Writing

The first few pages of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society have inspired me to write. To write what? I don't know. Just write. If you haven't read it, the book is all letters from one character to another, to another and another. Friends, strangers, co-workers, etc. and it makes me want to write letters, too. Hand-written letters to everyone. I still hand write some letters for birthdays or special circumstances, but I always feel like I need to be saying something really important. Not in this book, the characters write the way we email now or send texts. The random thoughts or running commentary about life and its details. I guess maybe increasing my random emails would be nice. I shouldn't think I have to have a good reason to write an email. Thinking of someone and how they're connected to some random event in my life is a good reason! Imagine how special you would feel if you knew every time someone thought of you. It would probably freak you to know how much some people think about you.  Now I'm not being mean, I'm thinking about how much I would freak people out if they knew my thoughts and how much I think of them. So yeah, let's not start writing everyone about every one of our thoughts, but being tactful and careful about obsessions, more writing, more emails, more texts, and definitely more hand-written notes could improve a lot of our relationships. And writing, just for myself, for self-reflection, for thanksgiving, jotting down memories or even working through difficult emotions could really transform my own experience of the world and the world's experience of me. 

Some light reading that supports this kind of writing:

- Opening Up: The Healing Power of Expressing Emotions by J.W. Pennebaker

- "Sharing one's story: On the benefits of writing or talking about emotional experience." by Kate G. Niederhoffer, and J.W. Pennebaker.

- "The health benefits of writing about intensely positive experiences" by 

Chad M Burton and 

Laura A King.