Your Words Matter
I love words. I always have.
Speaking Words:
One of my favorite things is a conversation that goes deep and covers many different topics. There are few things as powerful as the connections that are built through these conversations.
Reading Words:
I love curling up to read a good book, covered by a cozy blanket, sitting beside a lit candle. My full focus on each word the author wrote and how they strung each word together with the next, and the next, carefully to create the sentence. The paragraph. The chapter. The story.
Searching for the Right Words:
I enjoy trying to find the right words to capture what I have experienced or need to communicate in a succinct, precise way … and sometimes realizing there are no words to fully express it.
You know that feeling right? Repeating the familiar saying – “there are no words”.
Writing Words:
But the most powerful thing for me to understand my past, present, and dream of my future has been for me to write words. Unedited words. Words that sometimes seem to flow faster than I realized I was thinking. Words that come out and surprise me for a moment but then I realize they are certainly true and my mind is relieved to see them. This means progress.
Journaling is how I hear me.
Just me and the pen and journal. Or me and the open word doc… but the pen and paper works best for me these days. Yes, if you have had the opportunity to try and decipher my handwriting, writing is often, you know it is not legible but seeing the words on the paper and how my thoughts and feelings integrate and flow through the pen is the magic for me anyway.
Journaling is how I like to start my day. I have journaled off and on for as long as I can remember; but, as I have gotten older the more I recognize the value.
I am committed to daily practice and have not missed a single day for over a year. That still surprises me and though I’m sure the run will be interrupted, it goes to show how important it is to me. The tipping point for me was reading Julia Cameron’s book The Artist’s Way and working through the prompts she provided solidified my writing practice. She calls them morning pages and says they help clear out the “cobwebs” of our mind. I am convinced we all have more mental cobwebs, and blocks, than we know.
Julia Cameron’s perennial seller - check it out here.
So, if you want an amazing book recommendation this is it. And Julia will teach you more than the practice of journaling. Through her words and the prompts she provides, she will help you find new depths of creativity by going back in your story to find the best parts of you that you may have lost or quieted along the way…. But I don’t want to spoil it for you so I will leave it at that.
Back to Morning Pages…
Julia describes Morning Pages this way:
Morning Pages are three pages of longhand, stream of consciousness writing, done first thing in the morning. There is no wrong way to do Morning Pages–they are not high art. They are not even “writing.” They are about anything and everything that crosses your mind – and they are for your eyes only. Morning Pages provoke, clarify, comfort, cajole, prioritize and synchronize the day at hand. Do not overthink Morning Pages: just put three pages of anything on the page and then do three more pages tomorrow.”
I think the most powerful part for me is that when I write it gets my full focus. I practice doing this one thing mindfully.
I have to get quiet to do it.
It helps me hear me.
It helps me process what happened.
It helps me go back so I can move forward.
Writing about the hard, makes it seem more manageable.
Writing about the joyful moments helps me savor them even more.
It helps me trust myself more. I think it is because I know I am taking the time to get quiet and examine what is on my mind and I am not focused on others' reactions or opinions.
It is me flowing through the pen.
My journaling is private but it definitely influences my blog and my other writing.
This blog is an incredible opportunity to pull the threads between my personal experiences, clinical expertise, and research and share with you in a more informal and accessible way. It helps me articulate connections I have not previously made. It helps me not “hide” in academia and limit my writing to published articles, etc.
I have published seven blog posts so far, this one is the eighth. The response has been incredible and I love being able to share about topics I know are important and heavy on minds and hearts including my own.
But honestly, writing this blog and what I share through social media platforms often feels really vulnerable. Some days it feels more like opening my bathroom in the public square!
I am reminding myself writing can be both and. Both good and scary. Exhilarating and frightening. Risky and right. Most things that matter are both and.
So I try to sit in places I love that help me get quiet and encourage courage. Here is a view of one of my favorite writing spots. I snapped this after an early morning workout. The fog was still rising off the Deep River.
Deep River, Franklinville, North Carolina. Jan 2023.
Our words matter. The words we write for others and the words that are only for our eyes. Reminder, not everything is for others’. If you choose to write but it is particularly sensitive, just write it out and keep writing the next lines over the previous lines. It will look like a beautiful jumbled mess; but, I suspect your brain will appreciate that you got the words out and you will know how to move forward better than you did when you picked up the pen.
A Line A Day:
This week I started a new thing I am (for now) calling “a line a day” (#onelineaday) where I am pulling a line or thought out of my journaling practice and sharing on my social media accounts (see links below). I am already appreciating the opportunity to read back over previous writings to pull them out. The one I posted yesterday was from April 2022.
#onelineaday Post #1 on 1/6/2023
#oneline a day Post #2 on 1/87/2023. Was was writing I did in April 2022.
It gave me chills re-reading what I was thinking about on that spring April day. It made me remember how I felt that day and gave me the chance to savor now knowing how it turned out and how the fear had fallen away as I journaled those words.
So through #onelineaday, some days I will share a line from the current days journaling. Others will be from the past. I look forward to seeing what rhythm works best.
I hope these posts (organized under highlights on Instagram @drmichellescotton) will encourage you. Maybe they will challenge you as they did me. But most importantly I hope they encourage you to share your own words in whatever mode is right for you in this season.
Your words and thoughts matter.
I look forward to hearing from you.
