Bruce L. Bair Physician’s Assistant and Wellness Coach, interviewed me for his radio show, “Ask an Expert Anything.” This interview aired November 4th and I’ll publish excerpts of the transcript in several parts, edited for readability. Note: After our first webinar in October, Bruce took the plunge and started Journaling for the Health of It ™
In this segment, we discuss the connection between journaling and ancient healing arts like the Chinese Qi Gong, and how journaling’s one that everyone can practice at any time of day.
B: Bruce Bair M: Mari L. McCarthy
M: One of the things (journaling helps with) is just body awareness of how under circumstances we find all of a sudden, our body talks to us: the jaw automatically clenches, the stomach tightens, and other physical pains show up. Isn't that fascinating? So journaling just really gets us to understand how our body behaves unhealthily and how we can change our physical behavior by changing our thoughts and feelings.
We're definitely all connected, so I think the fact that we're speaking in terms of health and holistic health is very good because I think the mind/body connection was the first step. I think, okay, we're recognizing oh yes we do have a brain and we do have a body, but I think the thing is (with journal writing) we are now understanding, realizing, and appreciating that we are all physical, and all spiritual, and all mental, and all emotional beings -- as opposed to everything being so compartmentalized.
B: You talk like a Qi Gong master. You know, the Chinese moving meditation that becomes a martial art at the higher levels. I took a course this summer at the National Wellness Conference where we learned a little bit of mind/body stuff to go along with things that we were thinking and saying. And a lot of what you're describing with the journaling, it's a moving meditation.
M: Yes.
B: You know, it's much like a martial art. And for you, it really was because you were learning a complete new skill on the left side of your body and that might be something that people ought to try to do. You know, even if they only just type with their left hand, but to make it something different than what they usually do…When I listen to you, you sound just like this Qi Gong master who taught us.
M: [Laughing] Well…
B: Same kinds of things…journalers are doing something with words and something physical at the same time. He and his wife did a lot of things with the hands. It's just very interesting, how much that's connected. You know, how much what you're teaching with journaling is connected to these Chinese martial arts that are 3,000 years old.
Journaling is more art than craft
M: Thank you for telling me this. And that's what I really appreciate. Really, the journal is the tool. People normally just think, "Oh, writing, well, topic sentence, and grammar." I said, “No, no. It's really more of the art part of writing, as opposed to just the craft.” I think people tend towards the (left-brained) craft, but journal writing is artistry, it’s creativity.
It’s just looking at your total self and realizing how much there is to us and just finding something totally different about yourself and your being. It is amazing. And I have to say that you feel whole in doing it. When I started, I really felt completely disconnected and used to get headaches and all that. I don't anymore.
Journaling helps set and clarify goals. When I first got into pursuing one of my passions, singing, everything was always tense, but the more I got into the journaling and the writing and just got the release…I think that's helping me make me who I am today as far as being positive and open. My body feels very good.
You get to the point of appreciating the journal is your 24/7 therapist. No matter where you are, you can just sit down and just write, and you don't have to do anything formal like a topic sentence or things. You just do it.
As you are finding, Bruce, journaling leads you to where you need to go, or what you need to get out. Maybe one day you just need to do a data dump. Once you get into the process and just let it go, journaling takes you where you need to go next.
Epiphanies for everyone
B: Well, you know, like I told you, it'd fit right in with what I do, coaching… And I realize the way you're talking about it, it's very much a moving meditation. I hadn't thought of it that way before, but this is a very powerful tool that you can just take a few minutes a day, you know, to meditate and then to write on your meditation.
I think that you're going to break open, as they say in the writing world, and have an epiphany or epiphanies much more easily than you would without that…I think seeing those thoughts in a concrete form, you can change the way you think about them and then you are open to the subconscious mind and other parts of the nervous system to speak to you.
M: Mm-hmm. And I think it's a good testimonial that journaling is for young, old, male, and female. It's for everybody, so I think the fact that guys doing it, like you Bruce, I think that's great. I think it helps people understand that it is for everybody. It's very easy to get out the notebook and put the pen to the page.
As we said, our biggest obstacle, biggest challenge, is ourselves, and we just have to nurture ourselves and be a good parent to ourselves and help ourselves get out of the darkness we’ve been living in and into the light of our inner world.
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