Expressive Writing: Is it the ACT or the MENTAL PROCESS?

I n keeping with Klein & Boals, (see link) negative thought pattens are most helped by the "chronology" of Expressive Writing. -- I may be over-simplifying here, but it's an accurate statement.

So is it the motor act of writing, or is it the narrative format that most helps a person reconcile their traumatic event memories? Can a person think methodically on movie plots, for instance? Or does this outrightly prove Longcamp, who spoke of motor connections to memory being at least as important, if not moreso, than the writing element? (see previous link...)

I often think of when I interned at a community theater during high-school in the late 90's. There was this actor, Ken Weisinger, who--before he went on--would always do this little jig offstage, that he claimed helped him better enter into the mindset of the role he was playing. This is nothing groundbreaking, but I found it interesting, nonetheless.

Does the mere act itself of writing simply focus the mind more? In other words, if we ask the question of methodically concentrating on movie plots--let's say those that most resemble our own traumatic memories--are we then going to reconcile ourselves and heal from those memories? Or must we re-imagine (visualizing) alternative 'movie endings' and those rewrite our own traumatic event memories (at least in terms of the impact they have on us)? The rewriting, I am imagining, to be a bit like those Choose Your Own Adventures of old. But certainly at least a tad more focused.

Is it the writing that makes one concentrate on an ideal and realistic outcome? And thus would the narrative format itself prove not to be a help? It does seem too simplistic... More of that 'write your desired fate' and New Age-y visualization nonsense.

If writing helps one to focus the mind, then does that suppose the existence of a fully-focused mind??? Is a truly concentrated, focused life, in thought and in deed, actually achievable? Yogis, in some way, really seem to have the key to something good.

Are we all of us philosophers, meditators, religious types, convenience moralists-- just individual souls crazy for something to fix our eyes upon? (not to bastardize Donald Barthelme too much!)

Incidentally, I would use this movie, because I want to marry Nick Charles!