Is Writing Therapeutic?

Good question, which deserves a good answer.

To me it is, although for most of my life it served more as an infrequent outlet for my verbal gymnastics. I can't tell you the amount of times that I'd create a verbal masterpiece of comedic genius and be unable to repeat or reproduce it, or times that I put together a retort or series of retorts that earned me the sobering sobriquet from a former co-worker, "Verbal Nazi".

For the longest time, I actually lived up to that sobriquet, as my mouth would often cause me to get into serious hot water with someone else. It wasn't until I started writing in 2006, participating in chat rooms in 2007 and blogging in 2008, that I decided to put my verbal skills to the test.

I won't bore you with the gruesome details of my early attempts, since those can be found by exploring the early years of this blog, but I can say that writing and blogging has been exceptionally therapeutic for me.

I mean, what other medium allows you endless possibilities in unleashing your inner sanctum and your vivid imagination without getting into trouble? For me, the dual mediums of writing and blogging has been a proverbial depth charge (shot within a beer) of fun.

Blogging is the medium that allows me the comfort to practice my writing, and my writing allows me the comfort to think out loud on my blog.

When I blog, I can express my opinions freely and without worry. I can also practice the different aspects of my writing that I'm good at and some that I'm not good at, and glean both tips and critiques as well.

Writing allows me the freedom not only to be me, but to explore the other aspects of me that I used to keep buried for fear that people either wouldn't understand or would mock me for trying to do something completely different.

Think about it for a moment. Writing allows you to try something that's completely out of your comfort zone, and not have to worry whether or not someone doesn't like it.

Think I'm kidding?

Early on, I made it a point not to write G-rated stuff, because I felt very strongly that I couldn't tailor my writing to encompass all age groups (still do to this day). However, after a few particularly unpleasant encounters, I decided to challenge myself and viola, a G-rated short story called "Cedar Mountain" was born (and published at Beat To A Pulp).

Another example. After many failed attempts at properly integrating sex within my writing, I was determined not to write anything that could be misconstrued as porn. Suffice to say, my upcoming commercial debut is about a young lady who becomes an adult movie actress because she's in debt to her uncle the loan shark.

Finally, the story that I'm working on now, which may or may not see the light of day, definitely explores that inner sanctum and its darkest and scariest contents, with a probing that borders on the horrific. It taps into the darkest book related/movie related memories of my past 30 years and in turn, I have created some truly disturbing prose.

Am I thrilled about this? Absolutely not. Will I stop writing this particular story? No. Like I said, it probably won't see the light of day, except maybe to a select few who I might ask to critique it in their spare time and offer me their valued opinion on it, but by writing this, I'm able to work out all kinds of issues and problems that otherwise might not be resolved if I didn't acquire the ability to string coherent sentences together.

To sum it up, writing and its equally powerful cousin blogging, has become the cheapest and most efficient (and some day paying) form of therapy out there today.

And some six years later, I wouldn't have it any other way.