How To Write During Anxious Times
This article offers 6 tips on how writing can help in anxious times.
This article offers 6 tips on how writing can help in anxious times.
There’s a 2020 season that I now think of as “our normal times.” Back there in NormalLand, there were certain days when I let my job or my deadlines or my morning mood deflect me from writing or any kind of creativity.
Now we have a global Coronavirus pandemic. Now, thinking or speaking about anything else except COVID-19 seems frivolous or selfish. I mean, why should any of us bother to create anything good when our inner and outer worlds have gone bad?
Self-Sabotaging Mind Tricks That Prevent Wellness
Under the guise of being “a realist,” or a “pragmatist,” in the face of crisis, many of us suspend our writing or knitting or painting or jogging or meditating. We take a grim, utilitarian pride in this — all the while knowing that we are willfully abandoning the very thing that, during past crises, has helped us and, in turn, helped us to help others.
Here’s what I know: Since I was 14 years old, writing and reading have calmed and sustained me. Years, later, I would discover that over 300 clinical research studies (on the physical and psychological benefits of expressive writing) would endorse what, for years, I had been experiencing.
Here’s what I also know: When faced with our own denial or despair, we need to document the hard evidence, the proof that we have survived past challenges and that we have what it takes to survive others.
So during these past few weeks, when my neurons snapped and sizzled with fury or fear (and no, it wasn’t all COVID-19), I made myself write about times when I faced down adversity. Then, I read what I had just written and said, See? There I was walking through those doors, even while my heart was racing. I put one foot past the other to keep on keeping on.
6 Tips for Writing During Anxious Times
1. Redefine “Writing” Forget the notion of “good” or “successful” or “productive” writing. Instead, let yourself write what makes sense for you. Let yourself write what will bring you comfort. Let yourself write or do or create whatever it is that will make you feel better—and be a better person to those who need you.
2. Use a Miniature Notebook
Fifteen years ago, following some bereavements, I put a tiny, 3" x 2" spiral notebook by my computer monitor. I filled one of those tiny pages every day. I wouldn’t even attempt to classify that writing by genre. I didn’t need to. All I needed to know was that each tiny page would bring a few moments of joy and a sense of control over the losses and events that had happened. Job done.
3. Switch Up the Medium
If you usually hand-write your first drafts, remember that there are many online journals out there. Write short, small pieces on your phone. Or get yourself a pen and some post-it notes or white cocktail napkins.
4. Edit
Now might be the time to find and edit those old drafts sitting in your computer. Or go through your online photo albums to pick out some accompanying photos for those pieces. Writing? Who said anything about writing? You’re just sprucing things up, dotting a few i’s and crossing a few t’s.
5. Don’t Write, Walk.
There are few things that a walk outside cannot make better. Wordsworth did it. So did Thoreau. And Mary Oliver. I love this interview with Oliver where she speaks about being out in nature and “listening to the world.”
6. Resurrect and Read Your “Blankie” Poems (or Stories or Essays or Songs)
In this published essay from 2016, I list a few of the poems that, for years and years, have been my emotional “blankies.” Find yours. Read them again. Learn them by heart.
Or contemporary poet Tara Skurtu is hosting #InternationalPoetryCircleon Twitter, where she invites us to read, record and share our favorite poems (written by us or another writer). Sharing is about courage, not fear.
Speaking of fear and courage, sometimes, the most courageous thing we can do is to look away from the crisis playing out on our TV screens. Use the salvaged time for a few minutes of comfort, joy and writing.
Check out my virtual group seminar, “Writing for Stress Relief and Wellness.” The seminar is available to nonprofit organizations, clinical support groups, caregivers and remote-working employee groups.
Contact me to learn more about this and my other narrative medicine or writing in healthcare programs.