“Writing is a solitary business. It takes over your life. In some sense, a writer has no life of his own. Even when he’s there, he’s not really there.” Paul Auster
My exercise class is a group of women from the community who were instructed early on and who now self-direct. It makes for a fun time with all the conversational buzz that goes on without necessity to mind the teacher.
My mind began racing for the keyboard when a woman in the circle declared herself in the middle of a writing project when asked what she had been doing. Her response to a question about her book could have come straight from my head. “Oh no,” she said, “I’m not going there. Talking saps the energy from writing.”
I think about this often when I have an inspiration for any of my blogs. I may have a post almost written in my head, but if I talk to someone about it, the concept dissipates. There is no more impetus to write about it.
I also know that if I seclude myself, my thoughts may become circular. It is my connection with others that stimulates my creativity. I examine myself because of my actions and reactions when with others. I cannot truly know myself in solitude. And yet there is this part of me that I begin to withhold in that instant when a germ of an idea surfaces in my mind. I am no long totally present socially as I water the seeds of my creation.
Ah, the ever-present question: Do I be social or do I write. I have not firmly landed on either side of this internal debate.
¡Que sera, sera!
The Student
Originally posted in My Life Class August 31, 2013
A Letter to my Children 