How Writing Can Help in Brain Development

We often look at writers as thoughtful individuals with excellent cognitive skills. Sometimes, we even assume that talented writers are born with a special gift. Although some writers are naturally gifted, most people improve their brain functions with writing skills.

But how is brain development related to writing?

First of all, every writing genre involves an in-depth exploration of your memory to come up with great ideas. All experienced essay writers use this technique to write beautiful texts. At the same time, writing broadens your horizon and also helps you to concentrate better on tasks.

So, let’s establish a correlation between writing and brain development. We’ll also discover how writing impacts your mental health in general.

Writing improves your memory

When you write, the brain gathers information related to that topic to generate a coherent chain of thoughts. This process involves collecting pieces of data and correlating them to one another.

For example, teachers always give students take-home assignments and other resources for personal reflection. This ‘follow-up’ technique helps to retain information over an extended period. And if you can’t cope with the work volume, you can always hire an essay writer free.

Repetition is another aspect of writing that enhances your memory. When you work on a similar task over and over, the process becomes engraved in your brain. And with time, you can perform the writing task without even immersing yourself in the experience.

At the same time, the writing exercise allows you to seek more information to fill the gaps in your memory. This coordination between the brain and the visual perception of texts (on-screen or handwritten) engraves the information in your brain.

Writing is an excellent mindfulness technique

Mindfulness involves immersing yourself in a given task by elevating your state of awareness, regardless of your surroundings.

And how does that relate to writing?

Every writing exercise starts with organizing your workflow beforehand. After that, you always seek writing spaces without noise and distractions. In the process, you are conditioning your brain to ignore every other activity that is not related to the writing task.

Furthermore, writing helps you narrow your concentration down to one specific task at a time. Subsequently, this practice of mindfulness evolves into a higher level of spatial awareness. 

According to Patricia A Resick et al., writing by hand improves your cognitive ability. Besides, writing also conditions your brain to evaluate every incoming information before accepting it. This vetting process helps you filter out the most relevant data to make your writing better. 

Writing is good for your psychological well being

Writing is an effective therapeutic process because it helps you clear your headspace, albeit temporarily. 

You are probably wondering how this happens since writing involves accessing our long-term and short-term memories.

In reality, all thoughts and emotions cluster the brain, creating a state of chaos in our heads. However, writing tunes out all that outside noise to focus on only one activity.

Moreover, expressive writing for personal reasons (journaling) helps you access your emotions and filter out the negatives. 

According to James Pennebaker, expressive writing is similar to visiting a therapist in the sense that you talk about your feelings and trauma in a judgment-free space — your journal. Consequently, talking about these emotions improves your overall mental health.

Writing makes you a better communicator

Whenever you create a new text from scratch, your writing skills improve. At the same time, you get better at communicating complex ideas.

At first, everybody struggles to develop a writing style that replicates their thought process with clarity. But with constant practice and repetition, you will master the most effective ways to bring your ideas to life.

Besides, writing helps you understand yourself as well as your audience. And when you review your work, you rephrase the ideas to reflect your current state of mind.

Moreover, people who struggle with verbal communication can use writing to rehash their ideas and practice self-expression. And since writing allows you to change how you deliver your thoughts to the listener, you can choose better expressions on the fly.

Writing broadens your horizons

According to clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson, writing is an exercise that helps you improve your expertise on a topic. 

For instance, when you start working on a new piece of writing, you need to research the topic and gather useful information. During the research, you consult multiple sources of reliable information. And once you continue doing this for an extended period, you will delve deeper into the topic and gain further insights. Eventually, you will become a well-versed expert on the subject.

You can liken writers to athletes who train every day — the athlete works on their body while the writer works on the brain. As the athlete gets better at the game, so does the writer improve their writing skills. And with that improvement in writing comes a deeper understanding of the topics you explore.

Ultimately, writing down your ideas is an effective way to develop your brain. Writing improves the cognitive areas of your brain and your mindfulness. You can also keep your brain in shape by writing regularly. After all, writing allows you to explore ideas and become a better communicator. And most importantly, writing makes you more intelligent by widening your horizons.