THE PERSONAL PASSION TO WRITE

People often ask me, why do you write? Writing has always fascinated me. During high school, when I was going through the turbulence of adolescence, I wrote a series of poems to soothe me. My parents moved our family to a new city during my junior year of high school and it led to some emotional upheaval as I was forced to leave my school and lifelong friends. Writing provided me with a way of managing my feelings during a time when I felt rather helpless.

It wasn’t fashionable for boys to excel in grammar and composition, but throughout school I enjoyed and was proficient in language skills. I recall diagramming sentences in elementary school. While others groaned through the experience, I found the process challenging and enjoyable.

In college, I took courses in grammar, composition and poetry, even though my undergraduate major was in sociology and anthropology. I recall taking a Victorian Poetry course, even though the entire class was composed of English majors. I was forced to become a quick learner when it came to interpreting classical poetry.

There was a period in adulthood when I was going through my “midlife crisis” that I began writing poetry again. I wrote a poem called, So I Walked the Road Home which described my need to get closure on certain aspects of my childhood experience. The poem describes how I had returned to the site of my old little league baseball diamond, only to find that the fence had been removed and the field was now used for girl’s softball. Another poem entitled, A Home Within explored my journey to find a sense of true love and inner validation.

There has always been an inner tug or urgency to write a book and publish it. Having completed that task through my work called, Stepping Out of the Bubble, I now have focused my attention on article writing. I have written a plethora of articles on topics ranging from management skills to those related to personal growth and development. Writing for me is an avocation, a calling, although I am a paid contributing writer for FamilyResource.com, an online tool for families. Some of the personal benefits one can derive from writing are:

Writing is a soothing experience which “calms the waters.”
Writing taps into passions, dreams, needs, and feelings.
Writing helps to resolve life transitions.
Writing helps to provide closure to unfinished chapters in life.
Writing provides a sense of empowerment and competency.
Writing helps to explain oneself to the world.
Writing helps to fine-tune thinking about topics that are important.
Writing provides an opportunity to dialogue with others over differences in perspective.
Writing helps to establish a sense of personal identity.
Writing provides exposure to other people and organizations.
Writing provides an avenue for conveying strongly held beliefs and convictions.
Writing is a tool for sharing other peoples’ life story.
Writing is a means for conveying our fascination with specific interests and activities.

For me, writing is a cherished gift that has no end. As long as I am alive, I will hopefully have new and fresh ideas to share with others. Those who catch the vision of writing will find a sense of personal satisfaction and fulfillment. Writing brings out our best instincts and provides us with a tool for conveying our inner yearnings and ethical and moral principles. Writing provides us with an avenue for creating meaning by sharing our deepest convictions with the world. All we really have in this life are our truest sense of self, our experiences, our valued relationships, and the memories that surround these ideals.


James P. Krehbiel, Ed.S., LPC is an author, freelance writer and cognitive-behavioral therapist practicing in Scottsdale, Arizona. He recently released Stepping Out of the Bubble: Reflections on the Pilgrimage of Counseling Therapy available at http://www.booklocker.com/books/2242.html. James can be reached through his website at www.krehbielcounseling.com.