How do I write? How am I doing what I am doing right now?
Honestly, I don’t know. It seemed to just happen one day.
I started this page and then just started posting stuff on it.
I would get an idea and then I would just start writing about it.
Maybe that’s the secret. Just start exploring it.
That’s what I am doing right now. When you read this it will be a full article and there will be lines below this one full of words. But right here, right now, there is nothing ahead of me. I have to bring it into existence.
Is that the secret of writing? To just pull something out of your mind and make it real?
Well, seems to work for me. I look inside. I look at the whirly swirling bubling cauldron of ideas and write about what I see.
Humans go out into the world and see people walking around. They see dogs barking. They see cats bathing in the sun. They wave to a friend. And all those experiences go into their mind. It becomes backgrond fodder for the subconscious. Then some of those ideas bubble up and get noticed by the conscious mind.
In writing about writing there seems to be a magic. How do we use a thing to talk about itself? You can’t bite or clap with one hand. Yet we can use language to talk about language and use writing to talk about writing.
Maybe the secret to writing is to venture out into the unknown, just as I am doing now. I don’t know what it going to come next but I am following it because it seems to be going somewhere interesting.
That’s how I started my page. I thought “I wonder what will happen if I start a page on Facebook”. And look at me now. Who could have predicted I would get here.
I think what stops a lot of people is fear. Fear that you won’t live up to your own expectations. As someone who used to be crippled by expectations, we just don’t know what is going to happen, but we are still capable of walking forward. And now I can look back and say “Wow, this article is coming along”. But it started with a blank page.
That fear can be crippling sometime. What if it’s not good? What if I don’t communicate the idea I wanted to?
What helped me is realising that whatever I put out there, it wouldn’t have been put out there if I hadn’t done it. Whatever it is, whatever you think about it, whatever quality you think it has, the world will be a more interesting creative place because you put something into it that never existed before.
Language has a finite amount of words in it, but they can go together into arrangements that have never been seen before.
That’s the amazing power of the human mind. To make connections. To show people things they have never seen before.
Writing is like laying down a path that wasn’t there before. As I write these words I am taking you on a journey through my mind’s eye at the things I am seeing in there.
I don’t know what effect it will have on those around me. But it makes me feel more connected to myself and hopefully it can give you a bit of hope that you too will be able to look inside your mind and tell us about what is happening in there.
No one ever in the history of the world has ever had a life like yours. That isn’t an exageration. Your parents, life events, hobbies and environments all contribute to produce a mixture that is wholly new and never before seen in human history. Tell us about it. I am sure everyone would love to hear all about it.
Never think that people don’t care. Humans conquered the world not because we are the strongest, or the tallest or the biggest, or even the best at seeing or tasting or running. Who don’t do anything the best. But we work together and share our experiences. We care for one another. We all work together and produce something that is more than the some of its parts.
The world is messy, and the human world seems especially messy. But all humans are lucky in that they can form their own thoughts, experience their own lives and care and feel about those around us and that is not something I would give up for the world.
Keep learning, keep reaching out and keep living. The world needs people like you in it