Writing to heal

A lot of good things can happen in a person’s life. But there can be a lot of bad things, too. Very bad things. There are some things we can recover from and, hopefully, heal from. But there are some things we cannot recover from. Some bad things that happen to us or that we go through that is just too painful to move on from.

Death is one of those bad things. Losing someone we love can cause excruciating, inconsolable pain. It’s so hard to lose a loved one. For some people, they may never recover from such a loss. I have gotten to a point where I feel that the best way to remember someone and honor their memory is to do something good for them. Something they would be proud of. Something that carries a positive side of their spirit forward in some way. But even so, the pain of this loss may linger.

Heartbreak is another bad thing we have to deal with. There is some speculation that a person can die from a broken heart. This has actually happened, in both humans and animals. To love someone so much and then to lose that person, or never to even have a chance to be with that person, is such a harsh and merciless pain to live with. We try to move on from this. We do everything in our power to heal from a broken heart. It isn’t easy to love someone and when we do, when that love is lost, the pain can be so terrible that it seems like we don’t even have the strength to live anymore. To keep going anymore. Myself, I have no way of resolving such a pain, as it is one I know too well and still live with. Some people may have their own methods of healing their own broken hearts, but I have not read anything about it.

And so, what I have done, in dealing with these kinds of pains, and finding some way to keep going in life despite it, is to put it into my writing. I am a writer, and this is how I deal with the bad things in life: I write about them. Yes, some bad things I write about are not related to me in any way. Writers are observers of the world, observers of life, and write about what they see and understand. But there are some things I write about -- and have written about -- that are from me and my life. The bad things I have been through. I put them into my work, in some way. And I, ultimately, can add so much more power and realness to them in my writing, because I have felt these things myself. I have experienced these things. I have known these things.

So instead of dwelling on them, cursing them, wishing they had never happened or hating their very existence, I, instead, put them all into my writing. All of my sadness. All of my loss. All of my grief. All of my heartache. All of the abuse. All of the fear. All of the betrayal. All of the hurt.

All of it. All of the bad things go into my writing.

And this is how I release them from me. This, ultimately, will be how I heal from them. I experienced them and I know them. Therefore, I am allowed to write about them. I am allowed to put them into my work.

Having come to this conclusion, I now feel strengthened by my pain, rather than hampered by it. Instead of being sad over a family member’s betrayal, I will, instead, write about it. Or put it into my writing in some way. Instead of being angry over the events that led to my mother’s death, I will instead write about it. Or put it into my writing in some way.

There’s so many things that can go wrong in life. So many injustices, so many mistakes, so many misunderstandings and so much discrimination. As a human being, I am going to be exposed to or aware of such things whether I want to be or not. But as a writer, I can take all these things, every single form of cruelty and all of the bad things, all of the bad people, and put it all into my writing. All of it will be released from me, drained from me, and put into my writing in some way. This will be my way of dealing with it. This will be my way of finding closure from it. Hopefully to heal from it. And, hopefully, my way of making peace with it.