Resilience is often presented as an act of courage and resistance. But everyday practices, such as journaling, writing a text, or even making a simple to-do list, are manifestations of resilience.
The act of writing, common and universal, changes the brain. From writing a heated text message to penning an opinion piece, writing allows you to name your pain and create distance from it at the same time. Writing can transform your mental state from exhaustion and despair to solid clarity—a transformation that reflects resilience.
Psychology, the media, and the wellness industry shape the public perception of resilience: social scientists study it, journalists celebrate it, and wellness brands sell it. They all tell a similar story: resilience is an individual quality that people can strengthen if they try their best.
The American Psychological Association defines resilience as an ongoing process of personal growth through life’s challenges. News headlines routinely praise individuals who refuse to give up or find the silver lining in difficult times. The wellness industry promotes continuous self-improvement as the path to resilience.
In my work as a writing studies teacher, I research how people use writing to cope with trauma and practice resilience. She has witnessed thousands of students turn to the written word to better cope with their feelings and find a sense of belonging. Your writing habits suggest that writing promotes resilience. Discoveries from psychology and neuroscience can help explain how this happens.
Writing rejuvenates the brain
In the 1980s, psychologist James Pennebaker developed a therapeutic technique called expressive writing to help patients process trauma and psychological challenges. Using this technique, consistently writing in your journal about something painful helps you create mental distance from the experience and ease your cognitive load.
In other words, externalizing emotional suffering through writing promotes safety. Expressive writing turns pain into a metaphorical book on the shelf, ready to be reopened with intention. It signals to the brain: “I don’t need to carry this anymore.”
Sometimes you can write to cope with difficult feelings.Grace Carey/Moment via Getty Images
Translating feelings and thoughts into words on paper is a complex mental task. It involves retrieving memories and planning what to do with them, engaging areas of the brain associated with memory and decision-making. It also involves converting those memories into language, and activating the brain’s visual and motor systems.
Writing things down helps enhance memory, i.e. the brain converts short-term memories into long-term memories. This integration process allows people to reframe traumatic experiences and control their emotions. In essence, writing can help free the mind to be present in the here and now.
Take action through writing
The state of presence that writing can evoke is not just an abstract feeling; It reflects the complex activity of the nervous system.
Brain imaging studies show that putting feelings into words helps regulate emotions. Labeling emotions, whether through swear words, emojis or carefully chosen words, has many benefits. This calms the amygdala, a group of neurons that detects threats and triggers the fear response: fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. It also involves the prefrontal cortex, a part of the brain that supports goal setting and problem solving.
In other words, simply naming your feelings can help you shift from reaction to response. Instead of empathizing with your feelings and confusing them with facts, writing can simply help you realize what’s coming and prepare to take intentional action.
Even mundane writing tasks, such as making a to-do list, stimulate the parts of the brain involved in thinking and decision-making, helping you regain focus.
Creating meaning through writing
Choosing to write is also a choice to create meaning. Studies show that feeling empowered is a prerequisite and outcome of writing.
Researchers have long documented how writing is a cognitive activity, one that people use to communicate, yes, but also to understand the human experience. As many in the field of writing studies recognize, writing is a way of thinking—a practice that people never stop learning. As a result, writing has the ability to constantly reshape the mind. Writing not only expresses identity, it effectively creates it.
Writing also regulates your psychological state. The words you write are in themselves evidence of organization and evidence of flexibility.
Popular news stories about human resilience often present extraordinary resilience. News coverage of natural disasters suggests that the more severe the shock, the greater personal growth. Popular psychology often equates resilience with unwavering optimism. Such representations may mask other common forms of adaptation. The strategies people already use to cope with daily life — from sending angry text messages to writing a resignation letter — signal a shift.
Develop stamina through writing
These science-based tips can help you develop a writing practice that promotes resilience:
1. Write by hand whenever possible. Unlike writing or typing on a device, handwriting requires greater cognitive coordination. It slows your thinking, allowing you to process information, form connections, and create meaning.
2. Write daily. Start small and make it a regular habit. Even taking brief notes about your day — what happened, what you’re feeling, what you’re planning or intending — can help you get your thoughts out of your head and make rumination easier.
3. Write before replying. When strong feelings arise, write them down first. Keep a notebook handy and make it a habit to write before speaking. This can promote reflective thinking, helping you act with purpose and clarity.
4. Write a letter you will never send. Don’t just write down your feelings, direct them to the person or situation that is bothering you. Even writing a letter to yourself can provide a safe space to let go, without the pressure of someone else’s reaction.
5. Treat writing as a process. When you write something and ask for feedback, you practice taking a step back to consider alternative viewpoints. Applying this feedback through review can enhance self-awareness and build confidence.
Flexibility can be as common as the entries people write in their journals, the emails they exchange, the to-do lists they create, and even the essays students write for their teachers.
The act of writing is an adaptation in movement.
Emily Ronay Johnston receives funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.