Why We Write
And why we won’t find happiness writing the way we do now…
“Good writing is when you’re mad with it, it’s when it’s stuffed in your ears, your nostrils, under your fingernails.” Charles Bukowski
I’ve just read a piece about happiness which, as some of you know (a very few, apparently), is primarily why I write. Believe me, I’d give it up in a heartbeat if I actually found happiness.
Unfortunately, I’m still unhappy—not so much with my own words, but certainly with others. It seems there’s no shame in snatching loose platitudes these days, and even less in passing them off as homespun. Frankly, there’s nothing worse than homespun platitudes. I find them about as quaint as the average glue sniffer.
To be fair, she wanted to draw our attention to some interesting articles, and decided to start off with — you guessed it — some homespun platitudes.
I know that sounds harsh, but this piece on happiness was written by a member of the Medium staff, the Director of Creative Growth. To be fair, she wanted to draw our attention to some interesting articles, and decided to start off with—you guessed it—some homespun platitudes.
“As I enjoy the last dregs of summer in Chicago,” it starts out, “I bask in the near-perfect pre-winter weather, the joy in returning my kids to school, and the mouth-watering vegetables that are finally ready to pluck from the garden. To me, being in this space is the manifestation of happiness.”
Between “mouth-watering,” “plucking” and “manifestation of happiness,” I almost forgot about “last dregs of summer.” If you’ve ever been to Chicago, you know there are no “last dregs” of anything. Everything is extreme and not the least bit “dreggy.”
What shocked me more were comments from readers like, “I personally define happiness as contentment with the way things are,” and, “Happiness is cruelly fleeting but very beautiful.” I’ll tell you what happiness is: It’s the day AI realizes it can win Pulitzers without copying a word we write.
Even one of the articles the Director of Creative Growth recommended, by Charles Black M.D., made me wish he’d stick to medicine. He’s quoted as saying, “We can all be happy now if we learn to want what we have rather than trying to have what we want.” Isn’t this the same as saying “Material things won’t make you happy”?
When you’re so mad it gets “up your nostrils” and “under your fingernails,” you’d be surprised how happy you are being disenchanted.
If Charles Bukowski is right, and good writing is being “mad with it,” people either aren’t mad enough, or aren’t thinking enough. It takes thought to be happy. When you’re so mad it gets “up your nostrils” and “under your fingernails,” you’d be surprised how happy you are being disenchanted.
The reason people don’t get mad here on Medium—at least, not unless it’s something to do with war and carnage—is because we’re not disenchanted enough. We should be, but we’re not. We’d rather send our children off to school and grab some vegetables from the garden.
It’s also why our heroes are more likely to be Taylor Swift than Noam Chomsky. He says, “If you’re teaching today what you were teaching five years ago, either the field is dead or you are.”
Swift says : “So I drive home alone, as I turn out the light, I’ll put this picture down, and maybe get some sleep tonight.” This could come out of any teenager’s diary, and probably did. Her next album should be called “Songs From My Old Diaries.” If you can’t be mad, at least be honest.
Then again, maybe she should spend more time listening to what true reflection sounds like, as in John Lennon’s “My Life”: “There are places I’ll remember, all my life, though some have changed, some forever, not for better, some have gone and some remain…”
I doubt the big studios or publishers even recognize new anymore. They don’t take chances, so we don’t.
Artists don’t write like this anymore because we don’t reflect. We turn to another song, or article, or program, figuring it’s something new. I doubt the big studios or publishers even recognize new anymore. They don’t take chances, so we don’t. They look at gross rating points, we look at claps.
I’ve been on here for ten years and I still don’t understand what makes people clap. The article I mentioned above has over 1.1K claps and 27 comments. And article I wrote back in 2018 called “Happiness Is Boring” received 126 claps and one comment, despite nearly every sentence in the piece being underlined.
Anyway, we’re not going to solve happiness, or derive much pleasure from calling it “fleeting but beautiful.” And if you’re worried about AI taking over all the writing, here’s one ray of hope. AI doesn’t know diddly about disenchantment or reflection. It’ll never write “My Life” or “Revolution.”
She’s the one who should be worried. All her millions won’t alter the fact that she’s easy to copy because she’s easy to predict.
That said, someone’s going to feed AI enough teenage diaries to churn out more songs than even Taylor Swift can imagine. She’s the one who should be worried. All her millions won’t alter the fact that she’s easy to copy because she’s easy to predict.
As for the rest of us, I’d suggest you get mad, let it get stuffed in your ears, up your nostrils and under your fingernails. Otherwise, you’ll join countless others who figure platitudes are harmless. Obviously they aren’t.
