Write Books that Help Children
Manage Your Anger To Enrich Your Writing for Kids
That raging, fuming, temper tantrum can be a useful tool for igniting your writing, and it can help the children who read it to manage their anger too.
Fight of Flight
Had a bad morning? Your boss screamed at you unfairly? Spent 45 minutes trying to get through to the phone company? Chances are your anger levels are going through the roof.
You could express your anger in traditional ways - explode, shout and yell, break the crockery or throw furniture. Or go the internalising route and bottle it up, letting it simmer and seethe inside you. But there is a third way, one that is incredibly useful for writers.
Manage Your Anger Creatively
For writers this burning, explosive energy is a gift. Use it as a rocket blast to propel your writing.
Instead of throwing a tantrum or letting your rage simmer inside, sit down and start working on whatever story for children you are currently writing. You will probably find that a character will suddenly discover an angry situation of their own. They will have a lot to say to the other characters, they’ll storm about and generally stir things up in the imaginary world you are creating. This is a good thing. A good stir gets the other characters eager to have their own say, and all you have to do is sit back and write it all down.
Don’t Censor this Stage
Allow your characters to say whatever they want, and to behave as abominably as they dare. Let it all out. This energy is incredibly valuable.
Edit in the Second Draft
The time to assess the usefulness of what you have written will come in the second draft. Here you can measure up the writing. Is it too strong? Do you need to tone down the language? Or does your other writing seem pale in comparison? Has the emotion overwhelmed the storyline, or has it given it a much-needed zing? Invariably the answer lies somewhere between.
Expressing Your Anger in Your Writing Helps Children Learn to Manage their Anger Too
The children who read your books have been socialised in a particular way to deal with their own anger. Some may already have learned the hard way that an uncontrolled explosion and hitting out at random way gets them into trouble. But they may not know better ways to cope.
Others may have learned that any display of anger makes Mommy or Teacher unhappy, and have already mastered the art of suppressing it. The lucky few have learned to express their feelings appropriately and can let them flow out without causing harm to themselves of their relationships.
Good Anger Management Leads To Good Mental Health
When you use your emotional energy to propel the story forward, Children reading your book experience it as being filled with authentic emotion. Once they feel what you are feeling, they are hooked. They engage with the characters and care about them. By seeing how the characters express their anger, they get to not only feel their feelings vicariously, but also learn in a safe way what the repercussions of poor anger management can be.
You can read more about the emotional aspects of being a writer in Dealing with Disappointment,When your Book gets Criticized and The Emotional Roots of Writer's Block.
