“I do not feel as if my day had substance in it, if I have read nothing,”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson, quoted in First We Read, Then We Write: Emerson on the Creative Process by John D Richardson

__________

“When it came to books, I greedily devoured a wide range, like I was busily shoveling coal into a blazing furnace. I was so busy every day enjoying one book after another, digesting them (in many cases not properly digesting them), that I didn’t have any time left to think about anything else.”

– Haruki Murakami, Novelist as a Vocation

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I need books, books, books.

To imbibe.

To self-medicate with.

You cannot overdose on books.

You cannot addle your brain with too much reading, too quickly.

You can only take in one word at a time.

Sure, you can become intoxicated, that is the goal!

But the mind has its own gag reflex. If you dive too deep for too long, it shuts off and demands some trashy TV to counterbalance all the weighty moods and ideas ingested.

There is nutrition in these paper pulp pages.

Energy for the day.

Building mental muscle to endure.

To survive the bleak winter.

I am a bear, I have put on winter fat. I bed down and live off these word calories.

“The Golden Age of a sport is when the most innovation in technique and equipment occurs, and I’ve been fortunate to have lived and participated in the Golden Age of many an outdoor sport: spearfishing, falconry, fly fishing, whitewater kayaking, telemark and backcountry skiing, ice climbing, and Yosemite big-wall climbing.”

– Yvon Chouinard, Some Stories: Lessons from the Edge of Business and Sport

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“You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself
in any direction you choose.
You’re on your own. And you know what you know.
And YOU are the guy who’ll decide where to go.”

– Dr. Seuss, Oh, The Places You’ll Go!

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I’m too late to be part of a golden age of seemingly anything: the world has been explored and exploited; sports have been professionalised and commercialised.

Where are the golden opportunities?

I maintain that I am part of the golden age of walking.

Dr. Seuss is right — you can always take yourself somewhere.

Because walking requires no equipment.

No special technique.

No secret knowledge.

Walking does not invite affectation or hipster-ish exclusivity.

It is an open club whose only requirement is to get out of the house.

There is no showing off nor competitive first walks.

It’s simply about experiencing the world anew each and every time.

Celebrating freedom of movement.

A modest adventure that rewards consistency.

A bit like writing.

Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me
Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me
Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me
Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me
Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me
Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me
Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me
Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me

– Rage Against the Machine, Killing in the Name

__________

“I don’t have to vent my anger on them.  Instead, I’m venting my anger on this page, which is the only course an angry writer should take.”

– Joseph Sutton, My Writing Year: Making Sense of Being a Writer

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Haven’t we all felt the emotions of a toddler, expressed with the vocabulary of a teenager, bursting forth from deep within with a desperate No!

I would love to not be so timid with my frustrations and irritations.

I can safely scream at the page.

Am I a coward for writing rather than speaking?

Or am I saving myself – preventing catastrophe?

I suppose art is a space for free expression that would snarl you in all sorts of repercussions if expressed in the workplace or the street.

I am not wholly civilised.

I am simply lucky to have learnt a simple system of filtration – my thoughts do not need always to be expressed by my mouth.

I can write them down instead. They lie in front of me in silence. A graveyard of frustrations.

I can resurrect them by sharing them in public to cause havoc or mischief.

Or, more likely, indifference. Because what is so wild about my thoughts? And why would anyone bother to read them let alone be bothered by reading them?

This is all for me.

A repository of the good, the bad and the ugly.

“Mostly I was using whatever story I happened to have going at the time to get me through the day and give me some minimal sense of control and mastery. They were a secret source of sustenance. If I got a few good lines in the morning, that made the whole rest of the day better.”

– George Saunders, Author’s Note in CivilWarLand in Bad Decline

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“Man needs the conviction that he is doing something ‘worthwhile’, something ‘useful’, something that couldn’t be done by somebody else. This explains many disappointed hopes, many lives dedicated to a very small segment of human activity – and many breakdowns when this conviction is suddenly shaken. Man needs faith, not in a god – unless to be told that he is right – but faith in himself.”

– Georges Simenon, When I Was Old

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I want to believe in myself. Not as a guru or a great leader, but as a functioning and creative human being.

I need to feel the cool breeze of satisfaction. I crave the self-attention of writing.

I long to matter – to pursue something, even a little bit each day – that comes from my centre.

Whatever mood I wake up in, whatever burdens I feel weighing me down, my morning writing session can add a little corrective.

It is a reminder of my self worth.

I can function because I listen to my inner voice. For a few precious moments I attempt to be present with my thoughts.

In this time I dare to take myself seriously: I welcome honesty and earnestness.

Of course, I can choose to share much or little of these thoughts. There is no pressure to generate content or advice, nor great persuasive passages of instruction.

I am humbly submitting to a little self indulgence to keep me steady.

At core, writing is survival. It’s a levee built to hold back the swelling pressures of the outside world.

It is an attempt to keep the destructive forces of the world at bay. To avoid flooding my mind with the demands of others.

I seek to protect this precious loam, the topsoil of my imagination from which so much self satisfaction emerges.

It is such a minor thing to pick up a pen and write a few pages.

But so is taking a step. I don’t count my steps and neither do I count my pages. But I have faith that my pedestrian efforts will occasionally provide new vistas worth remembering.

“Creation, you see, requires continual therapy.”

– William Least Heat-Moon, Writing Blue Highways

__________

“Two years of one day at a time, sets and reps, iron and woodwork therapy, fear and trembling, prayer and God, and I stood upright.”

– Dave Draper, A Glimpse in the Rear View

__________

Writing as therapy:

Cheap

Quick

Private

Repeatable

Sustaining

Immediate

Adaptable

Simple

Daily

Forever.

“Here is my secret: I don’t mind what happens.”  

– Jiddu Krishnamurti, quoted in Practical Living by Brian Enos

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“As long as an idea stays in your head it is perfect. But perfect things are never real. Immediately put an idea down into words or in a sketch, or as a cardboard prototype. Now your idea is much closer to reality because it is imperfect.”

– Kevin Kelly, Excellent Advice for Living

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A reminder to self: the glory is in the doing not the reflecting.

The giving not the receiving.

The attempting not the perfecting.

I will resolutely stand by this methodology of fragments.

I will blurt out ideas as they are emitted.

I will not seek to hone, polish and render them into a state of perfection.

I seek not fool’s gold but interludes of solace.

I write as a form of adventure: I seek new ways of looking at the old self: me.

And there is always a parade of old selves to view when you make a habit of setting down new thoughts.

“Learn by doing because your best teacher is experience. You’re the best teacher of yourself, because you understand yourself better than anyone else. If you’re thoroughly dedicated and study something deeply, you can teach yourself whatever you need to know.”

– Rod Judkins, Make Brilliant Work

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“Once you have determined to do something, the less time you allow to elapse until you act, the better. A failed action, done quickly, will improve your confidence more than one done after great procrastination, even if it succeeds…

…Dynamic people take more actions in one morning than most people take in a month. The goal is to take many more actions in a given time period than you normally do. Start slowly, try to take even just two actions in a day, and increase from there.”

– Phil Stutz, Lessons for Living

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How can you arrive at an answer only worked out in your head?

The only way to know for sure is to use the hands: to grasp, pick up, try, experiment, take action.

Everything else is mere speculation.

You don’t want to be a fence sitter.

It’s healthy every now and then to make a firm decision and strike out in the direction of Action.

Keep what works, or discard.

Remember, it is all self-education.

You don’t have to create a masterpiece.

But you do have to create.

Be brave enough to start!

“My point is simply this: Whatever circumstances life brings you, you will be more likely to succeed and find happiness if you take responsibility for making your decisions well instead of complaining about things being beyond your control. Psychologists call this having an “internal locus of control,” and studies consistently show that people who have it outperform those who don’t. So don’t worry about whether you like your situation or not. Life doesn’t give a damn about what you like. It’s up to you to connect what you want with what you need to do to get it and then find the courage to carry it through.”

– Ray Dalio, Principles

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“Sunrise doesn’t last all morning
A cloudburst doesn’t last all day 
Seems my love is up 
And has left you with no warning 
It’s not always gonna be this grey 

All things must pass
All things must pass away”

– George Harrison, All Things Must Pass

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In a week where I have felt the creep of self-pity, it is satisfying to be reminded of simple truths.

I must take responsibility for my own actions.

I need to be adaptable.

This morning necessitated a pep talk: I had to face the reality of a day filled with hard work, despite my reluctance.

I met the challenge and survived (and I don’t think anyone was able to pick up on my initial reticence).

But now the day is nearing its end.

And I need to remember that all things must pass.

I no longer need the tough love of the morning.

The end of the day needs gentler words, that soothe and reassure.

A reminder that it is Ok to struggle.

I take the opportunity to step out out of the hurried stream of activities the day demands. I settle down with a great book, detach and lose my mind.

Tomorrow I might need a kick up the backside.

But tonight, tonight is mine to indulge, unwind and escape reality.

I have run
I have crawled
I have scaled these city walls
These city walls
Only to be with you

But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for

– U2, I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For

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“You must realize, Mr. Dunne, the universe is a library. When I was a young man, I searched the stacks of the branch near my house in Palermo, in Buenos Aires. My fondest hope was to find the single volume that would tell me everything I must know in order to survive.”

– Jorge Luis Borges, quoted in Borges and Me: an Encounter by Jay Parini

__________

I’ve always been someone in search of a system of living.

I’ve longed for an explanation of the meaning of it all.

I’ve craved guidance about where and how to take the next step.

Alas, it hasn’t happened yet.

What I have gradually come to realise is that I must be responsible for the creation of my own system.

There is no one Way.

No single answer, but many questions.

There is no enlightenment, only progress.

So I take ideas from here, there, everywhere.

Keep some, drop a few; accumulate a way of living quilted from the ideas of others.

I don’t ned faith in my system – I know it is eternally imperfect.

There is no belief needed other than in the limitless abundance of available knowledge.

I simply have to try, be curious and resist my natural inertia.

If I stay on the look-out, I may confidently strike out in the direction of a purposeful life.

Or, as is the case more times than not, I wander around the wilderness in search of a path.

But what an adventure!

A modest quest, just for me.

Long may I fail to find what I’m looking for.

“You see, there’s something else I’m going to do, something I must do – only I don’t know what it is. That’s why I go round painting and taping and drawing and writing and that, because it may be one of them. All I know is, this isn’t it for me.”

– John Lennon, quoted in John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs by Ian Leslie

__________

“I don’t know what else to do so I write. It’s my way of seeing the world.”

– Jim Harrison, quoted in Conversations with Jim Harrison, edited by Robert DeMott

__________

Who am I? What do I want to achieve? How should I spend my days? What is my purpose?

All great questions, if a little ambitious.

Mostly I answer with ignorance and uncertainty.

Then I try to get closer to a more precise answer by uncovering what others have got to say.

I read and write as a sort of quest: I am seeking some meaning and some structure to my life.

This journey has been haphazard and would be frustratingly imprecise for another to follow in my steps.

But it’s the only way I know how.

I’m leaning in to what makes my brain light up.

It’s mostly discovery generated from curiosity.

All my thoughts appear as small pieces; I’ve not found enough to see a pattern emerging, but nothing I have learnt so far has put me off my pursuit.

I will keep seeking, observing, gathering, and reflecting.

Perhaps the most useful lesson has been the power of sharing these discoveries.

Even if nobody reads this, its composition has helped me to gain a little clarity.

I’ve put something new in my box of knowledge and can now dive back into infinity.