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Who knew, back in Episode #4 when I discovered the amazing-but-unavailable book, Writing To Heal, that I’d eventually be interviewing the co-author of its revised and updated edition?!!
I learned a lot from my guest this week, John F. Evans, MAT, MA , Ed.D., a consultant, writing clinician, and an integrative health coach who speaks at national and international conferences about the power of writing to create better health, overcome trauma, and build resilience. He is also the founder and executive director of Wellness & Writing Connections, providing individual, group, and institutional life course guidance programs.
The first thing I learned from John is that I still have much more to learn about being an effective journaling coach! With an astute-yet-modest perspective, John shares some of the scientifically proven health benefits of expressive writing (while cautioning me of the potential dangers of simply touting them to others)! We also discuss the Pennebaker Paradigm, and the contribution that John is making to update and re-publish the landmark guidebook in this field, Writing To Heal, by Dr. James Pennebaker. As mentioned in Episode #4, this groundbreaking and revered work has been out-of-print for several years.
John also publishes articles for Psychology Today in a column entitled Write Yourself Well, and is leading a workshop, “Transform Your Health”, with the International Association of Journal Writers later this month. John teaches workshops at Duke Integrative Medicine, Duke Medical School, and the UNC Wellness Center in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. We’ll talk more about these in a future episode! (JournalTalk, Episode #15, September 15, 2013)
Credits:
Music: Christopher Brooke, “Happy Me” and Paul Mottram, ”Easy Bean Swing” (AudioNetwork.com)
Voiceover: Tami Egbert and Kym Maher
Logo Art: Wendy Kipfmiller, Snixysnix.com
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Very informative episode, especially about the kinds of journaling topics that are most helpful to people.
Nathan, your podcasts are a source of both valuable information and valuable inspiration.
I would like to hear more about which ways of writing about traumatic ARE NOT helpful and which ways ARE helpful.
Hello Sandra,
I’ve struggled with that question myself. And the best answer I’ve got so far was in a recent episode with Kathleen Adams (http://www.write4life.us/journalverse-creator/) in the discussion of the “Journal Ladder”. Basically, if you can contain the writing with some limitation in time or scope (such as sentence stems, or timed writing exercises) then you can keep yourself “safer”. Check out that episode and let me know what you think! -Nathan
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