Normally, Therese is the one with the health-related posts on writing. But I came across this tidbit of news today that I thought I’d share with you:

Writing Reduces Stress.

Really? Sometimes I think writing increases stress, especially when I can’t get a scene to work or everything on the page sounds like drivel.

Researchers have found that for older people and others, writing about events in your life that are causing you anxiety can lead to fewer doctor visits, better sleep and an enhanced immune system. The concept is called expressive writing.

I think there’s something to that. I find that if I imagine someone who I really dislike posing as one of my secondary characters, then I kill them off or make them suffer, I DO feel better. That unhelpful snarky witch manning the ‘customer service’ counter at the airport will die unpleasantly in my next scene. Thanks, Expressive Writing! 

Christine Gorman, a writer for Time who was under a huge amount of stress when she wrote this article about stress has started a blog about the nexis between health and media. It’s worth checking out. Her six tips for handling stress are well worth reading.

I often think that the explosion of popularity in blogging is a response to a stressful world. Blogging transcends boundaries and brings people of like interests together. Couple that with therapeutic writing (or ranting) and you’ve got a pretty decent stress reliever. 

So blog without guilt. You’re not wasting time. You’re doing something good for your health.

Kathleen Bolton is co-founder of Writer Unboxed. She has written two novels under the pseudonym Cassidy Calloway: Confessions of a First Daughter, and Secrets of a First Daughter--both books in a YA series about the misadventures of the U.S. President's teen-aged daughter, published by HarperCollins.
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