Verified by 
This is my first blog here. I have been writing about writing for years now. It is great to have a new place to share my excitement. A new place to help provide others with writing prompts.
Before I was writing about writing, I was...well...writing. As a writer, I have come to recognize the power of story, the power of words. When I need to understand something that has happened in my life or a feeling that I don't understand, the best way for me to approach it is through writing. I have read many other writers who sorted out their lives through words. I have joined the writing and healing community by putting my pen to paper or my fingers on the computer keyboard. The words that flow teach me something new about myself and about life.
Before I was writing about writing, I was also a psychiatrist. Through my work, I have come to understand the importance of story. We all are trying to understand the world around us. We all have stories that our families tell or stories that we tell ourselves. These stories try to explain what has happened in our lives. Sometimes they are healthy stories. But other times, these stories can hold us back. I have heard young women talk about how they have always been told that they were "the clumsy one" or "the dumb one" or fill in the criticism. These stories become a framework in their lives. It is how they start to view themselves. Clearly if you think that you are clumsy or dumb, that will affect how you approach other challenges. Often we need to understand how stories got started in our minds. We may need to find new versions. We may need to edit and rewrite and find a new way out.
James Pennebaker has performed numerous studies that look at the effect of writing on health. He has come to understand that part of the healing aspect of writing is the telling of stories. When people write about challenges or traumas that they have experienced, they start to put the event into a new perspective. They can write about what happened and how they felt. They can also retell the story to remind themselves that they have come out the other side.
For example, one study looked at a group of men who had gotten laid off from their jobs. Those men who wrote about their feelings about getting laid off landed new jobs at a much higher rate than those men who didn't write or those who wrote only about their day to day job hunting plans. The reason? The men who wrote about their feelings were able to work through the anger, the disappointment, the fear. When they got to job interviews, they appeared to be better job candidates. They had dealt with their strong feelings rather than having them leak out in the interview setting.
This blog is going to provide writing prompts-jumping off places so that you can use writing to discover aspects of yourself and your life.
So...
• Start with stories that you have been told by others and see what effect they might be having on your life. Were you defined in a certain way when you were growing up? Were you the athlete, the nerd, the outsider? How are those definitions still affecting your life? Do they still affect how you view yourself? Do they keep you from trying new things? Are they positive stories or are the stories holding you back?
• Write about what you think about writing. Here is what I discovered when I wrote this prompt.
I sit with a pen and scritch scratch across the page-The sound can be anything or nothing-fireworks and the march of feet down a lonely road. The sound of a campfire crackling-breath-sunlight-rain and the soft hiss of a blossom opening to the world.
Writing is the act of creating-of discovery of the belief in my words and myself-that we both have power.
Writing is community-a sisterhood of gentle souls who dive deep through words and surface on the other side of a deep truth.
Writing is a mystery a chance for self-discovery in a quiet moment and then a louder one when you can read your words and share-Be strong enough to write and to read the words on the page and accept laughter and tears and love and even fear-because none of these feelings can destroy you and what doesn't destroy makes you stronger in the end.
Your turn.
Go....Write On!
Martha Peaslee Levine, MD
Author and Psychiatrist
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, Psychiatry and Humanities
Penn State College of Medicine
Director, Partial Hospital and Intensive Outpatient Programs
Division of Adolescent Medicine and Eating Disorders
Penn State Hershey Medical Center
http://www.eatingdisordersblogs.com/your_write_to_health
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/your-write-health
http://www.beamaia.com
(©Martha Peaslee Levine, MD)
