WRITING | CREATIVITY
Why I Write
It’s only natural
In Belize, I was asked to explain to a ten-year-old why I write. And why he should, too. As the question emerged from his bright-eyed mother, I was a little unsure how to respond. But I didn’t have the heart to disappoint. After sitting with the question for a few seconds, though, I began to realize that in my time writing, I’d gradually built some pretty persuasive arguments for the value of putting our lives onto paper.
In short, I write because I love it. I love the idea of immortalizing thoughts and events and making permanent out of the fleeting. I love the power of examining experiences and I love the catharsis of reflecting on old memories. And I love the ability to revisit them later.
The more time I’ve spent writing, the more I’ve wondered how I could have stayed afloat in a world without it. When the very ideas in our heads are trafficked almost exclusively in words — writing, at its very core, is an outgrowth of thinking. And putting thoughts into words is as therapeutic as it is essential.
On so many occasions, I haven’t even understood how I felt on a subject before writing about it. Stances that felt fully formed crumbled upon further examination. And opinions that I thought stood on shaky grounds evolved into pieces worth reading when wined…
