How to Use Writing for Mindfulness

Writing is world-renowned for being one of the most therapeutic pastimes around, so it comes as no surprise that an increasing number of people are using the practice to reach a state of mindfulness. However, not only will it help you achieve mindfulness, but it can also help you to become more self-acceptant, more confident and it can help you understand yourself better.

Today, we’ll explore several ways that you can use writing to bring these benefits to your life, helping you to become a happier, healthier, more uplifted you.

Learn to Open Your Mind

One of the key aspects of becoming mindful is opening your mind up to the world around you. Through writing, you can become aware of how you view the world around you, helping you to learn new ideas, explore new concepts and become increasingly aware of how the people around you feel.

Through writing, you’ll be able to achieve all this in a non-judgemental way, stepping outside of the bubble that you would usually call your comfort zone.

Becoming Present

Have you ever driven anywhere and then come to the realization that you don’t remember the drive at all? What were you thinking about? Did anything happen on the drive? Who knows, but if this happens to you, it might pay to become more mindful.

This is because your mind isn’t focused on the present moment and is instead off thinking about other things. Though writing, you’re actively training yourself to focus on the present moment and the details of the present moment. Because you’ll be thinking about as much detail as you can remember when you write, training your mind to remember the details or be aware of them in the first place, throughout everyday life.

Organising Your Thoughts

Writing is simply the art of putting words into sentences. However, these sentences can transport you to faraway places. It can create places in your mind that don’t exist, and it can make you feel for characters that are completely made up.

However, you can use this mastery to organize your own thoughts and feelings. Whether you’re writing notes, keeping a diary or creating a blog, getting your thoughts down on paper, however you feel comfortable doing so, is a great way to relieve some brain space.

Riley Stevens, a writing expert for PaperFellows, continues;

“It doesn’t matter how you start writing or what format you’re writing in when it comes to mindfulness writing. Simply put your pen to paper, or fingers to your keyboard, and start writing whatever comes to mind. You’d be surprised how easy it becomes once you start to find your flow.”

Building Up Your Confidence

Many of us, although we don’t like to straight-up admit it, is guided by fear of the unknown, uncertainty, worry, anxiousness and insecurity. This is fine, this happens to us all from time to time, but it’s worth remembering that you don’t have to live this way.

Many of us have become trapped in this mindset, mainly due to how we grew up. Imagine you’re a child walking home from school with your friends and parents. If you were to climb on a low brick wall and you’re trying to balance while walking down it, what’s the first thing your parents say?

Usually, it will be something along the lines of ‘don’t fall’. After decades of having this kind of attitude, the caring kind, don’t get me wrong, it’s hard-wired into our brains to think about the what if’s and the situation of falling, rather than the situation of succeeding.

By writing down your thoughts and feelings, you’re giving yourself the opportunity to address these worries, so you don’t have to worry anymore. Over time, this will help you to become a lot more self-confident and headstrong in your own abilities.

Writing Helps You to Listen

Although writing is a relatively independent activity, a lot of what you write about will come from external sources. With the focus of writing later in your day fresh in your mind, you’ll notice you’ll become a lot more cautious about what people are saying, and you’ll be improving your memory simultaneously.

This is a great trait to have as you can draw inspiration from all areas of your life, whether you’re commuting to or from work, sitting at home or simply catching up with a friend. In all, this helps you to become present, the key to mindfulness.

Use Online Tools to Help

If you’re new to writing, it can be quite daunting and a lot of pressure to try and get things right. However, the chances are that you’re only writing for yourself which means that this simply doesn’t matter. But, these are skills you’ll have to learn in time to perfect your writing craft. Here are some tools to help.

Via Writing: A free online blog with all the information you need to know about grammar.

Assignment Writing Services: An online writing community that can help you with any questions you have regarding writing, recommended by Huffington Post in “Write my Paper”.

State of Writing: An online resource all about writing, including guides, tricks, and tips.

EliteAssignmentHelp: An online writing agency that can provide you with tips on editing your work.

AcademAdvisor: A free blog for tracking your writing style.

BestBritishEssays: An online resource that can provide you guides to improve your proofreading skills.

SimpleGrad: A blog for adding properly formatted citations and references to your writing.

Enhancing Your Memory

As you’ve probably realized as you’ve read through this article, memory plays a huge part when it comes to writing and mindfulness. Not only will you be able to remember specific details that you can share in your writing, but it will also help you to expand and enhance your overall memory capacities.

There are many studies that prove that becoming mindful can have huge positive health benefits on your mind, body, and well-being. These benefits include a reduction in physical and mental pain, improved sleeping patterns and even a strengthening of your body’s immune system.

Of course, meditating isn’t for everybody, but through writing, you can still practice becoming mindful, becoming present and finding the self-aware you need for happiness.

Tips for Achieving Mindfulness Through Writing

Many of us might not have even picked up a pen since we left education so the idea of writing might seem daunting, if not slightly overwhelming. However, this doesn’t have to be the case. Here are a few tips to get you started.

Firstly, always remember you don’t have to run in and start writing novels. Even if you’re starting small, even if it’s a couple of notes on a scrap of paper, it’s a good start. However, this leads me onto my next point of making a habit out of writing.

If possible, try writing every day, even if it’s only for ten minutes at a time. You could even time yourself so you have a goal and you can see exactly what’s going on. When you’ve finished writing for that ten minutes, try reading what you just wrote back to yourself. How does it sound? What do the sentences feel like to read back?

This will tell you everything you need to improve next time. As time goes on, you can increase the time you write for and therefore increase the benefits! You’ll be a master in no time at all!