Talking vs Writing

There are times when even the most emotionally open person will want to write about their feelings. For example, when a person is confused about what he would like to do. Writing helps to achieve clarity without the influence of other people. Consider the advantages of talking and writing, and use both to improve the quality of your life.

Talking	Writing
Talk is learned earlier in life. It is automatic.	Writing must be taught.
It takes less effort to speak than write, but either way of increasing understanding and insight reduces stress and enhances a healthy lifestyle.	Writing takes some thought. Increasing understanding and insight reduces stress and enhances a healthy lifestyle.
Talk is spontaneous.	Writing is deliberate. Rewriting to create a coherent story produces benefits.
Talk depends on the social context. (Acceptance from listeners is crucial to talk becoming therapeutic.)	Writing is independent. It is therapeutic if it allows you to experience your emotions.
Unless it is tape recorded, talking doesn’t leave a record.	Writing can be as permanent as desired. When people in studies expanded their stories to include positive emotion words, it predicted better health in the upcoming months.
Speech has simpler syntax and grammar.	Because it is more complex, there is more retention in reading and writing.
Talking is influenced by the personal presence of others. This can be either good or bad.	Writing promotes self-awareness, free from outside influences. It allows you to reconcile events in ways you can be comfortable with.

Journaling Allows You to Create a Private Space

Each of us has a different idea of happiness. Each of us has certain items that speak to us as a token of fulfillment. We strive so hard to overcome life’s problems we don’t take the time to treat ourselves with kindness. Journaling means giving ourselves permission to go inside. Writing helps us define what comforts and inspires us.

Try this: Number a page from 1 to 25. List twenty-five things that represent contentment. Don’t take the time to rank them in any order of importance; just capture the first 25 things that come to mind. For example:

1. Green tea
2. Extra pillows on the bed
3. Toys for the children who visit
4. Family photos
5. An herb garden that attracts butterflies, and so on.

When finished, scan your list and select a symbol that you can use to celebrate contentment. Pick something meaningful to you, an item that conjures up one of the best times you’ve ever had. Then when you sit down to write, think of the journal as this symbol. Use it to bring back the feeling of contentment and make it part of your current experience. If you reinforce this symbol of contentment, you will be able to recall and use it when you need to relax.

The Role of Intention

Whatever reasons you have for writing in your journal, you can get more out of the experience if you start with an intention. Take a moment to think about what you hope to gain from journaling.

Write your intention down on the first page of your journal, if you like, but then place the goal in the back of your mind. Don’t worry about how you’re going to achieve it. Try to tap into the power of the subconscious. The mind and body relegate a good deal of high-level, sophisticated thinking to what is called the adaptive unconscious, which does an excellent job of sizing up the world, influencing our emotions, or initiating action.

Now that you have an intention, let go of it. Trust that small answers will gradually start to add up, and eventually something will click. Your mind may hand you a solution in a eureka moment. Maybe not today. Be patient with the process. Open up to the possibility that the subconscious and the body possess an internal wisdom. Give yourself permission to tap into the power inside.

Let Healing Happen

When you go to a doctor, he prescribes a medication for you to take, or a treatment you will undergo, your body starts the healing process before the medicine is in your system or the exercise or surgical procedure has taken place. For most people, just seeing a doctor gives confidence that healing will occur. Depending on the patient’s cultural background, this is true whether the physician is a neurosurgeon at the Mayo Clinic or a tribal witch doctor. What happens is that healing starts when you believe it will occur. Your mind buys into it and your body makes it happen. The great physician and humanitarian, Dr. Albert Schweitzer, said, "The witch doctor succeeds for the same reason all the rest of us (medical doctors) succeed. Each patient carries his own doctor inside himself. They come to us not knowing that truth. We are at our best when we give the doctor who resides within each patient a chance to go to work."

Exceptional Cancer Patients

Any cancer patient interested in learning more about the advances being made in diagnsis and treatment should read CURE magazine. Cancer patients can receive a free subscription by signing up at: http://www.curetoday.com/. The magazine focuses on updates, research, and education for cancer patients and survivors. The Winter, 2005 issue has an article called, “Diagnostic Tools.” A small excerpt from that article talks about the exceptional recovery of a patient named Mr. Carley:

When Carley awoke from his third surgery, the surgeon told him that he had 38 tumors ranging in size from a marble to a golf ball. "He said they just closed me back up because there was nothing they could do. But I remember him saying, ‘Chris, they’re always coming up with new treatments.’ "

Five months later he began taking Gleevec. Within a month his tumors vanished, a response his physicians described as "jaw-dropping." Now a 10-year survivor with eight grandchildren, Carley has since founded the Chicago chapter of the Lance Armstrong Foundation and the Carley Cancer Research Center.

The gentleman that they gave as an example, Mr. Carley, sounds like one of the exceptional cancer patients we sometimes hear about, who defy the odds. The CURE article doesn’t go into the specifics of how he made such a remarkable recovery. If he followed the pattern of other exceptional patients, he had social support, expressed his emotions, asserted his basic needs without endangering his relationships, and he felt empowered, first by participating in his recovery and, in his case, after his treatment by finding something that he got excited about doing.

• Social Support can come from family, friends, church, or a cancer support group, which are available in most areas. If your medical facility doesn’t provide a support group, you may want to volunteer to start one. When I started a journaling support group, I got more out of it than anyone else.
• Expressing emotions is possible by talking to a professional or family OR by writing a journal. People are surprised by the notion that they should express their deepest feelings, but research has shown that doing so is essential to recovering from cancer.
• Empowerment happens in a different way for each patient. It can be as simple as guided meditation or as complex as beginning a research center like Mr. Carley. Bringing a sense of control back into the one’s life is the third trait of exceptional cancer patients.
• And finally, exceptional patients have a passion for living. They find something that brings them joy, and they pursue it with renewed vigor.

Carley founded a research center, but the rest us can’t or won’t want to do that. What we can do is find things that comfort us. I chose a symbol of comfort (something very meaningful to me) and keep it near my bed. Each time I see that symbol I remember that everything in life can work out well. Then to bring back a sense of control I chose to do things for myself that bolster the immune system. For me, that was as simple as eating more foods that contain antioxidants and practicing yoga. I believe that it is not as important what a person chooses to do, as it is to investigate what feels right, to trust one’s intuition, and then to actually make some kind of physical change. Putting a symbol of comfort by my bed reminds me, “all can be well.” If I practice yoga three times a week, it becomes an affirmation that, all is well.

Undo Stress

One theory of the mind/body connection is that thoughts and feelings are chemical. Every thought and feeling translates itself into a complex set of chemical triggers that cause neurons to fire. Even healthy, well-adjusted people have trouble dealing with life’s daily assaults. If we could reconstruct life’s events, we could also change the structure and pattern of brain activity and, in the process, minimize stress. When we are under fire, our bodies react with a “fight or flight” response. Blood is redirected to the arms and legs, preparing either to fight or run away. In this state, it is much harder for the mind to be productive, and the stress hormones the body produces make us more susceptible to illness.

As a practical matter, we cannot reconstruct our lives or undo physiological changes that happen without our knowledge or consent. We can, however, lessen the long-term harm with a variety of relaxation techniques. One of the ways that is receiving increased attention is journaling. Writing can help release stress and return us to a more healthy state. It can also capture, increase and allow us to relive the pleasure of happy times.

Journaling 101

Find a private spot.

• Write only for yourself
• It doesn’t matter how or where you write, but if you use a computer secure the files to keep them private

Get comfy.

Create a ritual, one that is meaningful for you:

• Play soft background music, choosing something that relaxes you without interfering
• Wear your favorite slippers or sweater
• Make some tea or cocoa
• Surround yourself with meaningful pictures or icons

Date your entries.

Write as needed.

• If worries or problems insert themselves into your life, you may want to write about it for 4 days in a row, at least 20 minutes per day
• By day 3 don’t repeat what you have already written
• Try to change to a different point of view or perspective
• By day 4 try to find a purpose or a benefit from the upheaval you are going through

Don’t edit as you go.

• Spelling and grammar don’t matter
• Writing skill is not important
• Putting your deepest thoughts and emotions into words is what provides health benefits

Start with an intention then let it go.

• Some people start writing about health issues but find themselves moving into marital problems. That’s okay. Go where the process leads you
• Tap into the unconscious mind

Express deepest emotions.

Record events, but also find meanings:

• Create a story with you and other people involved.
• Tie it to other events, childhood, family history or future
• How is the trauma affecting your life?
• Where can you go from here?
• What insight have you gained?

TRUST YOUR INTUITION

At first, you may find that writing makes you feel worse, but do not get caught in a spiral of self-pity. If writing does not provide benefits or solutions, seek guidance from a doctor or professional counselor. Journaling is not a substitute for medical treatment. It is a method of self-help that has helped many people in a wide variety of situations.

The Body-mind Connection

Today, let’s consider how physical experiences can influence the mind:

Think of lying down in the sand, the morning sun gently warming your skin, the ocean lapping at your feet, a rustle of pine needles somewhere behind you, a light summer breeze blowing, 78 degrees and not a cloud in the sky. Take your time and savor the experience.

The warmth of your skin is comfortable. Your breathing is easy, unimpeded by any resistance in the chest or the throat. Your muscles are so relaxed that you can not sense any pull. The sand supports all your joints. The body feels light, grounded but airy. You have the energy to move, but you prefer to remain quiet. The pleasure of the moment is felt in the body, but the sensations are so diffuse that it is difficult to describe precisely where it is happening. You have a desire to get up, but instead just stay put and savor the stillness.

Warmth passes sweetly through your blood. The breeze caresses your face. And these sensations eventually impress the mind.

If you direct attention away from the well-being of the moment and think about what is happening, your mind fills with pleasurable thoughts. What you usually regard as "body" and as "mind" blend in harmony. Any conflicts now ease. Any opposites now seemed less important. Thoughts jell around a word like, “tranquility.”

It is possible to bring the mind-body connection into journaling. When you concentrate on your feelings, define them, and then reinforce them with the physical act like writing, it captures good emotions and makes them part of your life experience. On the other hand when feelings are negative or unpleasant, writing them down has a way of telling your mind that you can handle it. You have dealt with the upheaval and can move on.

Start with an intention but then let it go

Whatever reasons you have for writing in your journal, you can get more out of the experience if you start with an Intention and then let it go. Determine what you hope to gain from journaling but don’t be concerned with the results. Write your intention down on the first page of your journal, if you like, but then place the goal in the back of your mind. Don’t worry about how you’re going to achieve it.

Try to tap into the power of the subconscious mind. Scientists do this when the work on a complex problem. The cure for Alzheimer’s is so huge that they cannot attack the problem in its entirety. They break it down into small, tiny subjects that they can work on. Gradually the small answers start to add up, and eventually something clicks. They have eureka moments when their minds seem to hand them a solution. The mind relegates a good deal of high-level, sophisticated thinking to what is called the adaptive unconscious, which does an excellent job of sizing up the world, assessing danger, or initiating action.

• Get comfy, relax. You may want to devise a ritual to help set the mood. Light a candle, make a cup of green tea, wear your favorite slippers. You may also want to go to a unique place away from work or home such as a library. Or if you write at home make one room look different with colored light bulbs or a special throw.
• Find a private spot. You may want to destroy or hide what you have written. It is enough to deal with your own emotional upheavals. You don’t need anyone else judging you or being offended by what you write.
• Date the entries.
• Write regularly. Each of you will define how often you need to write for yourselves. It doesn’t have to mean every day. Maybe you only want to write once a week. Maybe you want to write every day for four days, for at least 20 minutes, the way Dr. Pennebaker suggests, and then not come back to your journal until you feel the need to.
• Don’t edit as you go. Don’t overanalyze. Go with the flow. Whatever you write will be fine. Studies show that the education or writing ability made no difference in the therapeutic benefits of writing.

Challenge Your Own Identity

Journaling is one way to become more aware of the joy and mystery of life. Get comfy, relax. You may want to devise a ritual to help set the mood. Light a candle, make a cup of green tea, or wear your favorite slippers. You may also want to go to a unique place away from work or home such as a library.

It is best to find a private spot. You may want to destroy or hide what you have written. It is enough to deal with your own emotional upheavals. You don’t need anyone else judging you or being offended by what you write. It is not necessary to show what you write to anyone to receive the health benefits of journaling.

Writing privately is a good way to explore what is at the center of your life. Write for twenty minutes about your sense of who you are. Begin with the phrase “I am…” For example: I am a person who loves children. I am often happy. I am sometimes frightened. I am confused about my work. I am strong…etc. Feel free to change the sentence structure and follow any line of thought. Without censoring or judging the sentences, simple keep writing continuously for at least twenty minutes. If you feel like going longer, feel free to continue.

Notice what you wrote. Notice what you feel when you read it. Are there certain themes, things that repeat? What predominant impression do you come away with? …Which sentences seem most troubling? Which seem most accurate?

Which phrase seemed most important? Tomorrow or the next time you write in your journal, spend a while reflecting on this single element, the one that felt the most powerful when you wrote it. Become aware of what it may want to reveal to you.

A Magic Pen

There are an infinite number of reasons for keeping a journal. The act of writing makes you more aware and helps you pay attention to details you would otherwise miss. Paper and pen provide you with a vehicle to bring actions and feelings into the open.

• Writing increases understanding and insight, reduces stress and enhances a healthy lifestyle.
• Writing is deliberate, and rewriting journal entries to create a coherent story or gain insight produces health benefits.
• Writing is therapeutic when it allows you to experience your emotions.
• Writing can be as permanent as desired. When study participants expanded their stories to include positive emotion words, it predicted better health in the upcoming months.
• Because writing is more complex than talking, people retain more.
• Writing promotes self-awareness, free from outside influences. It allows you to reconcile events in ways you can be comfortable with.

Use the Mind to Heal the Body

We cannot control emotional responses, and we shouldn’t try. Emotions are not a question of right or wrong — they just happen. Picture this: You are strolling down a quiet street, enjoying the sunshine. You pass a picket fence. All of a sudden a dog charges the fence, teeth bared. It jumps and almost clears the top. Your heart leaps in your chest and you shudder away from his angry bark. If you had a bad previous experience with a dog, the fear may be paralyzing, not really connected to the current situation.

Fear is not always rational. It depends on one’s coping skills and life experience. Each and every feeling translates itself into a complex set of chemical triggers that cause neurons to fire. Even healthy, well-adjusted people are subject to daily assaults, which make it much harder for the mind to be productive. Stress hormones make us more susceptible to illness, but we cannot reconstruct our lives or undo physiological changes that happen automatically. We can, however, lessen the long-term harm with a variety of relaxation techniques.

Thousands of self-help methods are available. No one system is right for everyone, but researchers have shown that journaling has some surprising health benefits. Putting a bad experience into words by writing it down has a way of telling the unconscious emotional channels that we have dealt with that issue and can move on. The mind can undo the effects stressful situations have on the body.

Who, Me?

Each of us has a different idea of happiness. Each of us has certain items that speak to us as a token of fulfillment. Sometimes we are so busy that we overlook treating ourselves symbolically in way that match our accomplishments. Take a piece of paper and number the page from 1 to 25. List 25 things that represent contentment to you. Don’t take the time to rank them in any order of importance; just capture the first 25 things that come to mind. For example:

1. Green tea
2. Extra pillows on the bed
3. Toys for the children who visit
4. Family photos
5. An herb garden that attracts butterflies, and so forth...

Once you have your own list, review it and select something that you can use to celebrate contentment. Choose something that has special meaning to you, because it reminds you of an experience or time in your life that was happy. It can be an object, color, texture, view. In your journal describe this item in specific detail. How it looks, feels, reassures you. Find out why it comforts you. Write about this special item's history. Speak quietly to this private symbol of contentment.

Then whenever you encounter this item in real life, you will be reminded of life's rewards. Or when you are under stress, you can visualize the symbol and draw on its power to bring contentment back into your life.

Holiday Greetings

Writing about periods of upheaval in your journal has a way of telling your subconscious, “I can handle it.”

Rewriting those episodes helps you make things better.

Putting worries down on paper helps to close the issue, “I’ve dealt with that and can move on.”

Finding words to describe your hopes and dreams can make them part of your life story.

Trust your intuition and find what works for you.

Best wishes, Georgiann

Why Write?

Researchers in behavioral science have shown that therapeutic writing can be a good way of dealing with the stress of disease. It may be very beneficial for you; it is not a substitute for talking to family, friends and medical personnel.

Consider the Advantages of Writing:

Feelings happen below the level of awareness. Your nervous system responds to your thoughts and images as if they were real and happening now. There is no past or future for the nervous system. There is only now. Your body reacts to the images in the present and provides the appropriate level of energy. There is no distress when you focus on the present. Distress occurs when you have elicited more energy than you can use now. You do this by worrying, by presenting images of work or threat in the future or the past but do nothing about it now. Your body possesses a wisdom that has been honed since the first forms of life. In order to work in harmony with this inner wisdom, you need to learn how to communicate with your body and mind in clear images that elicit the right amount of energy for your goals. The body is a faithful servant that responds to the images you and your environment present to it.

As you read the following passage, notice how your body responds to the images:
Imagine that you are in a garden. The green grass, trees, and flowers present you with a quiet, peaceful feeling. Not far away is a lush lemon tree, heavy with bright, yellow lemons; its leaves are a deep green. As you approach this tree, your attention is drawn to a particularly large, ripe lemon. You reach for it, pluck it, and take a closer look. You can see and feel the pitted texture of its skin. You now grasp it firmly and cut it open, watching as the juice begins to flow. The fragrance of fresh lemon is in the air. As you bring the freshly cut lemon closer, and prepare to bite into it, you become aware that your body has already prepared you for the tartness of the lemon's juice.

Did you begin to pucker? The point is that even if we don’t fully understand or articulate our situation, our bodies respond and create minor or major biological changes. Joy boosts, not only the spirit, but also the body’s processes. At the other extreme, stressful events have a detrimental effect even if we do our best to shake them off. Writing is a tool for becoming more aware of your deepest feelings. And writing is a way of letting go of unhappiness. Expressive writing can help you overcome intrusive thoughts or worries that insert themselves into your life.

Expressive Writing Guidelines:

1. If you feel your writing about a particular topic is too much for you to handle, then choose something else. If you aren’t ready to address a particularly painful topic, write about something else. If you feel a particular topic will make you flip out, don’t write about it. Later on when you are ready, go back and tackle this subject.
2. Be aware that you can feel somewhat saddened or depressed after expressive writing. Don’t push yourself to do something you know intuitively is wrong. Write for yourself and no one else. After a few days, you should begin to feel better. (Four days is a good point to gauge your progress.) If you are still overly sad or concerned, seek help. Talk your doctor or a qualified professional counselor.
3. Another concern is privacy. If someone finds and reads your expressive writing, it may change your relationship with that person forever, sometimes in a bad way. Secure or destroy the pages no one else should read.
4. The final concern is that — if you reduce your inner conflicts — you may affect the course of your life and the lives of others in unintended ways. Statistically most people say that their life changes were beneficial, but they also acknowledge the power of expressive writing. In some cases, people quit their jobs, stopped seeing current friends and moved to a new city, because they realized they were on a life path they did not really want.

For more information consult:

The Writing Cure: How Expressive Writing Promotes Health and Emotional Well-Being,
Stephen J. Lepore and Joshua M. Smyth, American Psychological Association, 2002

Writing to Heal, A Guided Journal for Recovering from Trauma and Emotional Upheaval,
James W. Pennebaker, Ph.D. New Harbinger Publications, 2004

Cancer a Personal Challenge, edited by Dr. Bob Rich, Anina’s Book Company, Australia, available as a download from http://bobwriting.com

Backstory

Backstory for The Acts of Judas

The nurse sprays my shoulder with anesthetic. The icy fluid quickly deadens the skin. Moments later she inserts a 22-gauge needle into the subcutaneous catheter that leads directly to a vein. A catheter is a relatively safe way to pump one of the strongest chemotherapy drugs available into my body. The prospects frighten me, but the alternative is even more frightening. I watch the needle going in, and I do what I must to survive.

Six surgeries, six months of chemotherapy and radiation treatments kept the cancer from spreading. While going through chemotherapy, it was sometimes difficult to think clearly. My thoughts would stick like a programming loop, and I would say the same things several times without realizing it. In other ways, however, my thoughts were more lucid than before. I learned empathy, especially for people who face hard choices, and I understood life’s challenges in ways I never had.

Both the good and bad experiences of 2001 influenced the novel I was writing. The book ultimately became The Acts of Judas. The idea for ACTS had occurred to me five years earlier. In 1996 I traded novels with a fellow writer, Phil Porter. Phil and I “met” in an on-line writing workshop. His fiction was filled with exciting action scenes, and mine was character-driven. I appreciated his honest critiques of my work and agreed to read a draft of a novel he was working on. Phil was writing a story about the conflicts between Jewish Pharisees and Sadducees at the time of Christ.

My exchanges with Phil sparked an interest I had in Judas Iscariot. I wrote a fictional gospel, as if it were penned by Judas. I also did some preliminary research, but nothing more came of the idea until 2001. That was the year I took out the old files and began to plot the rest of the story. If a Judas scroll turned up in modern times, what controversy would arise? Who would find it? What would the discoverers do — use it for political purposes, or burn it? If you think back to 2001, you may recall that President Bush was beginning his first term. The Palestinians thought Bush favored Israel, and they responded by raising the stakes with more violence. Tensions in the Middle East escalated.

In March I decided to go ahead with my novel. In April the doctors diagnosed my cancer. I coped by not talking about it. Avoidance was my defense mechanism. Instead of facing it openly I put personal pain and uncertainty into the characters. I could vividly imagine how they reacted to duress. By the end of the summer in 2001 I was struggling with the accumulative effects of chemotherapy and trying to write a cohesive ending to the book. Then September 11th made personal concerns fade into the background.

When I finally came back to the book, the terrorists’ actions made the ending clearer. I knew I had to incorporate those events into the story. Not long after that Treble Heart Books agreed to publish the novel. It took two years to see the book in print. Now whenever I look at the cover, I remember what I went through and, more importantly, what the world has gone through. My own future looks bright. I wish I could say the same for everyone who survived the upheaval of 2001.

Treble Heart Books released my novel, The Acts of Judas, in December of 2004. Publication took my journey down a very different road. Whatever else happens, I believe that releasing my emotions vicariously through my characters was a factor in my recovery.

To read the book's reviews, please visit: http://www.trebleheartbooks.com/WDBaldino.html

Periodically I hear about someone new in my circle of friends who has been diagnosed with cancer. Everything I have read and experienced leads me to believe three things about surviving cancer:

1. That the patient needs to feel like an important member of the health care team. His or her satisfaction with the treatment plan works as well as any medication.
2. A patient needs to take charge of the healing process (mentally and spiritually, and not just physically.)
3. He needs to embrace a lifestyle that cherishes and encourages the immune system (the act of choosing what that means for each individual--diet, meditation, massage, music, yoga, etc.--is as important as any of the adjunct therapies he picks.)

Personally, my diet was good before I was diagnosed. I have added yoga and therapeutic journaling. Both comfort me. Both help me move to a climate of health. When you hear of someone who received bad health news, share the four E's with them. They need to

• Embrace a healthy lifestyle.
• Enhance their immune system.

Help make these goals a reality by:

• Expressing deepest

Emotion, either by talking about these deepest experiences with someone who allows you to be totally open, or by journaling. Putting those feelings down on paper has a healing quality, which is hard to understand until you try it.