Writing Therapy

PUTTING IT DOWN ON PAPER

According to research discussed by Robert Trivers in his insightful book called The Folly of Fools: The Logic of Deceit and Self-Deception in Human Life, the very act of writing stuff down can help realise change. So if that means making plans for the future or on the flip side writing about traumatic experiences we've suffered - the very act of writing this all down will help to either materialise or purge it.

Apparently, in tests, it was shown that those who had lost their jobs, after 6 months 53% of writers compared to only 18% of non writers had found a new job. One theory is that the anger felt is not displaced on to the new prospective employer and you become more attractive as a potential employee for that company. This theory holds up in all aspects. Try as we might to rid ourselves of the thoughts and fears built up over years - they manifest in several ways throughout our lives. The conscious mind may not detect or can be hiding these hard to remove personality traits. It's at times when we're tired or our conscious mind is dulled through alcohol that we reveal these parts of ourselves that we are trying our best to conceal or contain. Writing them down and facing up to them - then letting them go if destructive, through a symbolic act of deleting, screwing up or burning the paper could also help to free our minds from the torment of past memories.