How Putting Pain Into Words Can Set You Free
Most of us are carrying something we’d rather not look at. A relationship that wrecked us. A childhood we didn’t understand at the time. A betrayal, a loss, a failure.
We either talk about it or shove it down. I think plenty of people do the second for years, and it never goes away. It just waits.
There’s a simple, free way to start dealing with it: write it down.
What the research says
Psychologist James Pennebaker has spent decades studying expressive writing: deliberately writing about difficult experiences and the thoughts and feelings around them. In one of his best-known studies (Pennebaker, Kiecolt-Glaser & Glaser, 1988), 50 healthy students wrote for 20 minutes a day, four days running. Half wrote about the most traumatic events of their lives. The other half wrote about mundane things like their plans for the day.
The students who wrote about their worst experiences visited the doctor less and showed stronger immune function in blood tests. Three months later, they still reported feeling happier.
Why? My take is that, left alone, the mind replays fragments of what happened. Writing forces you to turn those fragments into a story: this happened, this is what I felt, this is what I understand now.
Pennebaker’s method is deliberately simple. Write honestly, ignore spelling and grammar, and write for yourself, not an audience. Treat it as a short, focused exercise, not a daily wallow in your pain. I like that. There’s no fuss and no special equipment, just you and a page.
Processing is not ruminating
This distinction matters more than most people realise. Rumination asks, Why did they do that to me? Why does this always happen? What if I’d done something differently? It goes round in circles and gets you nowhere.
Processing asks better questions. What actually happened? What did I feel? What did I learn? Is what I now believe about myself actually true?
Trauma specialist Bessel van der Kolk, author of The Body Keeps the Score, puts it plainly: “The critical issue is allowing yourself to know what you know.” I couldn’t agree more. In my view, healing often starts when you stop arguing with your own experience and admit that it happened and that it affected you.
Photo by Đan Thy Nguyễn Mai
Finding meaning without sugar-coating
Psychiatrist Viktor Frankl, whose work on meaning and resilience founded logotherapy, argued that even when we can’t change what happened, we can choose our relationship with it. I find that one of the most empowering ideas out there. It doesn’t mean pretending your suffering was “meant to be”. It means asking, Given that this happened, what do I do with it now?
Maybe it taught you boundaries, or made you more compassionate, or showed you what you’ll never tolerate again. Maybe the only meaning you can find today is that you survived. I’d say that’s enough.
As Thich Nhat Hanh taught, “The way out is in.” Moving forward starts with being willing to look inward.
The four-day practice
Find somewhere quiet. Put your phone away. Take a few slow breaths, then write continuously for 15 to 20 minutes. Don’t aim for beautiful and don’t censor yourself. Nobody else is going to read it.
- Day 1: What happened? Tell the story honestly, with the facts and what you remember.
- Day 2: What did I feel? Go beneath the facts. Anger, fear, shame, grief? Where did you feel it in your body?
- Day 3: What did it mean to me? What did you start to believe about yourself and other people? Is that belief still serving you?
- Day 4: What do I choose now? For me, this is the one that counts. What have you learned? What are you ready to forgive, not for the other person’s sake but for your own? What boundary do you need? Who do you want to become because of what you’ve been through?
If you want a closing line, try: “I cannot change what happened. I can choose what I carry forward.”
Photo by olga Volkovitskaia
A straight word of caution
I’d be doing you a disservice if I didn’t say this: it can make you feel worse before you feel better. Research shows distress can rise straight after a session, even when the longer-term effects are positive. That’s normal, but don’t force yourself to dig into something you’re not ready for.
If writing leaves you overwhelmed, numb, frightened or struggling to function, stop and work with a qualified therapist. Expressive writing is a useful tool, not a substitute for professional help when the trauma is serious or ongoing.
The aim isn’t to live in the past. It’s to visit it with enough honesty and perspective that you stop living from it.
Write the story. Then decide how it ends.
Main – Photo by Roberto Hund
About the Author: Steve Consalvez
