The Right to Write

Many of us have a secret book, just waiting to be let out. Like my friend who started writing a journal while she was pregnant with her daughter and then it grew into her writing to her daughter. She dismisses it by saying that her daughter will probably be the only one to ever read it since she is "not a writer".

I love writing. I love books that invite me to write in them, and writing on the first page is the best part. I love the smell, the sights and the feel of books. And the right pen is essential! I am always starting journals and then run out of steam halfway through and start another, with a supposedly different theme. I have done the gratitude journal a la Oprah Winfrey, the travel journal and also kept journals where I have poured out my deepest and darkest secrets - I often worry about those, as I fear someone will find it and all may be revealed - but it gives me such a sense of release and clarity to let it all out. Actually, sometimes burning the pages can be wonderfully freeing!

Reviewing these journals is empowering, as it can show how far I have come, and how much I have learned. When we write things down, they become concrete and real. When we write out deep and dark thoughts, they lose some of their power. Sometimes it just helps to complain or work something out in private. 

I have recently completed Julia Cameron's, The Right to Write, in which she says that we should write, because it is human nature and likens writing to meditation or prayer. A few years ago, while convalescing from an operation, I worked my way through her other book, The Artist's Way. In this book she recommends "morning pages" as "the primary tool of creative recovery". Morning pages consist of three pages of longhand writing which literally act as a brain drain. It involves simply moving the hand across the page and writing whatever comes to mind, first thing in the morning. Nothing is too petty, silly, stupid or weird to be included. If you can't find anything to write - write that! According to her, morning pages teach the logical brain to stand aside and let the artist brain play. 

I have been doing that on and off over the last few years and I can definitely recommend it - it is almost meditative and gives me insight into what is going on in my life. It is also hard to complain about the same situation morning after morning, week after week, without being moved to do something about it! It also helps to get rid of the negative stuff that clogs up my brain and makes space for more constructive thoughts. 

Writing about our experiences make them count and we don't have to be published to be called writers. Even if it is only our sons and daughters or ourselves who read what we have written, we are all writers.