Donna's Blog: Writing to Heal
Exploring the Science of Emotion, Trauma, Health, and Healing
Thank you for joining me in my little corner of the web! I’m Donna Jackson Nakazawa, an award-winning science journalist and speaker passionate about exploring the intricate connections between neuroscience and human emotion. Over the years, my work has been dedicated to uncovering how our early life experiences shape our brains, bodies, and overall well-being. I’ve delved deep into the science of how trauma affects our health and how we can find pathways to healing.
I offer online courses that empower you to reframe your narratives and heal from past trauma through a powerful journaling process, based on the innovative, trauma-informed, mindful Neural Re-Narrating™ program I’ve taught at universities and behavioral health groups nationwide.
My newest book, The Adverse Childhood Experiences Guided Journal, a workbook that applies my writing-to-heal program through exercises and prompts, will give you the guidance and space to process painful thoughts, feelings and memories to bring you peace, healing, and hope.
Feel free to dig into my blog posts – past and present! If you find the information here insightful and valuable, I hope you will also join me on my Substack, Healing Together with Donna Jackson Nakazawa, where I aim to create a warm and welcoming space where we can further explore together the profound connections between our emotions, past experiences, and health. I will be sharing insights, stories, and science-based strategies, all grounded in the latest neuroscience research. For now, as I work on building an engaging and supportive community, all my articles and features will be FREE. I hope you’ll consider following and supporting my work as we build this meaningful space together.
My Online Courses
Your Healing Narrative
Write-to-Heal With Neural Re-NarratingTM
Breaking Free From Trauma
3-hour self-paced workshop
Available now!
Neuroscience-Based Writing Practices to Rewire Your Brain from Trauma
The trauma of your past can’t be undone, but you can take charge of how it affects you. This compassionate journal offers a safe space to help you process, heal, and reclaim your power.
Writing to Heal - Recent Blog Posts
- All Posts
- Angel and the Assassin
- Childhood Disrupted
- Chronic Illness
- Neural Re-Narrating™️
- The Adverse Childhood Experiences Guided Journal
- The Last Best Cure
I am sitting here in an odd position. I am in bed with the flu, but the stomach flu can also mean all sorts of very un-fun things for me with my autoimmune condition. If you know my work you know exactly what I’m talking about. So I am trying really hard to do…
Every night we have a ritual at our house. I walk the ten footsteps down the hall to my son’s room, hug him as he sits in his desk chair, doing his forever-homework, and say, “Good night, I love you!” He sometimes mumbles the words back to me, but his arms squeeze around mine.…
My dear friend S. shared this with me. I saw her a few days ago. S. faces her own daily health challenges — her own and her partner’s. She’s started taking a meditative walk each day, at sunrise, and marking each walk with a photo. She looks back at the scene she saw that…
In my last post I asked the question, what do we mean when we say “cure?” Can a cure be the same as “healing?” And if so, what do we mean by “healing?” Many “chronic” conditions may not be “cured.” But we can change the quality of our moments and our days. Is that…
What do I mean when I use the word, “cure?” I struggled with that, to be honest, as I set out to research and write The Last Best Cure. My friend, who I’ll call J, challenged me on that. J. is a breast cancer survivor, who has faced a tough road. “I question whether…
I was just reading a lovely novel, To The End of the Land, by David Grossman (finalist for the National Book Critics Circle award for fiction). And in it the main character quotes an obscure book by Nahum Gutman, called The Path of the Orange Peels, in which the main character says that every…
In my own search for The Last Best Cure, I knew that if I wanted to gain a state of mind that was healing for my body and cells — and reclaim joy — I needed help. The best help on the planet. Tara Brach, one of the most gifted insight meditation teachers on…
