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Writing As A Form Of Therapy

SilenusSenior Contributor12 Apr 2016, 3:14 pm AEST

Writing As A Form Of Therapy

Hi all,

I have found throughout the course of my life that writing has been a constant companion to me. It has provided me with a way to vent my frustrations, to grapple with the eternal verities of life that confound and delight me, to explore ideas and concepts, and to try to put into words the often chaotic moods and thoughts that result from having a mind that's a little bit odd...

I have written lots of poems, especially in the last 3 or 4 years, dealing with depression and bipolar. They help me to process and understand some of the things that are happening in this twisted little noodle of mine. As such, writing has become one of my main forms of therapy.

One of the best things that I find about writing is that it can act as a kind of mood diary. I can read things that I had previously written, and it will quite often map out where I was at during the time of writing. The words I spread across the page act as signposts of my progress, too. As my self knowledge increases and my life journey progresses, I find that it affects how I write and what I write...

Often, we do not see the thousands of tiny little changes to our selves that our life experiences cause over the years. It can be very helpful to re-read old writings, in order to see how far we have come, what we have improved, where we have fallen back into old harmful habits, and the things that we have learned.

The language that we use in our writings and in our thoughts and in our speech is very important. It can reveal a lot about our selves, our states of mind, and our moods...

That language, it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. I believe that we attract certain kinds of people around us, and create (or at least influence) life situations based on our choice of language. It helps define who we are as a person.

Negative thinking, self-deprecation, self-hatred, these sorts of dangerous life traps are often revealed in our choice of words. So too are the positive things. It all starts with a glass. How we describe the glass and the quantity and quality of its contents, that's where language comes into it, and it can shape our very lives and the lives of those around us.

Writing... it is my solace and my main tool of self-analysis. It is my favourite form of therapy...

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In response to: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

SilenusSenior Contributor08 Sept 2016, 9:24 am AEST

Poem - What Thought Thought

My latest poem... written in a style called prose poetry... allows for a nice flow or stream of consciousness...

Hugs and happy vibes beaming to you all. I hope this poem inspires and challenges thought...

What Thought Thought

What thought thought, thinking away in our heads... ideas rule our lives... ideas bring the world to its knees... before the deed, there is the thought... I need or want to do this thing, and so I harness my potential power to action, and I do the thing... all ruled at the start by an idea... this intangible creation of our minds, thought, simply a biochemical firing of neurons in our brains... a little voice in our heads, listened to, heeded, and made real by an act of will and a desire to do... thinking a thought is never challenged, we never think to think about thought, unless in turmoil and pain we are caught... then we question and challenge our thoughts (always and ever using more thoughts)... the constant chatter of thoughts makes a brain turn insane... what thought thought... thought thought it was separate from all instead of connected... then thought could think about "me" and "other"... thought thought it would be clever, and created the concept of nations... then thought could think about "us" and "them"... thought thought that it wanted more stuff than it needed, so thought thought up the concept of property... then thought could think about "mine" and "yours"... thought thought that it was necessary to measure and compare, and came up with the concept of money... then thought could think about so very many things... everywhere thought thought it looked, it saw division and conflict, with fragments of self fighting each other... thought against thought, begetting more thought... ever thinking ever more thoughts... [A lightbulb lights] here's a thought... think about your thoughts before you see them through, for the thoughts are there before you say and do... [A larger brighter lightbulb lights] what thought thought... perhaps thought shouldn't think so very much...

In response to: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

Unknown userMember08 Sept 2016, 9:37 am AEST

Re: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

@Silenus lovely to see you back.
My question in all this is how to we make ourselves 'enough'. My thoughts are always centred around 'enough'. It seems that I'll never be good enough for me. I know this is a tangent slightly to the left of what you have written but is encompassed in it as well. Just for today how do I get through thinking I've done enough and I am enough?

In response to: Poem - What Thought Thought

DecadianSenior Contributor08 Sept 2016, 10:16 am AEST

Re: Poem - What Thought Thought

I really like that @Silenus

Very thought provoking. Very subtle

Thanks for sharing

Decadian

In response to: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

DecadianSenior Contributor08 Sept 2016, 10:33 am AEST

Re: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

I do love thinking @Silenus - I don't know where the point of thinking and over-thinking is - but maybe when the thought becomes unpleasant

Still - I think

Now I might have to look this up but Humpty Dumpty is a very interesting character in history - quite possibly King Charles1 who was the only British King to be executed - and then - no one could put him back together - maybe Charles was well and truly glad to be out of the argument - civil war and all that - but whatever - when the egg breaks it can't be put back together - we could scramble the egg - but once scrambled the egg is in worse shape -

Any further would be over-thinking

However - I did read philosophy in my first year and battled with Rene Descartes and the idea of being etc - and the problem of dreams and eventually come to cogito ergo sum - I think therefore I am - and at the bottom line this is the basis of your poem I think - (think - gotcha)

An animal mighr know something - eg - if I yowl or bark at the door - it might open - but it cannot think - some pets live a long time with humans and learn behaviours but they cannot think. However - humans can - and maybe some of the other great apes have thought too - and it's really possible some monkeys think things out

How provactive your poem and your post is @Silenus - thanks for sharing that

Decadian

In response to: Re: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

SilenusSenior Contributor08 Sept 2016, 10:42 am AEST

Re: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

Hiya @Former-Member...

I think what you ask about is spot on... how do we make ourselves 'enough'...

It strikes at the heart of the personal breakthroughs I've had in being able to deal with the moodstorms and thoughtstorms of my particular manifestation of loopy...

Let's explore this together... do you have time?

How do I get through thinking I've done enough and I am enough...

Hahaha... let's see how far down the rabbit hole we go...

Our brains... our thoughts... our concept of self... it all ties together, doesn't it?

Our brains seem to be hardwired to fix problems... there's the problem of survival... ensuring there's enough food, water and shelter to survive... solving this problem, that's what survival is all about...

Since we live in a "civilization", most of our survival problems are fairly trivial... scrounge enough money together to pay the bills and put some food on the table...

But the point is, our brains are conditioned from a very early age to fix problems... it's more than just the survival instinct and all of that important life-and-death stuff...

As babies, we are given toys. Often, because smart people think that it's a good idea, the toys that we are given as babies have some element of dexterity or problem-solving involved... put the round peg in the round hole, match the thing to the other thing, that sort of stuff...

Problems... teaching our brains to solve problems...

Jigsaw puzzles... there's a thousand-piece problem, waiting to be solved... hahaha... and that's what we consider entertainment... breaking up a perfectly good picture into a thousand or more pieces, and then throwing them to the floor or strewing them across the table in a chaotic manner, only to start putting the pieces back together again...

Problems... teaching our brains to solve problems...

Then school starts... oh boy! Here we go! Nothing but problems for our brains to try and solve...

Learning to read... a problem... more of a problem for some than for others...

Mathematics... lots of problems... teaching our brains to solve problems...

The reality is that the world of our thoughts (our thinking brain's domain as voices, words, images, memories) is a very conflicted and scary place...

So many problems to solve... hahaha... and when there aren't enough problems to solve, to make ourselves feel better about things and feel more in control, we make problems up out of thin air...

Our thoughts, so adept at manufacturing worry, hurt, fear, anger and a bunch of other lesser helpful emotions... all out of thin air, for what is thought other than out of thin air?

An idea is not tangible, but the things that we say and do when we are driven by that idea, well... that stuff can move mountains in the tangible world of the Really Real...

So, to recap - we have a naturally problem-seeking mind... we feel great when we solve a puzzle or arrive at a solution...

Sudoku, crosswords, the weekly quiz...

Problems... teaching our brains to solve problems...

And how does our brain solve problems?

It looks at the problem. It measures the problem. It pokes and prods the problem. It makes value judgements about different scenarios, even about how severe the problem is. It analyses the problem further...

Driven by this desire to be free of a problem, we seek to change something, to transition from whatever state of existence we are in (where there is a problem) to a state of existence where the problem is gone or lessened...

It doesn't matter if it is an internal problem within our own world of our "Self", or if it is an external problem... the process that we follow is nearly always the same... analyse, measure, reason, measure again, and eventually arrive at the best possible solution to the problem...

Often, the solution to the problem brings more problems...

And that's just what our brains love, because solving problems is what it's all about... hahaha...

I have analysed myself for years... self-awareness, self-evolution, growth, regression, pick myself up, dust myself off, regrowth, reshape, respond...

Each traumatic life event or drama, looked at as a problem to be fixed, because it is obviously those things that have led me to be in this current state I am in... conflicted, afraid, hurting, angry, [insert your own particular flavour of negative emotional state here...]...

So, I go to see a therapist for a while... we talk about a bunch of stuff... uncover a bunch of other stuff... maybe get an insight into further problems...

Problems... teaching our brains to solve problems...

But wait...

What if I just said "Stop"? I'm going to challenge this "I'm broken and I need to be fixed" fixation that I have... I'm going to stop measuring and analysing and poking and prodding and finding problems that may or may not be real...

I'm going to accept what is... quietly, without any effort of will or intellect, I will observe what is...

Now, I have moved beyond the need to accept things... that is a wonderful step in our meditative journeys... I don't need to accept things, because I have no choice... that which is is that which is... the world doesn't care if I accept it or not...

I put down my measuring tools...

All of those analytical tools...

All of the voices of my thoughts, nagging at me, trying to make me feel guilty, just manufacturing problems out of thin air...

In response to: Re: Poem - What Thought Thought

SilenusSenior Contributor08 Sept 2016, 10:50 am AEST

Re: Poem - What Thought Thought

Good morning @Decadian!

As always, your posts are a delight to read.

In response to: Re: Poem - What Thought Thought

SilenusSenior Contributor08 Sept 2016, 10:57 am AEST

Re: Poem - What Thought Thought

This poem, the first that I attempted to write in the prose poetry style, really flowed out of me in no time at all... I think it was an attempt for my writing-as-therapy self to resolve some turbulence...

What I'm really trying to get at with this poem is to communicate the difficulties of talking about mental health issues... most people don't want to hear about it, and even fewer people know how to deal with it...

There Once Was A Beautiful Person

There once was a beautiful person. Not a skin-deep physically beautiful person. A beautiful person, through and through. Do no harm and help where you can beautiful person. Love and compassion beautiful person. Spread joy beautiful person... but this beautiful person was gifted-cursed... they had a beautiful heart and soul, despite having suffered through much hurt... at the same time, the pain they felt every day, inside and out, physical and mental... it had tested them and made them stronger... beauty through adversity... compassion and empathy, connecting to other hurt beauties... the sad smile is the most beautiful of all... but all that beauty came with a curse, for the gods are a fickle lot... all that pain, it had changed this beautiful person... their voice, earlier so bold, warm, caring and inviting... beautiful voice... now transformed to a hideous blood-curdling scream every time this still-beautiful person opened their mouth... [4th-wall-breaking aside to the audience] "Dum dum duuuuummmm!!!" Alas, this beautiful person, gifted-cursed so... how they all recoil away from this beautiful person... and so, a lonely beautiful person is left to never bring joy and healing to others, left all alone... where pain transformed and gifted-cursed this beautiful person, now loneliness brings its own gift-curse... learn to adapt, beautiful person... stand alone, beautiful person... never open your mouth again, beautiful person, for fear that the blood-curdling screams will chase them all away...

In response to: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

Faith-and-HopeSenior Contributor08 Sept 2016, 10:59 am AEST

Re: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

Hi @Former-Member .... 💜🌷

Can you take that question outside yourself a bit .... ?

Think about how you might try to answer it if someone close to you were askin the question .... like your girlfriend, or one of your sons .....

It is important to understand that you are as important as anyone else in your life .... you count .... you matter .... just as much .... ❤

I sense you have an awful lot of compassion for others,but struggle to extend the same courtesy to yourself .... part of learning to be a friend to yourself ....

I think some of the answers you are looking for will start to materialise naturally when you apply this principle .....

You have your therapist, Phams worker, family and friends to help you step up to this .... you can do this .... I believe in you .... 💜💜💜

In response to: Re: Poem - What Thought Thought

DecadianSenior Contributor08 Sept 2016, 11:09 am AEST

Re: Poem - What Thought Thought

Thanks @Silenus

I enjoy reading what you write too - you have given me a lot to think about with the beautiful thinking-cursed person - I think that's what you wrote - I will have to get back to it for the definition

There is so much layered thought there - it deserves thinking about

I think a lot - sometimes I take long walks just to think - I have never felt cursed by my thoughts - to me they are a gift

And I like a challenge

Dec

In response to: Re: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

Unknown userMember08 Sept 2016, 11:54 am AEST

Re: Writing As A Form Of Therapy

@Faith-and-Hope @Silenus

Thank you both for your responses and they both addressed the issue of 'enough' in different ways and I can identify with them both.

I love the rabbit hole @Silenus, its always an interesting place to go as we grow curious about things. You made me laugh about our need to problem solve and the fact we do jigsaw puzzles to do so but it was also a good reminder that my old psychologist did take note of my insistent need to problem solve EVERYTHING, even things that weren't problems yet sometimes😬 as you highlighted. I think much of my 'enough' issues are possibly tied up in trying to problem solve what is enough.

@Faith-and-Hope Thank you for your response and almost all of it has come from my therapist in pretty much those words, it's a bit uncanny. I guess my therapist is trying to instil that I need to find a way to 'do' without thinking. Even the smallest task I can make impossible with my thoughts. I never find that peace of just doing something a ticking the box and then moving on without making a judgement on it.

On my good days like today I wake up at a reasonable time in an ok mood and not too cloudy and then am faced with the massive ever growing list of 'to do' but I get so caught up in my thinking and prioritising and working out what is enough and will I ever feel it as enough that I often self destruct by mid afternoon when I haven't accomplished anything on my to do list and am exhausted from beating myself up. On the rare occasions that I have enough clarity and do I get caught up on feeling it's not enough and again self destruct. I guess both of you answered my question in relevant ways. I need to find a way to stop problem solving and just 'do' and I need to find some self compassion that sometimes it's enough. Now if I can just find that magic wand somewhere. 💜😊

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