The benefits in writing down your thoughts
Writing (or journaling) was something I started as a kid. Back then there wasn't much to it other than basic descriptions of my daily life. It wasn’t until 2010 that I started doing it diligently, almost every second day. It started off as me detailing various events at the time, the things on my mind, whatever I was struggling with, and that was it. Overtime it grew into something that I could easily spend more than an hour doing, and gain some valuable insights. At times it was a form of escape too.
Back in 2010 and for a while afterwards, attempting to write on a deeper level felt strange. It was something new, and trying to force it felt strange, cringe even. I knew I wanted to get more out of it, but I didn't know how; so I simply unloaded my thoughts onto paper and let them take me wherever at the time. I continued doing this for a while, even when I couldn't see the benefit in doing so; I figured it was all I had back then. Eventually I'd get into a 'flow state' where the words and writing became an extension of me, and I'd come across an insightful realisation that left me with a greater sense of clarity.
Over the years writing has come to serve as an essential tool for my own thinking and self-discovery. Yes, it's helped me deal with certain difficulties, but the benefit I have gained from it as a means of self-expression and self-reflection has been invaluable. Exploring your own thoughts and feelings, on paper, is something that requires a sense of honesty with yourself. Most people can barely be honest with others, let alone their with own selves, so when you cultivate this approach of self-honesty, you naturally become an honest person.
It's also an opportunity to be upfront with yourself, almost as if you're having someone else talk to you. That might sound strange, but the point I'm making is: we've all had those moments or periods of time where there's something bothering you, or something 'on your mind', but you're always pushing it further and further back, ignoring it. I know I've had my share of those moments, and lacking any friends or family to open up to, writing it all down on paper, unfiltered, has always been a relief.
Call it what you want: self-reflection, introspection, whatever, it's an attempt at a conversation with yourself. If it's something you've never done, reading this might sound strange, and for a while that's how it felt for me, but I'm now at a point where it's natural and feels normal to do. You're not always guaranteed to have someone understand you, and exerting a lot of effort in explaining something, only to be met with a dead end, can leave you feeling more anxious and bothered. This is where writing down your thoughts will help, but only if they're unfiltered, with nothing holding you back.
As Nietzsche wrote:
"writing is an aid to thinking, a kind of memorandum-book in which the thinker can survey his own thinking and fix it for future use."
Writing cultivates your ability to think, but it also develops your capacity to write in an original, unique way. It’s so easy to fall back on common phrases, tropes, what have you, but it takes a very unique ability to write in a way only you know how. It’s how you distinguish yourself. It's a long process to get to this point, and I know I'm still cultivating it myself.
Looking back at my journal entries from across the years, it's incredible to see how much I've changed, matured, even stayed the same in some aspects (for the best), and it's as if I'm watching a time-lapse video of myself growing up. There's something heartening about it, being able to read the thoughts of myself from 5 or 10 years ago, and appreciate how far I've come, how the worries I had back then are irrelevant now, or the things I wanted, I now have. But my favourite thing is reading the journal entries where I had my moments of insightful clarity, and experiencing the sensation again.
Going back to an earlier point I made, friends haven't always been there for support, even family at times (there's things I wouldn't have felt comfortable discussing with anyone), but I know I can always trust in that after a solid session of journaling, I'll be better off than before. Only you know what your thoughts are, your feelings and whatnot, and if you're unsure how to process any of that with your own self, then it's unlikely you'll be able to communicate it to another person. This is why it's important to know how to write down your thoughts, to get to a point where you're not holding anything back.
My last point, which I mentioned briefly earlier, is that journaling has served as a form of escape. Just as reading a fictional book allows you to live in a different world, journaling has proven to be a safe haven for when the world, culture, whatever, doesn't make any sense. If there's no one around who understands you, then having this conversation with yourself on paper allows you to make sense of it all. It's not a guarantee that you'll gain some sense of clarity, but at the very least it's a form of reprieve because you can only control your own life, and being reminded of that via this conversation on paper, I've found, has always re-grounded me.
I should add that I've been writing this for over 2 weeks now, which I find funny because here I am espousing the great benefits in writing, but when it comes to actually writing about it, I've struggled to finish it properly. There's so much more I want to say on this topic, and maybe I'll leave that for a second post, but I hope I've captured the essence of what I'm trying to say.