Writing as Helpful Hobby

[Dorian_Gray]

Hi All,
A little hobby I found really helped me when I was pretty depressed that I thought I would share is writing fiction.
How it worked for me was I created characters (only semi intentionally) that reflected different aspects of my personality and put them in a over dramatized version of situation I had found myself in and just wrote what came naturally. I didn’t set out to create characters in that way it more so just happened as one can only really write from ones own imagination ad experiences anyway.

I found it very helpful in just getting thoughts out there and in some ways conversations between characters helped make real some of the circular thoughts I got in my head when feeling depressed/anxious as instead of being mingled together in your head they are separated out into discrete ‘person’s' who speak one after the other, so I was able to focus on each ‘voice’ one at a time while writing. While not all voices are nice in terms of self talk it helped me to remember that not all my self talk was negative only some of it and that voice can be countered my other ones that are still mine.

It also provided a way much like other hobbies of getting into a ‘flow’ mental state and often more frequently than other hobbies I have- the reason being is whilst for say a sport you need to be at the place with the equipment etc. to get into that zone, if you’re writing fiction you can come up with ideas/scenarios/conversations at any time in your head (on train, waiting in line or something those quiet moments that can sometimes be hard to sit alone with yourself.).

So might not work for everyone but might help someone so I encourage anyone who likes stories and is looking to try something different to help with their anxiety/depression to give it a go.

[quirkywords]

Dorian Gray

Thanks for writing your post about the pleasure of writing fiction.

I have written a thread called Words friends or foe, about how writing can help us either through keeping a journal, writing fiction or whatever type of writing one chooses.

I have found writing very helpful in helping me sort out ideas. I find if I am having trouble with a problem I make it fiction or I write a letter to myself , look at myself from another view point.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts,

quirky