

free it took many letters because i had

to tell him

many times what a bastard he had been

before

i could finally tell him that i did

actually forgive him

and i also wrote emails to the women

he had been with and i did email the

final version

the one where i could tell them i

forgive you to these women and some of

them wrote back to me and one of them

thanked me for allowing her to find

closure

and then she wrote me a long email about

how she had suffered

when her own husband had been unfaithful

and so then i wrote back to her

consoling the poor thing and then she

wrote back to me

and i went hang on a minute this is not

really serving me

and so i stopped that conversation

and i started a conversation with my own

heart

telling myself that i was loved

self-compassion is one of the

superpowers

writing made me discover along

with gratitude on that dismal day when

we were told

that there was no cure for johnny’s

cancer i had instinctively

captured the sweet fragrance of

frangipani

and the sunshine outside the hospital in

my journal

i didn’t know then about the benefits of

a gratitude practice

but i had instinctively yearned to

include something

positive about that terrible day

writing a gratitude journal is as easy

as writing down

five things at the end of your day that

you’re grateful for

and there’s always something to be

grateful for

and it is what will put the smile back

on your face

but we are harsh storytellers of our own

stories we tend to dwell on the negative

the wrong turns taken the shattered

dreams

the missed opportunities and we allow

our inner editor to sabotage us into

thinking

that we’re no good the idea i want to

share with you

is that writing is a simple and very

effective way

to release those negative self

narratives that can hold us back

and it is a way of slowing down to your

own inner dialogue so that you can

change the script

and that you can change your own

narrative into a healthier

narrative because in the end it’s all

about

how we tell the story of our own lives

from the raw materials that life gives

for me it was grief that made me

discover the healing power of writing

but grief has many forms and i’m sure

many of you here will have experienced

the different shades of grief

your children leaving home or watching a

loved one go down the rabbit hole of

addiction or mental illness

or divorce that can be grief on steroids

or global pandemic grief

affects each and every one of us

but going through grief i learned that

our western culture

is grief adverse we are raised to

stoically

armor up and get through the difficult

times

without showing our emotions

but the truly brave are those who allow

themselves to feel their difficult

emotions

the truly courageous are those who allow

themselves to be vulnerable

those who hadn’t grieved told me to get

on with it already

maybe you should stop using his name

because you know it’s five months

already

but the thing is you don’t get over

grief you get through it

and my journal was there to listen to me

page after page journal after journal

until one day i was able to let go

of that story turn a page and write

a news story for myself and i didn’t

return to my academic

university position i now teach the

healing power of writing to people

all over the world and let me tell you

you don’t have to be feeling depressed

or miserable or have gone through a

traumatic life event

to benefit from the healing power of

writing

there’s great joy in connecting with

your creativity

and that moment when you discover your

own voice

on the page is empowering

it allows you to own your own story

because writing is a way of cultivating

ever deepening dialogue with yourself

and the most important relationship in

your life

is the one you have with yourself

so i invite you tomorrow why not start

all it takes is 10 minutes and i’m sure

some of you here will say

i don’t have 10 minutes i don’t even

have time for breakfast

so then think about it how often do you

mindlessly scroll through your instagram

feed the news feed

and just like that 10 minutes are gone

and we all do it we look at the lives of

others

we send emojis to strangers but how

often

do we stop to look at our own lives

and to send ourselves words of kindness

and so tomorrow before you do anything

else with your phone

use it as a timer set it for 10 minutes

and then just write without stopping to

edit

or to think just write like nobody’s

watching

and you’ll be surprised what can happen

when you allow to lead the pen to lead

the way

it’s a way to outsmart your inner editor

and it is a way to look at life

through the lens of wonder and or

and that is what will bring a new

perspective on your own life

and there are many ways to do that you

could start with a simple brain dump or

maybe

you want to write about your goals for

the day or maybe you use a writing

prompt

five things i did i saw this morning or

today i feel

or the smell of freshly brewed coffee

and the memories that evokes in me

and then just keep going and that’s when

the magic happens

trust me so i want to leave you

with these thoughts this thought today

a regular personal writing practice

is as beneficial to your well-being

as a daily walk or a regular yoga

practice

it will make you feel focused calm

and connected it’s a great antidote to

stress

and it is available to each and every

one of us

at the cost of pen and paper

you