Why Writing Matters

I didn't post anything last month. I haven't written in so long, I'll have to write about writing.

I have a draft on my blog that consists of quotations. Being known as I am to collect quotes, I must clarify. These aren't amusing things I heard someone I know say, but quotations I found that impressed me in some way. Most of them regard writing.

I like reading Jeff Goins. I just added his blog to the ones I follow. He can feel rather self-promoting and redundant. But he always makes me want to write. The majority of his articles can be summed up simply: write what you're passionate about and be confident-admit you're a writer!

Of course, reading about writing always makes me want to write. Which is why I am writing rather than writing a summary of an article. That is not writing. I do not like writing things I am not interested in writing. In other words, something academic. As I am fond of saying, if it needs citations and research, I don't want to write it. Until I get into it, at least, and then if I can grasp some importance in the subject (i.e. relation to real life), I sometimes sort of like it. 

One of my favorite quotes says, 

"Perhaps it would be better not to be a writer, but if you must, then write." - J. B. Priestly

It's a favorite (though admittedly when I use the word "favorite" it's used loosely) because it describes me well. Similarly, 

"You become a writer because you need to become a writer - nothing else." - Grace Paley

Thinking overmuch always makes me need to write. As another of my favorite quotes about writing says, 

"I am a writer perhaps because I am not a talker."  - Gwendolyn Brooks

That also describes me well.

You might strongly agree that I am not a talker if you don't know me well. You probably strongly disagree if I know you well. Or perhaps you know me well enough to understand.

I think that is why I like reading Jeff Goins. He recognizes something important. I am a writer. I have things to say. But, speaking takes courage.

And that is something I want. I want to have the courage to say what I really think. The confidence to believe that it's worth saying. As my poetry professor says, a good poet must have a sense of (as my brother would say) hubris. Of self-respect and pride. He takes it a bit farther than I would, saying you must believe that what you have written is the best thing ever written. But there is truth to it.

"A writer is somebody for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people." - Thomas Mann

Although non-writers would mostly disagree, there is something true about that. And maybe it's because the non-writer doesn't care much about what he writes. The reason anything is hard is because you care about it. If you didn't, it wouldn't be hard.

The best things I have written I can enjoy as if someone else had written them. In some cases, I know they are good. And the reason they are is that I was honest. And they were about something I considered important.

To say something you think is important and--even more so--to let other people see that you think it is important--is to be vulnerable.

I'm writing about my writing, and my need to write, but it matters because what I'm really writing about is fear. Fear and love and identity--which means I'm writing about Christ.