By the time someone reaches out to me, their relationships have failed or are ready to crumble, and their sense of identity is fuzzy at best. When they look in the mirror, the person staring back at them is unrecognizable.

Maybe you’ve tried the latest therapy craze but it just didn’t take.

Or maybe you tried to pinpoint a medical reason for your symptoms and only found more questions instead of answers.  Perhaps you’ve tried to numb the pain with drugs, alcohol, or external validation but that only led to more problems.

It can be frustrating when you know that almost every problem is solvable with a little hard work…except this one!

If you’ve ever journaled before you know the powerful benefits of taking that journey in your mind. For a moment, think back to those creative writing classes you took in high school or maybe you attended a 12 step program and you were asked to journal.

What did you like about those classes? How did you feel immediately afterwards?

I believe in life everyone has a story to tell (I am a therapist by training after all!).

I also believe the stories we tell ourselves are the key to our well-being. If you’ve interpreted the events of your life to mean that you’re unlucky or unwise, it’s hard to look optimistically at the future. Conversely, if you acknowledge that you’ve made mistakes and faced difficulties but seek (or have already glimpsed) redemption, you’ll feel a much greater sense of agency over your life.

But how do you get the stories out?

For some of us, we have already tapped into a creative outlet to be able to express ourselves. For others, we fear if we let even some of our story out, it will feel like pandora’s box opening and never to be closed again.

I hear this on a daily basis in my private practice-”Adina, can we just skip the painful stuff and get to the healing?” And my response is always, “I wish!”

The 13th-century Sufi mystic and poet Rumi wrote, “The wound is the place where the light enters you.” Thinkers from Freud to Brene Brown have all postulated that there’s strength in vulnerability.

When we write our stories, we write our truth. We become protagonists instead of victims of circumstances beyond our control.

If you are interested in using writing as a coping mechanism, try these practices below:

1. Don’t hold back.
2. No detail is too small; no feeling too large.
3. Reach for revelation.

These classes are designed to meet you where you are. No prior writing skills necessary. I will provide prompts to help you mine your memories, traumas and dreams through expressive writing.

This writing bravely program will help you identify:

• Multiple Ways to Build Your Resilience in The Face of Pivotal Events
• How to Tell When Your Pain is Protecting You.  The pain of guilt, shame, remorse caused by the inner critic.
• The Masks we wear and why we should take them off now and again!
• The secret to not losing yourself: how to recover from a narcissistic relationship.
• How to deal with feelings of loneliness and isolation. Loneliness is seen as an epidemic in the U.S.
• How to cultivate a resilience mindset in the face of adversity.
• Expressive writing as a coping mechanism is beneficial. In fact there are over 1000 studies to back this up.

Here’s the Writing Bravely details below:

Where: Zoom meeting-online

When: Tuesday evenings 6pm eastern | 4pm pacific starting January 24th.

What: 90 minute group meetings with me.

Cost: $100 per week for 6 weeks.

If you are ready to sign up, please schedule a call with me here. I want to make sure you are a good match for the group.

If you’re unsure but want to sign up for the writing bravely newsletter to get updates on new class schedules and community events, sign up here!

In my own experience, I know this works. When I believed therapy was “too scary,” the act of writing started my healing process.  Writing was the ultimate coping mechanism.

Writing was the honey laden salve on my traumatic wounds. And so I would write. And I would write. I would write through the pain and suffering. And the best part is, I write in a group where I feel the empathy from others pouring through the Zoom screen. It’s transformational.

I first experienced the healing effects of writing during the early days of the pandemic. Feeling unmoored and isolated, I began searching for a writing community.

It was awkward at first. I had never shared anything I’d written before (and never felt that I wanted to). Luckily the awkwardness quickly passed and what I felt instead was intense relief knowing that what I’d been living through was a shared experience (both the collective trauma of the Pandemic and my own historical trauma).

Since then, I’ve become a writing hope merchant! I believe we can write our way through to the other side. Writing allows us to sit with the uncomfortable feelings and be curious about them-their contours, shapes and sizes.  Writing can help us honor and light up our stories while prompting us to envision our future selves restored and renewed.

And now I want to help you write your way through to your future self.