{"id":8323,"date":"2022-04-18T23:47:44","date_gmt":"2022-04-19T04:47:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/?p=8323"},"modified":"2022-04-18T23:48:29","modified_gmt":"2022-04-19T04:48:29","slug":"why-write","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/2022\/04\/why-write\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Write?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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The Journey<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice\u201a
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
\u201cMend my life!\u201d
each voice cried.
But you didn\u2019t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations\u201a
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice,
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do\u201a
determined to save
the only life you could save.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2014 Mary Oliver<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I have not <\/strong>been listening to myself, I realize now. It\u2019s not like I haven\u2019t been talking (I have), but I haven\u2019t heard what I\u2019ve been saying. Because I thought I was talking (or more accurately, writing) to you. You, my reader. Let me see if I can explain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three or four times in the last month, I\u2019ve tried to pen a blog, but each time I\u2019ve pulled back, feeling like I was writing around something, rather than into it. It was discouraging \u2013 not being able to complete an essay. Writing is always hard, of course, but it is usually an enjoyable challenge for me \u2013 to locate the thread, weave it through, and tie it up. Even better is the opportunity to offer the reader a takeaway \u2013 something useful or inspiring, or at least a story that makes one nod along in recognition, feeling less alone knowing there are others who feel the same way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In the best of both worlds, a personal essay is both illuminating to the reader and cathartic for the writer. But what I have been trying to write lately I now view as pure navel-gazing. Of course I sensed this, which is why I kept stalling out. I\u2019d drive down a long, twisting road, take a fork, then another, and realize that anybody following me was now surely lost. Yet stubbornly I\u2019d turn around and go down the road again \u2014 pursuing the same topic, thinking there must be something inherently beneficial to writing about it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turns out there was! Only it was beneficial to me, not to you. (But hold on, I do have something for you.) I didn\u2019t see or hear it at first, but gradually I realized that the hands on my keyboard had taken the gibberish inside my head, translated the whole mess, sorted my thoughts into a logical framework, and displayed them on the screen in front of me. There, to the left of the blinking cursor, was the thing that had been puzzling me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I finally understood that solving this puzzle was important to me; it needed my attention. But not yours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Yet here\u2019s the takeaway for you: Write.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Writing is an excellent way to reach that place inside yourself that may not feel like it has a voice. It\u2019s a way to capture your feelings and articulate them, to quantify your spirit. You never know what might be pulsing in your fingertips as they hover over the keys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You don\u2019t have to keep a daily journal, or write complete essays, or show your writing to anyone else. You don\u2019t even need to write down more than a sentence at a time. But you do need to hold on to what you\u2019ve written. The big idea here is to collect your thoughts so that you can look back at them from time to time. You\u2019ll find out what really matters to you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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While you\u2019re collecting your own thoughts, collect those of others, too. Grab snippets and quotes and excerpts and poems that you like and stash them all in a little notebook that will become a gift to your future self. I started my wisdom notebook in the early days of my sobriety to try to keep hold of the good and useful things I was hearing. Over time I added poems (like those from Mary Oliver<\/a> I\u2019ve included here) and passages from books and favorite authors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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By gathering what I like, I\u2019ve learned that the topics I gravitate to most are grace, faith, addiction, spirituality, nature, the psyche, family, gratitude, honesty, fear, responsibility, and materialism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I look at this notebook frequently for advice and reminders:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou do not have to sit outside in the dark. If, however, you want to look at the stars, you will find that darkness is necessary.\u201d \u2014 Annie Dillard<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAddiction exists wherever persons are internally compelled to give energy to things that are not their true desires.\u201d \u2014 Gerard May<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cGrace is accepting the fact that in the end we are accepted, despite being unacceptable.\u201d \u2014 Paul Tillich<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat we are looking for already resides within us.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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It was reading this notebook the other night that sent me back to look at what I\u2019d been writing recently, that opened my eyes and ears to see and hear what I was trying to say to myself. It was my younger self reminding my older self of how wild and precious life is (to paraphrase Mary Oliver) and that \u201cwhoever you are\u2026the world offers itself to your imagination.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Wild Geese<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting \u2014
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2014 Mary Oliver<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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LISTEN TO KRISTA TIPPETT TALK WITH MARY OLIVER<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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LOOKING FOR RECIPES?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Visit cookthevineyard.com<\/a> and sign up for the free weekly newsletter<\/a>. (Something I do as part of my day job.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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If you arrived here from the internet and would like to subscribe to the Sixburnersue blog, click here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Journey One day you finally knewwhat you had to do, and began,though the voices around youkept shoutingtheir bad advice\u201athough the whole housebegan to trembleand you felt the old tugat your ankles.\u201cMend my life!\u201deach voice cried.But you didn\u2019t stop.You knew what you had to do,though the wind priedwith its stiff fingersat the very foundations\u201athough their […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[168,163,164,162],"tags":[214],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8323"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8323"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8323\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8338,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8323\/revisions\/8338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}