Writing as Healing

Among other things, writing is a miraculous healing tool.  Whether we're on the receiving end of an eloquently delivered, thoughtfully prepared speech, or pouring our hearts out on the pages of a journal, writing is a powerful emotional tonic.  Writing offers us the opportunity to reinvent ourselves, to rewrite our personal histories.  Writing offers us catharsis.  And, the need for a cathartic experience is the reason an audience pays the price of admission in the first place.


Indeed, the very purpose of a story, whether it's on the page or on the screen, is to provoke an emotional response in the viewer/reader.  Oddly enough, all six and a half billion of us human beings seem to respond in predictable ways to the same things.  We all have hopes, dreams, fears, superstitions, etc.  In the end, the only thing frightening thing is how similar they all are.  No other work better explains the need of story telling and the importance of symbols and rituals throughout human evolution than Joseph Campbell's and Bill Moyer's conversation, "The Power of Myth."  I come back to this work again and again and always get a little something more from it with each reading.  I highly recommend you add it to your writer's bookshelf.



By all means it's great to exercise one's own demons, but to write for the entertainment industry requires more than bearing one's soul, however brave, honest and gut-wrenching that may be.  Industry professionals expect more from a writer than the shock value of exposing the dark side of human nature for the sake of grabbing the attention of a few readers or viewers.

A screenplay, first of all, has to be produceable.  It needs to stay within certain parameters (some creative, some financial, some just insane) that work to the advantage of many parties with different agendas and priorities (producers, agents, talent, backers, distributors, etc.)  Ultimately, a well written, engaging story that touches on universal themes and has something intelligent to say about the human condition will have a better chance of getting produced and distributed.

Hollywood loves an uplifting, inspirational story with a happy ending.  We love to watch the underdog win in the end.  Watching our heroes and heroines overcome immense adversity is an essential part of our own growth.  Vicariously, we get to catch the bad guy, win the race, save the planet and gain a little personal glory.

This week's suggested website: Kickstarter.com (www.kickstarter.com).  A great concept that's actually working to get some artists some very valuable attention.  This site is designed to get creative projects of all types funded.


This week's writing prompt: Give yourself five uninterrupted minutes of quiet time.  Let's focus on dialogue.  One way to look at dialog is to include what people say as well as what they hide. Write a one page confrontational scene between two characters using only dialog.  Drop some hints of what's to come in the story or what has already transpired with these two using only dialog.  Write for five minutes.