The Unsent Letter

I am fast approaching the 12 hour mark of my time in the psychology building and have given up on my critique of an article for today after it dawned on me that in no way have I done enough reading yet to be blabbing away about it being a fundamentally flawed slap in the face to traditional experimental psychology. So I've made the decision to do that tomorrow instead. I do this after remembering some wise words in a pep talk by Rhiannon Nicole at HeyGorg (incidentally, stumbling upon HeyGorg was a big part of inspiring me to blog in the first place).

I wanted to write some advice, I know my advice is only based on my experiences but honestly I've been told it's quite good even if often I fail to follow it myself (see!) so here we go. Today a friend asked me for help and I told her something my Mum told me when I was 12 years old that I've lived by ever since: write it down. 
Without going into any real detail, the first time I used this strategy I was quite young and not sure how to deal with very strong feelings of hurt and anger. My Mum told me to write a letter and then we'd decide if I wanted to send it. I did too, poured my little heart out, but when I was finished I didn't really need to send it, didn't want to any more. I'm not going to pretend this got rid of the pain that the person the letter was directed to had caused me, but it eased. 
I've done that ever since. It doesn't really matter what you do with the letter once you've finished it. Burn it, bury it, save it, keep it in a box under the bed. It's writing that's healing, a chance to clarify your thoughts and calm your heart. In my case I know sending certain ones would have caused more trouble than it was worth, and some things once said you can never take back. Hence the benefit of taking some time to think, is it really worth saying? Not all unsent letters need to be angry though, sometimes it's just something you feel you need to say but maybe it shouldn't really be said or you aren't ready for it, some are all about love. 
My friend and I did this today and I'm wondering if hers will get sent after all, you can really see when anger has filtered out of the person and into the letter. 
Since there's no chance I'm going to broadcast any of my own, you can read lots at Letters I'll Never Send. Submitting something anonymously is always another option for an unsent letter, and proof that I'm certainly not alone in this theory. So that's my first bit of advice; take a deep breath, let it out and let yourself move on.