When I was training business English, I would play a simple game with client groups to activate their passive vocabulary. I would give them a minute (two if they were lower level) and a prompt, and they would have to list as many words based on the prompt they could. I would use this to improve challenges they had with difficult letter groupings, or sounds they don't have in Finnish, like CH, SH and TH - or prefixes like UN, DIS, MIS etc.
Simple.
How it works on activation, is that while they are scraping their mind for words, they come across a lot of other words that don't fit the rule, meaning they have to filter them out. To get a list of ten words, they might have excluded fifty others. Under the pressure of time, this happens even more, as their minds would scramble, and I would help them out by giving them how much time remaining, sometimes making a ticking sound.
The discomfort was visible.
While this is a game I now play with my six year old too, I also mentioned something similar to a friend of mine who is going through some rough relationship issues. I asked them,
Do you write about it?
They know I write a lot and do have some faith in my advice in general, and I gave some reasons why it is a good idea to put thoughts down on paper. Because, while they might not want to have everything written down, especially if they have an audience in mind, the act of writing gives the brain a problem to solve, a prompt to work from. This means that while it is focusing on what it wants to say, it is also processing a range of related thoughts that come to mind randomly, which gives additional opportunity to discover, process and let go of thoughts and feelings.
At least for me, writing often leads to surprise thoughts that take me down new paths of enquiry, but still building upon the main branch of thought. It is a creative and innovative process, activating passive thoughts and bringing them up for verification. Are they relevant, is it something I need to address, does it give me insight into my behaviors and point toward a better direction?
Does it help me accept and let go?
Usually.
Writing is like going to therapy with the self and is a cathartic, healing process, if it entered into openly. It isn't about rewriting history, but when done more in the moment, can capture the thoughts and feelings and provide a snapshot of that time, giving a "save point" to return to and reflect upon. This alone can give immense value, seeing how a little distance and time has possibly changed our perspective, shifted our expectations of the way things should be, by showing the way things were.
When we are trapped in the moment, circumstances and the emotions they evoke, can trap us in their cage and dump us under the waves to drown us. We can't get that space where we can breathe, let alone think rationally and a little more objectively through what we are facing. We end up on a path of destruction, or self-destruction, saying half-baked things, with words poorly chosen and a tone we never intended.
Sorting through our thoughts and consolidating them into a usable form mitigates many of the risks that we face and, can help us in our interpersonal communication and in the facilitation of the discussions in which we are involved. It helps us interact better with others, especially in times of conflict, because we have already started processing the emotional baggage and disempowering it, as well as predicting lines of conversation that may arise. Rather than being passengers on the ride, we turn into an active, thoughtful and balanced voice.
Rather than agents of conflict, we can drive transformation.
We might not be able to change others, but actively making a change in ourselves impacts on those around us too. And, when we do act in ways we'd rather forget, spending time to process our behavior can mean that we can forgive ourselves, let go and be better equipped for the future.
Together or apart.
While we are social animals, most of the conversations we have are actually in our own heads, speaking through our experiences with ourselves, processing and parsing information, making sense of it, building ideas and beliefs on it and using it to drive our physical interactions. We spend a lot of time in our heads, but most of don't actually spend much time developing the conditions of our mind.
It is no wonder that when those emotions grab us and push us under the waves, we find ourselves fighting for breath, fighting with each other and, fighting ourselves. I believe that writing is one of the most efficient and effective ways to improve our mental health, yet we live in a world that has minimized its importance and driven a paradigm that surface level is enough, we needn't dive deep.
My friend has started writing and has been surprised at what topics have been raised to the surface, and what emotions bubbled over. They didn't realize what some of the underlying issues were and now that there is some visibility, there is the chance to catch them, deal with them and throw them away again, before they fester and become a problem that rears its ugly head at the most inopportune time.
They are not doing it for anyone else, there is no audience - it is just for them.
But, it will affect everyone they come into contact with. No longer a force of destruction, they become part of the wave of positive change.
We might just need a little prompt from time to time.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
