If you have ever been to a therapist then you are familiar with the concept of journaling. There is a reason therapists tell you to write down your feelings. By writing your feelings you are able to know the areas of your life that you need to focus on.
If you are not a fan of writing the old fashioned way, there is an endless pool of online platforms such as WordPress, Diary applications etc. You can use writing to release your negative emotions and also help others going through the same troubles. Lots of celebrities have attested that sharing their struggles in written content has helped overcome so much of their struggles.
How to Begin a Therapeutic Writing and Sharing Lifestyle
Start with a draft
Don’t obsess about getting the content right the first time. Begin with a working title on the topic that you’re writing about. It should guide and speak for what you’re covering on your piece. In as much as it’s not your final pick, keep it as accurate as possible and make sure that you remain vulnerable and true to yourself.
Clarify
There are probably a lot of posts related to your topic online, but one of the ways to add uniqueness is by using brackets or parenthesis to clarify further what your topic is about. A study conducted showed that headlines with clarifications did almost 40% better than those without.
A sensitive topic like “ Rehab for cocaine addiction” would benefit from adding clarification of what the content is about. If it’s a podcast, useful tips or demographic, that should go after the title so that readers have an idea of what is in the post. The idea is it fight vulnerability and regain your personality and confidence again.
Stand out
No matter the genre of your topic, you need to have a human element. Though people are interested in different things, it takes the same principles to get a teen or addicts interested in what you have to say.
It mostly starts with the understating of your audience, but at the same time, your real personality needs to come out. One way of looking at it is that, as a professional, you can crack a joke and make a reader laugh and in a different context appeal to the humor of a high school student.
When doing so, make sure that the value of your piece is not lost. There is a way to stand out and still ensure that the spirit of your content gets captured. Make sure that your title captures the demographic- whoever it’s for- instead of saying why anyone should click on the link.
Length
The other question that comes in is the length. On average, the title should be 8-12 words long. It, however, depends on the medium; for a blog, eight words work best, while in the social platform such as Facebook titles with 12 words work well. The idea is to write whatever pops out of your mind but if you are sharing it with the world, make sure it remains on the minimum.
Be Authentic
There are various reasons why someone would share an idea that’s not their own, the most obvious being a person thinks they will get away with it. For the most part, they do.
This doesn’t typically apply to everyone. If you wish to create an authentic experience for your users it’s unlikely that you’ll scrape and use other person’s content without their permission. Copyright infringement is a reality in the digital space, and there are ways that, as an honest person, could have accidentally taken part in this legal problem.
With images, most of us are straightforward and take extra steps to attribute the source or the photographer, but when it comes to text, things are not as clear-cut. Online searchers are a quick way of reminding us that there’s nothing new under the sun. That is however not an endorsement to take other people’s content. It may be true, but there’s always new and different ways of looking at the same thing.
Avoid Sharing Other People’s Experience, Stay True To Your Cause
This point is rather obvious but if you’re writing a personal peace do not copy and paste another person’s work and present it as your own. If you wish to do so for whatever reason, get in touch with the author and ask them for permission to share their work.
Most people would be flattered and may accept, but you ought to respectfully accept if they wish not to have their content on your site. The other option is to quote sections of the blog, attribute and share a link to the original article. When your blog reaches a certain size, you may eventually run into this problem.
Conclusion
Writing goes a long way when it comes to facing our fears and starting our life over. It helps us shed the skin of pain, trauma, grief, and loss, and gives us the insight we need to start over and create a new life with a new perspective.
