Harnessing emotions from trauma in your writing

We are all currently living through a worldwide pandemic, the cause of all sorts of emotions. Sadness. Loneliness. Devastation. Grief. Contentment. Happiness. It’s often said that writers write what they know. Following this period in our lives, we writers will have much fodder to scribble about. But, how do we snatch the intensity of those feelings and express them in all their rawness?

Some folks journal. I don’t. Instead, I write scenes that relate to what I’m experiencing at the time, though not necessarily the exact same event. Many of my readers have said that the characters’ emotions spill off the page and affect them at a deep level. I think it’s because I’m at the height of those emotions when I write about them.

I wonder what my writing will be like in the near future.