Why I write

Hemingway said that you write for the one you love.  The last book was from a place of giving, written for a dear friend, something that I knew would help.  Honestly, up until I hit publish, I was on the fence about putting it out to the world.

I once heard that we all want good judgement, and good judgement is the result of experience, and experience is the result of bad judgement.  That made me laugh.  In that case, I thought, by now I must be the king of good judgement.

I sometimes think of my past self, the child growing to the man I’ve become.  He doesn’t exist anymore except in my imagination.  Memories arising when I least expect them.  Sometimes, I catch a glimpse of him and I feel such a fondness.  I wish I could spare him the pain I know he’ll experience.  But I also know the love he will as well.  The amazing things he’ll see, the adventures he’ll have.

At the same time, I, who has experienced all that he will, I so often forget the lessons.  So I write for him.  A guide, perhaps, to the future.  To the self that I will one day look back to and nod, knowing.

After Hemingway finished The Old Man and The Sea, the book for which he won the Nobel, he took the manuscript to his wife.  She read it, then said to him, “I forgive you for everything.”

The act of going within, finding our truth, and then sharing it, it helps us far more than we know.  Because when you find that gift and express it to the world, it is better, you are better.  It’s just the way things are.

That is why I write.  To share with ones I love, to share with myself, to remember and live the lessons, to make less mistakes – or at least better ones.  A guide for me to return to and apply because I know that when I do, my life flows naturally, things easily resolve themselves.  The struggle ceases and magic begins.