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“Writing is medicine. It is an appropriate antidote to injury. It is an appropriate companion for any difficult change.”
— Julia Cameron
Aeons ago, I was gifted The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. The book blew me away, its conception born from the AA’s 12-step program. Embodying a theme of recovering and discovering your creative self, the book fundamentally encourages you to establish the habit of the ‘morning pages’, a phrase coined by Cameron.
Basically, to write a stream of consciousness in longhand before you begin your day. This will gradually enforce a healthier resistance against the bombardment of unwavering inner criticism in whichever medium you are creating.
Fast forward to lockdown and you would have seen so many self-help articles and motivational podcasts advocating journalling as a tool to manage through those difficult and unprecedented times. Knowing about the power of journaling for a long time I saw it as an exciting rebirth. But funnily enough, I naively imagined journalling to be a girl thing, even back in the beginning as a morning pages follower. I never considered if men valued the benefit of putting their thoughts and fears from pen to paper.
I wanted to challenge this and in so doing, I discovered that even hardened Rock Stars, like Nikki Sixx and Bill Wyman journaled in and around their crazy celebrity lives. The more I looked the more I realized that it wasn’t even as if journalling was a new phenomenon. One of the first diarists recorded in the fifteenth century was Leonardo da Vinci, who was known to fill in over 5000 pages on his ideas and observations.
Nikki Sixx, the co-founder of The Mötley Crüe, wrote about his descent into drug addiction. His journalling about his descent into rock bottom became ‘The Heroin Diaries.’ And Bill Wyman, the bassist in The Rolling Stones, kept a daily journal for 30 years during the height of the band’s ground-breaking career. He adapted his journal into his Autobiography, ‘Stone Alone.’
But what about the everyday man? Would he consider journalling an integral part of his life? Andy Tinch; 59, an expatriate living in Odense, Denmark was influenced by Wyman’s Stone Alone and kept a daily journal for 15 years. His writing wasn’t about unlocking any creative potential. Nor as a mental health tool. He just enjoyed the documenting of the then and now stance in keeping hold of his diaries. Tinch explained, “It was mostly a discipline but sometimes it was emotional, it didn’t help me grow but it was fun to look back over previous years’ diaries to match the present date to years gone by.” Tinch was rigid on writing every day, and said, “I felt annoyed with myself if I missed a day and so I would write double the next day.”
Amar Nath, 44, a lawyer from Haryana, North India routinely journalled during his senior school years to timetable his studies, sleep pattern, and play. But sadly, his father died unexpectantly during Nath’s post-graduation. He found that his journalling helped him get through those challenging times of social and financial obligations he had abruptly inherited. “It was very difficult to handle all those, (responsibilities), and my studies side by side. At that time all my writing habits saved me!”
Nath went on to create journals for all aspects of his life. And in 2012, his life turned dramatically after needing a kidney transplant. This changed his whole outlook on life. He went on to help the marginal children in his village, providing philanthropic library services, to encourage the children to study more.
Mindjournal, a British company founded by Ollie Aplin based in Brighton, UK, has become the world’s first and only men’s journalling brand. Their vision is to ‘globally help men to feel happier and healthier.’ There are various journals on offer, and they have also created a signature check-in tool, interactive chapters, guided exercises, and a mood tracker to engage men to stick around and instill this innovative mental health writing psychology.
Conclusion
Communicating is an essential storytelling part of being human and an integral part of us, male or female, or however we wish to identify. Collectively, we innately have methods to channel our experiences. The notion that men store their thoughts and feelings deeply away in a metaphoric box has long gone. It’s a new age to be seen and heard for each and every one of us, respectively.
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