Finding Joy in Writing About the Hard Stuff

And writing as a way of healing

A few weeks ago, I sent a screenshot of the following poem to my friend (aka soul brother) Liam with the enthusiastic note, “I’m loving writing!”

Missing

Imola
is swallowed up by
Imola the mother
the wife
the cleaner
the cook
Imola the writer
is banished
to a distant land
without a phone line
or internet.
I have lost 
touch
with her.

If you find her
would you 
tell her
please
that I need her
to return?

Liam’s (less enthusiastic) response came seconds later: “Are you okay? Do you need to talk?” I was bewildered. Couldn’t he sense my elation through the text? I was practically bursting with joy when I wrote that message! It was only when we spoke on the phone that Liam was finally reassured by the animated tone of my voice that I was more than just okay. The Imola I wrote about in that poem felt like a distant memory. The Imola who wrote the poem was grateful to have a writing grant to write about that painful memory, even if Imola of today – the writer, the single mother and immigrant – had plenty new challenges on her plate. It was difficult to explain this joy to Liam.

I ran into similar trouble when on the comment section of George Saunders’ Story Club ‘on the value of exercises’ I joined the always insightful

mary g.

in offering some writing advice to the questioner. To build on what Mary G wisely suggested to this writer, to feel their way into their writing and see if it takes hold, I added: “if you could just relax into it, and be open to the playfulness of writing, you might surprise yourself. It’s worth remembering that there is very little at stake. We are not performing brain surgery, only writing. And nobody will die from our bad writing :) Have fun!”

In response, I received the following question from another Story Club member:

Dear Imola,

I would so appreciate if you could elaborate on this hope and joy beyond the hardness of writing about [difficult subject]. Owing to the nature of my work, I also write about these things. For whatever reason, the words become slippery, their weight turns to dust, or whatever thoughts they animate collapse into one another. I get... stuck. Not always, but often.

I recognized, and appreciated this commentator’s vulnerable question and wanted to honour it with the seriousness it deserves. This question has been on my mind all week as I continued to write (with joy) about my own difficult subject, and inspired me to go digging for wisdom in two of my favourite books on writing: Julia Cameron’s The Right to Write and Louise DeSalvo’s Writing as a Way of Healing.

Here are my thoughts and findings:

1.     THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN HAPPINESS AND MEANING

In Men’s Search for Meaning (1946) psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl chronicles his horrific experiences as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps, and describes how a search for purpose and meaning in life is a central human motivational force that can help us face the worst suffering, and survive.

His work has been central to my understanding of what keeps me going on the worst of days. It isn’t chasing happiness, that I see as something illusive, unpredictable and impermanent; but the meaning that I find in a worthwhile pursuit (like writing and motherhood), which gives me a clear sense of direction. It is a propelling force that energizes me, every day, as I rise early in the morning to attend to these tasks. The happiness/ joy that I feel is a by-product of this pursuit, but not the goal.

Which brings me to the first thing I ask writer friends when they feel blocked, and / or discouraged:

WHY WRITE?

Why bother? Why does your work need to exist? Can the world go on without it? Most certainly it can, so why do you bother showing up, especially when it is so hard?

For me, writing always starts with a question. A question that refuses to let me go, until I attempt to answer it. And I will confess here that during those days when Imola was ‘missing,’ there was one persistent, stubborn question playing on my mind: ‘Why am I not happy when I’m supposed to be the happiest? What’s wrong with me?’ And yet, I did everything I could think of to silence this question and didn’t write a word. And not writing, felt like a form of death; a depravity. I was deprived of my life force, my breath. So, in my case, ‘why write?’ is synonymous with ‘why live?’ and I really want to live, and live to my fullest potential :)

2.     THE WRITING LIFE

In her The Right to Write – Julia Cameron makes a distinction between two very different ‘why’s of writing: Writing for discovery, and writing for product. The first is what she calls THE WRITING LIFE, a life “that cannot be separated from life as a whole.” It is a writing that “claims our world;” writing that is “a powerful form of prayer and meditation. Writing [that] brings clarity and passion to the act of living.” She goes on to describe her thirty year writing life as her “constant companion, lover, friend,” and not only as her job, her passion. “If we are invested in a writing life – as opposed to a writing career – then we are in it for the process and not the product,” she writes.

I think it is a wonderful reminder to enjoy the journey, while trying to forget, to the best of our ability, that we are aiming to (eventually) arrive somewhere. Even if we (more or less) have a blueprint of the story’s arc, the journey is all the more adventurous when we allow ourselves to get a little lost, not knowing where the story wants to suddenly go. There is a sense of daring in that; a sense of excitement.

3.     WRITING AS AN ACT OF LISTENING

But “what if there were no such thing as a writer? What if writing were simply about the act of writing?” Cameron asks. This feels to me a kinder, gentler approach to writing; writing that is more organic, an intuitive process that is about “getting something down, not about thinking something up.” This is a creative approach that was also echoed by Elizabeth Gilbert in her famous 2009 Ted Talk Your Elusive Creative Genius. It is a little difficult (and possibly, even irritating) to imagine that a work of art can be “dictated to you” by a mysterious entity, until you actually experience it. I know this because it happened to me.

The most fun I have ever had writing happened when I was writing a short story, begrudgingly, because my fiction teacher at university insisted that I wrote one, instead of submitting another excerpt from the novel I was working on at the time. Again, the story began with a question: ‘What would my ex-boyfriend think of my life if he saw me right now?’ And then, I flew with it – to the most exciting, unexpected, and fictional places. Yes, the question and circumstances were borrowed from my life, but the story of a lost child seemed to come out of nowhere. I wrote manically over the weekend, the first draft of a 6,000 word story that seemed to be writing itself, through me. I remember rushing to my computer early in the morning, eager to find out what happens next!

More surprising was the fact that this ‘energy’ seemed to translate onto the page. Everyone in class was moved by it. This story that was about lost love, a miscarriage and parenthood felt free and spacious. By stark contrast, the novel I had invested so much of my time and effort in was burdened by its “high stakes.”

This experience has taught me one of the most valuable writing lessons: Paying too much importance to the high stakes of your writing can be debilitating. The writing process, therefore, can often feel like an impossible paradox. On the one hand, I have to believe in what I’m creating as the most important thing in the world – in order to show up for it daily, even when there are at least a thousand great reasons not to. And on the other hand, when I do show up, I have to remember that what I write will not cure, or accidentally kill anyone (as the brain surgery I referred to earlier), and therefore, is of little importance. Dancing between these two paradoxes is how I allow myself some playfulness.  

But of course, it’s not always easy. And then there is the hashing up of old pains and traumas to consider, which understandably can be upsetting, if not handled with care.

4.     WRITING AS A WAY OF HEALING

Clinical studies have shown the profound health and emotional benefits of opening up through writing. In the 1997 Psychological Science paper “Writing About Emotional Experiences as a Therapeutic Process” social psychologist James W. Pennebaker and Sandra Beall have found that “writing can be an avenue to that interior place where… we can confront traumas and put them to rest – and heal both body and mind.” They have made an important distinction, however, between “simply writing about trivial topics, or only venting one’s feelings about trauma” which in itself “is not sufficient to improve health.” To improve health, “we must write detailed accounts, linking feelings with events. The more writing succeeds as narrative – the more health and emotional benefits are derived from writing.” This act of linking feelings with troubling effects, they have found, makes our bodies display responses associated with yoga and meditation. Which might explain why I have always claimed that writing does more for my mental health than my daily yoga and meditation practice.

“Writing can be a sturdy ladder out of the pit,” writes Louise DeSalvo. “The act of writing about something painful can help right a wrong that has been done to you. It can be a form of restitution.”

I have found this to be especially true when I sat down to write the pain out of my system – a process I call ‘emptying’ – regarding an event that I felt I had no agency over. My sole purpose when I sat down to write was to feel better. I had no creative ambitions at all, therefore, no pressure on the quality of my writing, which was very liberating. As I began to write, and even research back into the past, I noticed an instant, and drastic shift in my mood. Now as a ‘creator’ I reclaimed the agency that I had been denied of in real life. In writing, I slowly and systematically began to diffuse the power this event had over me, because I have reclaimed the story as my story, and understood its meaning. “The more I wrote, the more I became a human being,” as Henry Miller observed.

‘Emptying’ my pain onto the page helped me release it, and in the process – honour it. Better on the page than weighing on my heart. I have pages and pages of pain that would never see the light of day, but it is thanks to those pages that my heart didn’t harden with anger, resentment and shame, and has managed to remain hopeful and open to love. It is thanks to those pages that I have been able to put the painful past to rest.

I am not religious, but I like to go back to this quote from the Gospel of Thomas that summarizes this beautifully:

If you bring forth what is inside you – what you bring forth will save you. If you don’t bring forth what is inside you, what you don’t bring forth will destroy you.

I hope this helps. There is so much more to cover on this topic, but I will stop here. I invite you to share your wisdom in the comment section below on anything that helps you to write, especially when the stakes are high and the subject is difficult.

In the meanwhile, a big bear hug from me to you, dear and brave writer.

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