December 13, 2019
11 AM PST | 12 PM MST | 1 PM CST | 2 PM EST
Sandra Marinella
The Story You Need to Tell–How Writing Our Stories Can Transform Our Lives
Session Description:
Do you have a story that needs to be told? Most of us do! Can writing our personal stories and memoirs transform our well-being? Join us to learn how!
How to write your story is at the heart of The Story You Need to Tell. While facing cancer, Sandra Marinella decided to “write to heal.” She began by reading her old journals where she learned the power of her personal writing to help her navigate a death, a post-partum depression, and her cancer, followed by her son’s cancer. This inspired her to teach the power of writing our stories to writers, veterans, and cancer patients. This pioneering work demonstrated how we can find, share, and write our stories in ways that help us move past physical or emotional hardships and toward resilience and renewal. Her acclaimed book, The Story You Need to Tell—Writing to Heal from Trauma, Illness, or Loss is the go-to-guide for writers on transformative storytelling and personal writing. A recent study at Mayo Clinic has demonstrated that these writing methods profoundly decrease stress, improve moods, and transform personal well-being. Learn how to write for change and well-being!
What we will explore:
- What is the “story you need to tell” and why do we need to tell or write it?
- Why do our stories play such a critical role in our personal lives? What is the neuroscience and psychology behind our use of our personal stories?
- What are the benefits of writing our authentic stories?
- Recently Mayo Clinic conducted a study on the personal writing taught in The Story You Need to Tell. What are the surprising findings?
- Can anyone write her story?
- What are a few of the significant take-aways from working with thousands of writers, veterans, and cancer patients as they have discovered and written their personal stories?
Sandra Marinella Author Bio:
Sandra Marinella, MA and MEd, is an award-winning writing teacher and author from Chandler, Arizona. She has taught thousands of students and presented hundreds of writing and story-sharing workshops. Her articles have appeared in The English Journal, Seventeen, Well Being Journal, Psychology Today’s blog, and more. When Sandra faced breast cancer, she turned to her personal writing to help with this difficult journey. The experience inspired her to teach writing of personal stories to veterans and cancer patients. As she watched storytelling and writing help others transform their lives, she wrote The Story You Need to Tell-Writing to Heal from Trauma, Illness, or Loss. Currently she teaches at Mayo Clinic in Phoenix where research has established the effectiveness of her writing methods to reduce stress, improve our moods, decrease pain, and increase overall well-being. She speaks and teaches story-sharing workshops at community venues and conferences across the country. You can learn more at www.storyyoutell.com.
Upcoming Workshops and Conferences
Mayo Clinic Workshops in Phoenix in January through February, 2020.
The Story You Need to Tell–How Writing Your Stories Can Transform Your Health will be offered at Mayo Clinic in Phoenix for six weeks (January 14, 21, 28, February 4, 11, and 18, 2020, from 1:00-3 pm) Participants will learn the power of their personal stories and writing to help manage stress and their health. Call 480 342-4888 to register or see https://www.storyyoutell.com/event/mayo-clinic-workshop-series/
National Association of Poetry Therapy 40th Annual Conference in Albuquerque, April 2-5, 2020. As the Keynote Speaker, Sandra will be presenting “The Power of Our Stories,” She will share stories and recent research that demonstrates how poetry writing, story writing, and sharing our writing can profoundly improve our well-being. See https://poetrytherapy.org/index.php/national-association-for-poetry-therapy-annual-conference/
Expressive Therapies Summit in Los Angeles, 9 am, April 25, 2020. Sandra will be presenting “The Stories They Need to Tell: Therapeutic Writing Tools for Healing & Transformation.” She will share activities that can be used personally, with clients, or in classrooms to inspire story-sharing and improve health and well-being. See https://expressivetherapiessummit.la/
Sandra, I loved your comment about bringing one’s more mature self into experiences witnessed as a child. You supplied language for thoughts I have had about looking through the telescope of time (more than 50 years actually) to observe both the wounded girl, and the happy girl I was then.
In other words, we can infuse our stories with the wisdom distilled over the years. I suppose that can take the form of “takeaways” we observe as we write.
Thanks for all this!
Thank you for the kind comment Marian. It did, of course, take years for this thinking to surface. Lovely to talk with you!