John Evans left this physical world on December 29th, 2022 after a long and courageous journey with cancer. He will be greatly missed in our journaling and expressive writing community. His legacy and work will live on through his books and teachings.
John F. Evans, MAT, MA, Ed.D was a writing clinician and integrative health coach who worked with groups, individuals, and health care professionals, teaching them how to use writing for better physical, emotional, and spiritual health. Evans authored five books and taught journaling and writing for self-development for over thirty years. With James Pennebaker, Evans co-authored Expressive Writing: Words that Heal (2014). His book, Wellness & Writing Connections: Writing for Better Physical, Mental, and Spiritual Health (2010), is a collection of essays from the Wellness & Writing Connections Conference Series (2007 – 2010). At Duke Integrative Medicine, Evans taught Caring for Caregivers, Legacy Writing, Transform Your Health: Write to Heal, Leading Patients in Writing for Health, and Writing as a Tool for Integrative Health Coaches. Evans blogged occasionally for Psychology Today in Personal Perspectives and had a private practice at Psychology Associates in Chapel Hill, NC.
Evans received a scholar-in-residence and post-doctoral fellowship award in Expository Writing from New York University, a doctorate in post-secondary literature and writing pedagogy studies from North Carolina State University, and an MA in English from Middlebury College. He was founder and executive director of Wellness & Writing Connections, LLC.