Continuous Past

When I’ve spoken about writing and depression before, I’ve had people say, “Yeah, I get depressed when I have to write.” That seems to be a leftover effect from diagramming sentences in high school English. People hear ‘writing’ and break out in a cold sweat.

The kind of writing that I’ve lectured on, practiced on my own, and used in groups and individual therapy is anything but drudgery. It is not stiff, stilted, follow the rules kind of writing. It is not having at least three lines in every paragraph kind of writing. It is not getting rid of sentence fragments kind of writing. Sometimes fragments rule! Like fragments of dreams. Fragments of memories.  Fragments of fantasy. Or is that flights of fantasy? Fly me to the moon kind of writing is what we’re talking about. This is stream of consciousness, discover what I think, plumb my emotions kind of writing.

So how do we get started? Get a journal you love and a pen you like to use. You can use the computer if you want; although some studies suggest that longhand writing can help individuals deal more effectively with emotional material than typing. As a writer, I’m not certain about this. I have certainly plunged into a zone and dealt with emotional topics while typing away at my keyboard.

What will this blog offer? Writing prompts and exercises to use for your own emotional exploration and to use with patients. In the intensive day programs in the Eating Disorders Clinic at Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, I run a weekly journaling group with our patients. We’ll check in on some of those prompts, touch on inspiration, and try to loosen some creative energy.

For the first prompt, discover your thoughts about writing. This can help you discover any hidden bias or fear that you might have as you start putting pen to paper. Or you can help your patients get loosened up with this prompt as they start to explore their thoughts.

What does writing mean to you? What memories do you have about writing? Did you have a pen-pal? Send postcards from vacation or fantasize about great adventures when you received postcards from someone else?

Pick a quiet place and set a certain amount of time aside so that you can drop into your thoughts—even if it is just five minutes. Try to turn off the inner critic or encourage your patients to ignore the voice that tells them that everything has to be perfect. It doesn’t have to be. There is even an imperfect tense in English or rather called the continuous past. As therapists we know that the past is continuous and affects the future! But I did promise that we wouldn’t get into grammatical rules so…..

Go Write On!

Martha

Martha Peaslee Levine, M.D.

Comments

[Kristina]

Dr. Levine, I'm very excited to journal along with the prompts. Since I left the program I have left my writing to the wayside and think that it may be have been an intricate part in my recovery efforts before. I would like to use the prompts as a way to better explore my life with this eating disorder and how I can use the information to grow past the need to use it as a way to cope in the world. Thank you!

[Hope]

I am very excited about journaling with your prompts! I am a believer in journaling and have learned alot about myself and healing. I will use the information to gain greater insight into my ED and learn to cope with my emotions instead of shutting down or ignoring them (especially anger and sadness).

[Phyllis Klein]

I am also excited to participate in this blog. I believe so wholeheartedly in the healing power of writing that I spent several years becoming a certified poetry therapist. Don't know what that is? Go to www.poetrytherapy.org
Just today someone sent a new Mary Oliver poem to an internet group list I am on. Wow! There's so much packed into the lines, so many ways to relate, converse, and imagine just waiting in the poem to be discovered. And the same rules go for writing poetry for healing--no editing, no worries, just words and line breaks waiting to speak to you and sometimes lucky others at your discretion of course.
Eagerly waiting to write on, Phyllis