to write a letter to myself when encountering a complicated decision, or a hard emotion, or a surge of inspiration. By the time I’m done composing my thoughts in the structured form demanded by written prose, I’ve often gained clarity. I do make a habit of regularly reviewing these entries, but this habit is often superfluous. It’s the act of writing itself that already yields the bulk of the benefits. Earlier in this chapter, I introduced Raymond Kethledge and Michael Erwin’s definition of solitude as time spent alone with your own thoughts and free from inputs from other minds. Writing a
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