Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Why I Write

Writing is cathartic for me. It helps me clarify and organize my thoughts. It helps me muddle through the melange of ideas and ideologies that fill my head. It puts me on the right track of why I espouse an opinion and what exactly that opinion is.


Sometimes, it can also feel like vomitting. Pardon me for being so blunt and coarse. I used to talk aloud to myself and thus "vomit" up all the thoughts and questions in my head. I thought that would always be a part of my life, this talking to myself. But maybe it's evidence of a better place I am in my life that talking aloud to myself has simply gone away. Like the person who you always seem to see in line at the grocery store and then one day you realize, "Hey wait, I haven't seen ..... in a while". My release from this self talk snuck up on me. That internal angst and fear that accompanied my life like a silent companion; just left surreptitiously one unknown evening.


I think it's because now I write. It's a compulsion. When I feel questions arise; when I find myself forming an absolulte on an idea; when I'm taking my stand; when I'm completely lost in confusion or see things that leave me wanting to scream at the injustice or weep for the hurt I'm seeing others deal with....then I HAVE to write. I have to sort it out - to GET it out.


Maybe that's the healthy part of the talking to self AND the writing. Because it IS getting it all out. My feelings are there. I mean, GOOD NIGHT, I feel like I'm immersed in them sometimes. So they have to get out of my brain, my heart, my conscience and on to something else. If I can make those thoughts visible, I can sort them out. I can deal with them. I can make sense of the jumble that is my brain sometimes. So even this morning, as I'm gearing up to start work and take care of the essential minutae of having a job; I found myself needing to write. If only to write about why I need to write....I just felt a little over flowing and needed to loosen the valve a bit.

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