Six Reasons Writing is Good for Your Mental Health

From simply stressed out to anxiety to depression, writing is good for your mental health.

Let’s face it, we all take a downer sometimes. Now and again that translates into more serious complaints such as anxiety, OCD, depression or bipolar, but one therapy that is free in that context is putting pen to paper and writing.

When I was in the Priory Hospital in London after I had just been diagnosed with late onset bipolar disorder, I had a yoga teacher who used to say “If it’s troubling you, get it down on paper.”

I took her advice, and guess what, not only did I find that getting my troubles down on paper was therapeutic, but also that the fact and action of writing was equally so.

I subsequently took up writing as a hobby and discovered over time that it was excellent for my mental health.

Here’s six reasons why:

A sense of purpose

We all need a sense of purpose, because from that derives our sense of self-worth. If we have no purpose, at best we are aimless, and at worst we sink into a slough of depression and despond.

When I lost my job due to bipolar, I felt a deep sense of failure and loss. After all, I had spent six years training as a lawyer and a decade successfully practising as a workaholic attorney at a top media and entertainment law firm in London.

Suddenly the rug was pulled from under my feet.

I felt like my psyche was sinking in the quicksand of failure.

When once I was a top lawyer, now I was nothing.

But then I took up writing, and it gave me a profound sense of purpose and self-belief. Suddenly every morning I would wake up and have something to aspire to.

I would bounce out of bead ready to go.

And I would know that I had the opportunity to engage in an activity that I loved:

Writing.

Focus and concentration

When I was very ill I would often swing wildly between depression and mania. My mind was all over the place. Let’s face it, it’s difficult to concentrate in circumstances like that.

Writing not only gave me a purpose, it gave me a daily exercise regime whereby I could practice focus and concentration. It was hard at first, and extremely distressing. After all, I was a guy who had been accustomed to leading complex negotiations over lengthy documents for days at a time, and now I could hardly focus enough to write up a paragraph.

Luckily, focus and concentration are like a muscle, and the more I practised the better I got. I’m now again able to concentrate and focus for at least a couple of hours at a time, and that’s down to my writing.

Structure

The best blogposts, like the best screenplays, are well-structured.

Learning about writing structure in turn gave much needed structure and order to my mind itself. When I learned how to structure a screenplay, or bring order to a blogpost, I was imposing that structure on my mind, so enabling it to function much better.

It brought me out from the chaos of mania and depression.

A regimen

There’s that old unattributable adage about inspiration turning up at your desk every morning at nine thirty sharp.

Most writers will already know this, but if you want to write successfully you need to impose a writing regimen on yourself. One famous writer once said that he writes every day except Christmas Day and his birthday. Then he said that he had lied: he writes every day including Christmas Day and his birthday.

When I decided to write, I promised myself that I would write every day, but that I would write for no more than two hours a day to avoid my life becoming unbalanced.

Imposing a writing regimen created another type of structure – a temporal structure – on my life, that gave order to my day and hope to my soul.

The hope of success

Hope is an important part of the fundamental human condition.

Without hope we have no purpose.

And without purpose we are aimless and can sink into depression.

Writing gave me hope:

The hope of improving the quality of my writing.

The hope of a readership.

The hope of having a writing career one day.

Writing brought me hope, and for that I am eternally grateful.

Grit and determination

As anyone who writes screenplays or promotes a blog knows, success requires commitment, grit and determination. You have to hustle.

When I was in legal practice I had to hustle a lot because I needed to market my own practice. In the early days, before my bipolar go the better of me, I was very good at it, and I used to love it. It was one of the things I missed.

So I am in seventh heaven when I am marketing my screenplays and my blogposts. I’m not very good at marketing my blogposts yet, because I’m still learning about my platform and the online world, but I will get there.

Learning to be determined is an important skill in life. You get further, you stay the course, you succeed no matter how long it takes.

Writing reinvigorated that for me, too.

Conclusion

Writing is a good in itself:

It’s good for creativity.

It’s good for the soul.

But from my experience it’s also extremely good for the mind.

I’m a far better person today that I would have been had I not taken up writing.

I wish the same for you.