Sleight of hand

If words are reluctant to appear on the page when you sit down to write, why not try switching pens?

It's a simple trick, an easy way to encourage words (and thoughts) to keep flowing. 

You might call it an illusion, a magician's sleight of hand, but when you find yourself stuck it's a way that might help you draw new words from the mysterious source from which all words flow. 

It's what I do, switching to one of the pens that I keep ready on my desk.  

Over the years I've collected dozens of pens. I fill them with different colored inks--violet, blue, black, ama-iro, kon-peki (both different shades of blue), sepia, and more--and, depending on my mood, I select a pen with the color ink that suits my mood that morning. 

Each pen's barrel is a different size, shape, weight, and color. Some of the pens are made in Japan. Others are made in Germany, Britain, and here in the United States. Some have fine point nibs, others medium, or extra-fine. Some are sharp-edged, others rounded. 

But the pens share something in common. The moment I hold one of the pens in my hand, I feel as if I'm holding a magic wand that's filled with magic ink. And as soon as I begin writing with it, I can feel the pen weave its magic spell onto the page, helping me draw words out of silence. 

Each pen leads me down a different path into a sea of words. 

Words that heal my heart. Words that make me smile. Words that connect me to those I love. Words that help me understand the world. Words that link me to the divine source of words. Words that form stories, create poems. Words, words, words...

Some days there are so many words that I feel like I'm swimming in words. But other days, staring at a blank page, I can feel as if I'm stranded in a desert without a drop of water within reach. 

That's when switching to a different pen can help me overcome the silence, poke through the resistance, leap over reluctance, and swim past fear. 

Somehow holding a different pen in my hand can banish the dread of emptiness that I feel when I look at a blank page.

Just seeing the pens lifts my heart. 

And just holding one of the pens gives me the courage to begin, to step into the unknown, and to begin swimming. 

Each pen gives me hope that I might discover something that I've never seen before. And questions begin to bubble up: What will I learn today? What will I find that's been hidden for years? What will this pen bring to the surface?

Of course, there are no guarantees that switching pens will help words appear on the page or that a new pen will help you find what you need on the page. 

But it's always worth a try.

So when words are reluctant to appear, why not try switching to another pen... and see if it might help you discover what you need to find this morning... just as switching to another pen helped me.

You end up writing when...

You end up writing when the need to write is

stronger than the fear of rejection,

when curiosity and your desire to discover

something new about yourself and the world--

and what you think and feel about it all--

is stronger than your fear of failure.

You end up writing when your voice, 

telling you that you must write, 

is stronger than all the voices in your head 

telling you to stop.

You end up writing when you cannot

not write, when it feels as essential to 

staying alive as breathing, and when writing each 

word, your hand shaping each letter on the page, 

is as vital and life-affirming as 

taking a breath.

There are secrets you can't see or know

There are secrets you can't see or know

until you begin writing.

Your pen opens the world 

like a key unlocking a door.

Each page is like an empty canyon

waiting for the echo of your voice

to fill it.

Sitting at your desk is like watching 

the waves of the sea, waiting for them 

to bring the mysteries of the deep to the surface 

so you can sort through shells and seaweed, 

sea glass and stones, and find whatever 

your eye deems worth saving.

Paper is like sand

holding memories

until time washes them away

like footprints on the beach.

We are here, then gone.

Poof!

And all that's left behind

are these words

which someone may-- 

or may not -- find 

one day.

Why do I write?

Why do I write?

Trying to answer that question is like trying to define love.

How do you put a feeling into words? Why do you love anything?

You feel something strongly... but what is that feeling? And where does it come from? Out of the blue? Or like a gentle wave that gains momentum and strength as it approaches the shore?

You see words appear on the page beneath your pen, and your heart melts.

You open a journal to a blank page, and something stirs inside you.

Just holding a pen in your hand sends a shiver up your spine.

You are where you belong.

Doing what you were born to do.

Who knows why this and not that--writing instead of drawing or playing an instrument, adding numbers, parsing the law, whatever.

Maybe it's not something to question, just something to accept.

A part of your identity as much as your fingerprint or the features on your face or the sound of your voice.

You write because you can.

Because there's nothing else that lets you be yourself in the same way... without pretending, without needing to wear a mask.

There's no hiding from yourself on the page. No barrier (except for your own limitations and talent) to keep you from seeing (being) yourself.

With each word you come closer to the truth of who you are, and, in the process of putting words on paper, you discover who you might become.

Each word is a gift into the nature of being you.

It's like improv

You don't  have a plan. 

Each morning you take a pen 

and open your journal 

to see what will happen. 

It's this not knowing 

and your curiosity 

that brings you back 

to the page each day 

to see if you'll make 

a new discovery, 

a new way of understanding

yourself and the world, 

a new way of seeing life. 

It's like improv, 

the art of making something 

out of nothing, 

completely spontaneous, 

unscripted, 

just an empty page 

and a desire to find out 

what you're thinking 

and feeling 

in this moment.

The Paths We Follow

Each day I sit down to write wondering what I'll discover on the page, not knowing what words will come or where they'll lead me. 

I remember days when I used to sit at my desk in my college dorm room staring at a blank sheet of paper and wanting to write, doubting I could write at all. 

I stared at the typewriter trying to find where the words were hiding, wondering if they'd ever come out to play. It was as if the words were shy mice or rabbits frozen in fear.

I didn't yet know how to let go of fear, how to let my thoughts go free, how to reach in and pull a strand of thought and follow it without knowing where it might lead, without worrying if it would dissolve and leave me stranded on a distant shore with no way of getting back.

Some writers rely on outlines as a way to get past their fear. But outlines inspire a different kind of fear in me--a fear of constraint, of pushing a circle into a square, or a square into a circle. With an outline, I fear that I won't be able to follow my thoughts wherever they might lead. 

I don't want anything to cut me off from the thrill of spontaneous writing, from the joy and magic of seeing my thoughts emerge on the page as they appear in my mind. 

That's why I prefer opening my journal to a blank page and seeing where the words take me. 

There's no path to follow because it doesn't exist. 

I can only see a path after I finish writing and look back to see where I've come from.

Only then can I see the distance I've traveled, and the path I carved to get here.

What about you? 

What paths do you take into your stories?

And what obstacles are standing in your way?

And how do you make your way past them?

Riptides and Tidepools

If you think about writing as a flow—a flow of words, a flow of thoughts and images, a flow of consecutive days that you can sit down and write—you begin to notice differences in the rate of flow, the speed that writing takes place on some days, the slowness on others.

There are moments when it can feel like the flow of your writing is as strong as a riptide, and you find yourself caught by the current, unable to escape, forced to go where the flow is taking you.

These riptide moments are exciting, like unexpected gifts taking you to places you might never have found if you hadn’t let yourself go with the current, let the words take you where you needed to go. 

There’s no time for gazing at the waves curling into shore or watching clouds floating overhead, no time for searching for shells on the beach or for digging sandcastles. 

There’s only the riptide current and the constant effort of trying to keep your head above water as the words rush over your head and past you, and your pen is trying to keep up with the flow, trying to catch the words and thoughts and images as they speed by.

But then there are moments when everything seems to come to a halt, when the words seem to stall and get stuck somewhere, and the flow—that current that was so full of energy and life which took you so quickly into a different world—all but stops.

What do you do then?

Those are what I like to call the tidepool moments. 

Years ago, when we spent part of our summer vacation in Maine, we rented a cabin on the rocky coastline north of Bar Harbor. 

Every morning, after the sea retreated, my wife, daughter, and I would go down to the shore and explore tidepools glistening in the morning light.

Each tidepool was filled with gifts from the sea—starfish and crabs, sea anemones, shells, sand dollars, and more.

In tidepool moments, instead of worrying about where the current is taking you, you can slow down, inspect the water, play with words as if the words themselves are gifts from the sea.

You can walk along the edge of the tidepool, watch the sunlight glistening on the surface of the pools, enjoy the tickle of icy sea water on your toes, and discover what’s been hiding beneath the surface of the sea because it’s now accessible and waiting for you.

In a tidepool moment, the flow of writing is calmer, more introspective, more self-aware, and more conscious of everything around you, unlike writing in a riptide moment, which can be frantic and filled with fear of the unknown. 

Each moment, whether a tidepool moment or a riptide moment, offers us another way of writing, of experiencing the flow of writing, of exploring the world. 

We can’t predict which kind of moment we’ll find waiting for us when we sit down at our desks each morning. 

Riptide or tidepool? 

Let’s head down to the shore to find out.

For more information on writing fast vs writing slow, visit:

https://thewritepractice.com/fast-and-slow/

https://alifeofproductivity.com/the-joys-of-writing-slow/

https://annejanzer.com/scribe-muse/

https://thejohnfox.com/2018/05/a-manifesto-for-slow-writing/

https://www.darcypattison.com/writing-life/should-you-write-fast-or-slow/

The Ten Truths of Writing

The first truth of writing:
You don't know anything.

The second truth of writing:
You know more than you think.

The third truth of writing:
Your fear of not knowing is an illusion.

The fourth truth of writing:
Unless you learn to push through the illusion,
you'll never write anything.

The fifth truth of writing:
Everything you need to know is already inside you.

The sixth truth of writing:
Touch your pen to the page and begin.

The seventh truth of writing:
Write until there is no more ink left in your heart.

The eighth truth of writing:
Let the well refill itself.

The ninth truth of writing:
Begin again.

The tenth truth of writing:
And again.

Keeping a journal

What do we discover when we sit down each morning to write in our journal? 

What draws us back to the page day after day?

And why do we keep filling up pages that we know may end up on our shelves or tucked away into drawers, never to be looked at again?

One reason we keep journals, I think, is to create proof that we exist, to announce, if only to ourselves, that we are here, alive, not an illusion or a figment of someone’s imagination. 

The marks that we make on the pages of our journals are evidence of our being here, now, in this moment.

Another reason, I suspect, is that writing helps us discover what we’re thinking in this moment, to put into words the thoughts that swirl through our heads, to enjoy the process of thinking, to take joy in following a thought wherever it might lead, whether to a dry gulley or to an overflowing riverbed.

If you’re like me, you want to feel that sensation again and again, to feel like a child gazing up at the sky and daydreaming as clouds pass by, to lose yourself in the play of words, in your imagination, in the flow of ink, the sound of a pen scraping the paper beneath your hand, each day hoping to discover something new, some part of the world or of yourself that you’ve never seen before.

Another reason why we keep journals, I’d guess, is to preserve a faithful record of what we might be thinking or feeling from day to day, week to week, year to year, so we can look back (if we ever decide to look through our journals) to see where we were and what we thought about and how we felt at a certain age or on a certain date.

Our journals can help us remember what life was like, how we might have solved a problem or failed in an attempt to do something new or to remember how we were feeling  during a challenging (or not-so-challenging) time in our lives. 

Keeping a journal is a little like saving photos or news clippings to aid in remembering so the record of our lives is a true and complete record, not merely a facade but the truth underlying our existence.

Why do we keep writing? What draws us back to the page?

Perhaps it’s simply the daily joy that writing brings, or the sense of identity the act of writing gives us. 

As long as we are writing—and continue to write—we are observing the world, exploring thoughts and feelings, learning something, which, when put into words, seems permanent and somehow resistant to the wind and change and the passage of time.

That’s every writer’s dream, I suspect, the secret wish each of us makes when we begin to write. 

We pray that the discoveries we make each day on paper will endure long after we’re gone, and for as long as the pages of our journals survive.

Connecting

As long as your pen or pencil is moving across the page, your fingers typing at the keyboard, your words flowing onto the screen or onto a piece of paper, you are connecting with a part of yourself that is hidden until the moment you tease it out with words.

It doesn’t matter if you’re writing poetry or prose, it’s the act of writing that matters, the challenge of opening your heart to the world so you (and others, if you decide to share what you’ve written) can know what’s there and can make a connection.

Call what’s in your heart the treasure beneath the sea or the pearls hidden within a shell that only you can find if you have the patience to dive deeply enough and pry the shell open with a stroke of your pen, a tap of the next key.

Whether you’re writing every day in a journal, starting a new project, or returning to a work-in-progress, you come to the page each day, if you’re like me, in the hope of connecting with the deepest part of your self, each word offering a chance to discover something new about yourself or your life that will help you understand how to live fully in each moment.

If you’re writing, you are connecting with the air you breathe, the sound of leaves rustling overhead, the taste of a peach on a warm summer day.

You are connecting with memories and with the people around you, with the feel of sea spray on your skin, with rain falling against your eyelids, with snowflakes tickling your lips and nose.

You are connecting with those you love who are no longer alive and with the person you once were and the person you are becoming.

No matter what you are writing, you’re connecting with each moment of life and with yourself as you experience life in all its mystery and beauty.

What’s so strange and wonderful about writing is the way the process reveals thoughts and emotions that you don’t always know you have until you see the thoughts and emotions expressed in the words that you write and which appear on the page in front of you like gifts from the sea.

Whatever you’re writing this morning or tomorrow or later this week, I hope you’ll persist and keep writing so you can find whatever you’re looking for.

I hope that you’ll make the connection with the deepest part of your heart so that you keep coming back to the page and learn more.

I hope you’ll keep writing and searching and exploring, and, after you’ve spent time writing, I hope you’ll look down at whatever you’ve written and discover what is most important to you.

Mostly, I hope you’ll take that first step… even if it feels like you're stepping into thin air... and find the treasure waiting for you.  

x

Each time I put pen to paper

Each time I put pen
to paper the pen takes
an unexpected turn,
this way or that,
a new path I hadn't
seen before that moment
of discovery.

It's what makes the
act of writing so
fraught with tension,
the not knowing
what will happen,
the not knowing if
anything will happen,
or if the pen will stand
motionless over the page
not moving at all,
leaving the page as fresh
and unmarked (without
a ripple) as when
I sat down to begin.

The secret to writing is,
simply, to begin, to let
the pen move across the
page, not knowing what
will come next, the nib
touching the blankness
of the page, and, like a
pebble skipping across
the still surface of
a pond, sending ripples
outward, reaching
toward shore.

Our Fifth Lap

This post marks the fifth year since I leaped into the water and started wordswimmer.

During the first year I wasn’t sure I’d be able to write more than a paragraph or two each week, never mind month after month. It was the first lesson that I gleaned from blogging. Somehow, if I began to write, I would find the words to post. And out of that discovery came another: somehow, out of the words, new ideas and new stories would emerge.

Little did I imagine that I’d still be swimming five years later. But I'm drawn to the water today as much as five years ago. What pulls me back, like a tidal flow, week after week? My joy in exploring the mystery of the writing process, of course, but also my pleasure in finding other swimmers in the water with me. Somehow the circle of swimmers has expanded each year, and I’ve come to rely on this new community in ways that I could never have predicted before getting into the water.

Over the course of writing about writing, I’ve learned that not every writer likes to think about the writing process. Some prefer to let the words flow and avoid paying too close attention to how the process works. But I’ve found the more I think about how the process works–what’s driving the story, what’s compelling the reader to keep reading, and how the words make their way onto the page–the better I can grasp the way my own stories work (or don’t work). Each story that I read offers another key to how I might approach or envision my own story. And the comments other writers share in response to each post help keep me aware of the various issues that all of us grapple with–plot, characterization, voice, setting, tone, tense, point of view, fear of the page, reluctance to explore emotions, etc.–whether or not we think of them as we write. These are aspects of our craft that we can learn and refine by sharing our thoughts and learning from each other.

Of course, commenting on posts here at wordswimmer isn’t required. But I always appreciate hearing from readers, even if I don’t always offer a response. It’s not a formal class, after all, but an informal conversation that you’re welcome to contribute to if you feel the urge. If you do post a comment, you may find the process of thinking about how to express your ideas on a particular aspect of the craft helps you better understand it. But whether you post a comment or not, it’s simply good to know you’re in the water, too.

When I started blogging, lots of friends wanted to know why I blogged. What did I get out of it if I didn’t earn any money from the process? I think about this question often on days when I'm stuck for a topic and consider stopping, or when I wonder if I’m spending too much time on the blog and not enough time on my work. But then I realize this is my work. Writing. Trying to figure out a character’s motive. Wondering about words. Thinking about plots and rhythm and language. Immersing myself in stories.

So, I dive into the blog each week because in the process of writing, of setting down words, I find that I make discoveries that I’d never have made if I hadn’t taken the time and made the effort to put thoughts into words. In the process of blogging, I've discovered that words beget words, and these words can lead to new ways of seeing and understanding. Writing in this way isn’t just a means of communicating with others; it’s a means of self-revelation and discovery.

For all the unexpected gifts that wordswimmers have shared with me in the water over the past five years, I want to say thank you. I’m grateful to you for joining me here each week, and I look forward to swimming more laps with you in the weeks ahead.

For more information on writing as a process of self-discovery, visit:
http://markdavidmuse.blogspot.com/2008/08/writing-as-self-discovery.html
http://www.slowdownfast.com/an-exercise-in-self-discovery-finding-your-passion-through-the-pen/

And to learn more about the benefits of blogging, see:
http://www.reason4smile.com/2008/02/12/seven-benefits-of-blogging-to-your-personal-growth/
http://www.statepress.com/2010/03/24/the-benefits-of-blogging/
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-healthy-type