Alexandersmap

    Category: Writing

    • The Big Reveal

      “He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life.” – Muhammad Ali

      “He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” ― Friedrich Nietzsche

      Is courage the leap into the unknown or the perseverance and grit to see it through? I think Muhammad Ali would add that courage requires more of us than simply stepping into the ring, it’s taking the punches and standing up again round-after-round. We all have our own ring to step into, filled with work, family, relationships, fitness goals, writing goals, getting-through-the-day goals.

      What are we prioritizing and what do we let slip away? Isn’t it just as courageous to say no as it is to say yes to something? Perhaps more so? Which does beg the question: What are we really trying to accomplish in our brief time here?

      A long and rewarding career? Wrestling a career from the ground up is a grind, filled with moments of sacrifice and tactics, honor and betrayal, tedium and tenure. How we play it determines just how long and rewarding it turns out to be. Maybe we also prioritize building a strong nest and raising a family. It takes courage simply to have children, especially for the mother, but also courage to stay in the game for the long haul—raising them to be strong advocates for decency and hope.

      Just what do we lean into for the long haul? Comfort? Adventure? Can you be comfortable when you seek adventure? Perhaps, but isn’t it a different kind of comfort than the comfort the person who seeks comfort seeks? Every climb requires discomfort. Every leaper must bear the impact of the landing before leaping again. Discomfort is what we pay now for comfort later. Conversely, comfort now tends to make later more discomfortable. We each must pay our dues in life to get to the place we want to be. Life takes time and courage to see it through.

      The neighbors through the woods had a large shed built last year during the summer months. My bride and I debated just what they were building as it seemingly took all summer to complete the work. She said that whatever it was, we’d have the big reveal when the leaves dropped in the fall and everything would become obvious. Sure enough, that’s exactly what happened.

      It’s worth asking ourselves every time we stand up in our own ring, why am I doing this? For there’s no long-term courage without a compelling purpose. Sometimes the answers are obvious, and sometimes we have to wait for our own big reveal, when the seasons change and the things that were most important all along become apparent. Often, courage is staying the course long enough to find out.

    • A Better Direction

      “Quitting, for me, means not giving up, but moving on; changing direction not because something doesn’t agree with you, but because you don’t agree with something. It’s not a complaint, in other words, but a positive choice, and not a stop in one’s journey, but a step in a better direction. Quitting–whether a job or a habit–means taking a turn so as to be sure you’re still moving in the direction of your highest dreams.” — Pico Iyer, “Quit Pro Quotes”, Utne Reader, Sept./Oct. 1996

      We all have moments when we contemplate quitting and doing something else with our brief time. What stops us? Persistence? Faith in the future we’re building? Or is a sense of obligation? We slide into lethargic habits built over time and don’t see that there may be another way. I used to call this an attractive rut that one could easily stay in until the end of time. Maybe having a drink every day at 5 PM is the proper response for a long day of work, or maybe simply walking until you forget what your troubles were does it. Then again, maybe the proper response is to quit altogether the life built around what we believe to be all there is in our world. The answer is different for each of us, but the way we react when someone suggests quitting something deeply ingrained within our identity is telling, isn’t it?

      When you read the word ingrained, did you immediately think of the spelling? I often debate internally whether to use ingrained or engrained when I write it, which says as much about me as anything I suppose. But the point is, we all have traits and defaults within us that seem natural (like obsessing over the right way to use a word that 99% of the world won’t give a thought to). Whether those traits and defaults are productive or detrimental to our progress is a question worth asking ourselves now and then.

      I encourage you to either click the link to read the rest of Iyer’s thoughts on quitting, or Googling the article if you’re rightfully suspicious of clicking links random bloggers throw at you (although you can trust this random blogger—I promise). There’s magic in Iyer’s words, as there usually is, and they may change you profoundly, as they have me even as I write this. The quote above is easily found (Rolf Potts points to it often), but, as with any quote, mining deeper into the place it was drawn from offers so much more. For me, Iyer landed a knockout punch with this nugget:

      “Continuing the job would represent an invisible kind of quitting–an abdication of possibility–and would leave me with live unlived that I would one day, and too late, regret”.

      Don’t read this as a public admission that I’m quitting my job anytime soon, but a spotlight on the key message here: we all abdicate possibility that we will one day regret if we don’t go for it immediately. For now is all we have, and there’s living unlived to get to. See the world. Write the book. Hike that mountain. Sail to that faraway destination. Ask the question. Take the chance…. LIVE.

    • To Become Writing

      “Maybe the true purpose of my life is for my body, my sensations and my thoughts to become writing, in other words, something intelligible and universal, causing my existence to merge into the lives and heads of other people.“ — Annie Ernaux

      Annie Ernaux, the Nobel Prize winner in this, her 82nd year on the planet, touches upon something every avid reader and writer feels: we transcend ourselves through words, merging into the lives of others. Sometimes those other lives are sitting across the table from us, where stolen glances search for progress and acceptance. But mostly, written words travel through time and space far better than we humans do, reaching people we’ll never meet, just as we’ll never meet those whose words merge into us. This is where the magic begins.

      To become our writing is a deliberate act of transcendence, drafted one word at a time. It’s a bold act of betraying our previous identity, left on the shelf for others to discover or completely ignore, for as long as there are books and shelves to put them on. As a reader, don’t we delight in this quiet invitation into someone’s soul?

      I write this knowing there’s a stack of books within arms reach just sitting there, marking time, waiting for me to return to them. We’re torn between two lovers, reading and writing, and must make time for each to reach our potential with either. We must live to take these words and make them our own, if only for a little while before we release them to merge with another. For existence is both transactional and transcendent. Words record, and carry on without us through others.

    • Mastering Our Moments of Truth

      “Anybody can look at a pretty girl and see a pretty girl. An artist can look at a pretty girl and see the old woman she will become. A better artist can look at an old woman and see the pretty girl that she used to be. But a great artist-a master-and that is what Auguste Rodin was-can look at an old woman, protray her exactly as she is…and force the viewer to see the pretty girl she used to be…and more than that, he can make anyone with the sensitivity of an armadillo, or even you, see that this lovely young girl is still alive, not old and ugly at all, but simply prisoned inside her ruined body. He can make you feel the quiet, endless tragedy that there was never a girl born who ever grew older than eighteen in her heart…no matter what the merciless hours have done to her. Look at her, Ben. Growing old doesn’t matter to you and me; we were never meant to be admired-but it does to them.” ― Robert Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land

      We might never achieve the mastery of a Rodin in our art, but surely it’s something to aspire to. We might also aspire to it in this bold act of living. For living with and for others is itself an art, mastered by some, clumsily attempted by most. Everyone wants to be seen and heard and appreciated in the moment they encounter another person. How many disappoint in that moment of truth?

      I aspire to craft a sentence like Heinlein’s in each post. Maybe I will attain that level of craftsmanship on the next one, or the one after that. Time will inform the reader of such things, but making a go of it day-after-day is what matters most on our journey to becoming. Art isn’t the same as aging, for aging subtracts some vitality from the physical self, while days are accretive in art.

      At a party recently, I was reminiscing with a woman about her mother, who passed away a couple of years ago, shattering my belief that she would live forever. When she was alive she and I had a thing for each other, she being 40 years my senior, but young at heart. From the day I first met her I treated her as the vibrant woman I saw in her eyes, and she treated me as her would-be suitor, doomed to fail but welcome to try. This performance went on for almost three decades before she passed, and still makes me smile today.

      We may not become a Rodin or Heinlein in our art. But living offers other opportunities for mastery. Life is about the connections we make with people along the way, one after the other, in our time here. To master that is truly a gift.

    • In Favor of Wonder

      “Sadly it is not only the force of gravity we get used to as we grow up. The world itself becomes a habit in no time at all. It seems as if in the process of growing up we lose the ability to wonder about the world. And in doing so, we lose something central—something philosophers try to restore. For somewhere inside ourselves, something tells us that life is a huge mystery. This is something we once experienced, long before we learned to think the thought.” — Jostein Gaarder, Sophie’s World: A Novel About the History of Philosophy

      Gaarder’s premise is sound: We come into the world full of wonder, but as we grow up being alive becomes a habit. We reach a point where we think we’ve seen it all before and grow comfortable with the general act of our daily existence. Each day remains a miracle, but the vast majority of people take it for granted. What a pity.

      I’ve been working to break this habit in myself for years through deep immersion in philosophy, poetry, history, travel and the deliberate process of savoring the moment. Sometimes I get it right, sometimes I slip into the routine of the day-to-day. But every day I try to begin with reflection on this miracle of being alive. The blog forces me to stay in this lane, if only for a short while, before work and responsibilities draw my attention elsewhere. But I always strive to return to wonder.

      What if instead of returning to wonder we found a way to stay on the dance floor with it? Not in some stupor or drug-induced high, but through deliberate focus on each moment. Turning the habit of living day-to-day on its head and instead embracing heightened awareness and the quiet delight available to us in each encounter along the way. Isn’t that taking the act of living to a higher level?

      We all want more wonder and delight in our lives, for it’s the frosting on our cake—our exclamation point on our moments. The thing is, to break the old habit of merely living, we’ve got to favor wonder and make it a regular part of us. Like any habit, it becomes a part of our identity through consistency. That’s putting the wonder in a full life.

    • Lost Words

      “If you get stuck, get away from your desk. Take a walk, take a bath, go to sleep, make a pie, draw, listen to ­music, meditate, exercise; whatever you do, don’t just stick there scowling at the problem. But don’t make telephone calls or go to a party; if you do, other people’s words will pour in where your lost words should be. Open a gap for them, create a space. Be patient.“ — Hilary Mantel

      Mantel passed away this week, leaving a vast treasure of her words to sift through. Writers are said to live forever, transformed into their words, so long as there are people to read them. In that context, we create our legacy one word at a time. So we ought to make those words as much our own as possible. Aspiring to the level of a Hilary Mantel is surely a worthy, if lofty, objective.

      We all get stuck sometimes, and state change often clears that which blocks us. Any productive endeavor benefits from quiet focus time, we know this. My own productivity, thrown off by a schedule off kilter recently, would benefit from a return to structured quiet time.

      Routine draws words from hidden places deep within us. Changes to routine inspire new ideas, shake old beliefs, and force a reckoning with priorities. Each serves us when balanced, and undercuts our potential when we tilt too far in either direction. Are we a one trick pony or risk merely surface-level understanding? The answer, always, is somewhere in between. It’s there where we may find those elusive lost words to piece together just so.

    • Beating Dragons

      ‘Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.“ — Neil Gaiman, Coraline

      We talk about evil in the world, the worst of humanity, beasts of unimaginable strength and viciousness… but most dragons aren’t out there in the world, not really. Most dragons reside within us. The beast isn’t rising up to sink our ship; it’s holding us back from setting sail. The true dragons are bad habits and that voice inside our head that tells us to snooze a bit more, for you’re too inexperienced or established or young or old to dare change things now.

      Slay these dragons.

      We often think about the gaps between our desired state and our current state as a chasm, when mostly it’s simply a gap. The business of closing gaps is as simple as establishing routines, doing the work one day to the next and moving past what we previously thought possible to discover and close another. We know this intuitively, yet we still listen to dragons. Until their fearsome voices fade into the distance as we build new gaps between who we are now and what we once were.

      Life will throw its dragons up at us, but we might prevail anyway. Simply take the next step. Like a toddler learning to walk it’s invigorating and delightful to see where our steps might carry us, one after the other. Make soup of those dragons. It turns out they taste a lot like chicken.

    • Mastering the Omission

      “Storytelling reveals meaning without committing the error of defining it.” — Hannah Arendt

      There’s an art to telling stories. You see it masterfully displayed in the work of certain authors and public speakers. Everyone knows a great story when they hear it, but many don’t understand the craft of actually creating something that becomes compelling. As a would-be writer and occasional public speaker, I chip away at storytelling with the natural hope of drawing in the reader or audience, instead of lulling them to sleep.

      Like any craft, storytelling requires apprenticeship and time. The artist grows into everything of consequence that they’ll ever create. We hone our skills, witness firsthand the impact of our work on others, and go back to the drawing board to try anew. Everything we do is a hit or a miss, and good timing is, if not everything, essential.

      I say this as a lifetime apprentice to the craft of writing. A blog is like balsa wood for the aspiring storyteller, allowing the writer to carve out a sympathetic audience. But The Thinker wasn’t carved out of balsa wood. One must eventually step out of one’s comfort zone and take more risks. A journeyman reaches mastery when they create a masterpiece. We all reach a moment when we believe that the journeyman gig isn’t nearly enough.

      Any masterpiece includes certain elements that demonstrate the fine skill of the craftsperson. In storytelling we often think about what to include, but often forget that true mastery includes omission. To draw an audience in, we must leave the space for them to fill.

      As you’re doing right now.

    • A Wisp of Smoke

      “There may be a great fire in our soul, yet no one ever comes to warm himself at it, and the passers-by see only a wisp of smoke.” ― Vincent van Gogh

      Wildfires are once again turning our New Hampshire skies a milky white overcast, with a burnt orange sun. This looks extraordinary at sunrise and sunset, but never natural. And yet a wildfire is a natural occurrence, I suppose, if unduly influenced by humanity. A reminder of places changing a great distance away, yet close enough to change our place too.

      How often people confuse our wisp of smoke for another fire. Though fire reveals itself in both subtle and apparent ways, we never really know what burns inside the soul of another. We often don’t know it ourselves.

      Yet writing reveals. Pages become kindling, words provoke and burst into ideas, and passion plays with the muse to light up our minds and dance across the keyboard. We place ourselves into this cauldron willingly, and forge something transcendent by consequence of the heated ritual.

      Drawn in by the slightest ember of idea, the writer coaxes it to a signal fire that others may see, if only they’ll turn their attention ever so slightly this way. Still, the beacon indicates nothing more than where we’ve been. For the artist is already gathering tinder to reveal what’s next.

    • Creating, Out of Yourself

      “Do not do what someone else could do as well as you. Do not say, do not write what someone else could say, could write as well as you. Care for nothing in yourself but what you feel exists nowhere else. And, out of yourself create, impatiently or patiently, the most irreplaceable of beings.” — André Gide

      The writing comes slowly. The writing comes effortlessly. The work has bursts of creativity mixed with repetition and familiarity. The things I’m most proud of often fall flat, the hits keep getting views and likes. So it shall be.

      We must do the work, and see where it takes us. The work took me to André Gide recently, and I’m delighted with the discovery. Another stepping-stone on the journey across the mad stream of noise and nonsense that wants to sweep us all away before we’ve done the work. When you find such solid ground in the midst of chaos you celebrate the landing. Gide reminds us not to settle, but to make something of ourselves in our time.

      The work deserves our best, because it represents our best in our moment. Should it fall flat in its time or become a surprise hit matters little, save a bit of ego stroke. Work that matters doesn’t fly on the wings of a clever hashtag or marketing campaign. That may matter to a publisher or salesperson or PR firm. What matters in the creative process is how it resonates within us. And where it takes us.

      If we’re lucky, maybe it carries us to places we haven’t been before. To something unexpected and delightful in ourselves. Should be keep at it just a little bit longer.