The Need to Write


/ You wrote your name in invisible ink / For you were so afraid of what they might think / But the scars they left, they were loud and clear / Weren't they? / — Silhouettes, Sleeping At Last

I need to write.

Not want to, or would like to. I need to. And not for the sake of others, either.

For me.

Because I’ve discovered that there are many words in me with no place to go, and they will not stay silent. Nor are they easy to carry. In fact, I’ve felt the pressure building inside of me for many months, and I’ve had no idea why. Until now.

Even in hindsight, I don’t exactly know how I reached this conclusion. The last couple of years have thrown me into a schedule that hardly leaves room for my first loves—God, family, friends, music—let alone putting pen to paper, and even then; those times were projects for clients. Personal writing has been reduced to writing long overdue letters to friends now and then, or mad dash scribbles in my journal when my head feels like it’s about to burst.

I’ve always enjoyed writing. For several years, in fact, I called myself a writer and toyed with the idea of becoming a novelist. But then life sped up to the point where other things took priority, and writing of any sort got put on the back burner. This included my blog, which had always been a safe place for me to explore ideas and process my thoughts in a hopefully articulate and helpful way.

It’s been a long time since I’ve just let my thoughts flow freely onto the page; stringing words together in artistic phrases, editing and tweaking them to paint a glimpse of a picture I wish to better understand. I’ve let circumstances, priorities, people, and more come between me and this part of myself. In my hectic life of pouring out, I have neglected to pour out one of the things that gives my soul air to breathe: writing.

We live in a crazy world, full of so many different people and perspectives. My feet are weary and aching from walking in a different pair of shoes every other minute, trying desperately to understand every point of view and failing most of the time. Yet in my struggle for understanding, I’ve found a need to understand myself; buried deeply beneath a layer of self-sacrifice and people pleasing. Having peeled back the layers of insecurity that tend to ignore my own needs, I’ve recognised that I need time and a means of expression; a revelation in which I’ve discovered writing to play a larger part in my life than I previously realised.
"You have to write, Jo. You have to write. Sift down through your heart, through all the pain, and grief. There are words there. There's a woman there. And it's you." — Little Women (2017)
I think the final piece of this puzzle fell into place watching the 2017 version of Little Women. After facing a tragedy that shook her to her core, Jo went to her father for advice. In his telling her of her need to write, I felt my heart swell in my chest; the pressure of long pent up, unspoken words within me pushing hot tears into my eyes. "But I don't know what the words are. I don't know what to say,” Jo said in reply. "Say you were happy once,” her Father answered. “Say there was laughter. Say what is true."

Rightly or wrongly, I am a verbal processor. Talking out loud about everything and anything is my way of reconciling the world to myself and my understanding. But as I’m learning to choose my words more wisely, and being more careful of the audience I express them to, I’ve realised that the unspoken words still have to go somewhere. They don’t just evaporate, they need to be redirected or else they build up inside me until I feel my heart is going to burst; sharpened shards of glass shattering and splaying in a million directions, cutting through everyone and everything I care about in a violent display of hurt. Honestly, “going to pieces” sums up how I have felt for much of this year: the silence inside me screaming to be let out in a gully-raking rush of thoughts and emotions. I’m kinda surprised I’ve managed to keep things together as well as I have, and I’m grateful for those who have been a safe pressure valve for me to have some release before catastrophic failure.

Ultimately I am learning to make God my one safe place, my refuge and my escape from the taunt of a full soul and a tired mind trying to make sense of the world. He will hear the things that I’m afraid to say, and help me to see through His eyes. It’s a slow process, getting to a place where it doesn’t matter if only Jesus hears my voice, and it being enough. I am so comforted by the knowledge that He hears me, sees me, and understands me completely. I really must learn to lean on that glorious truth with my whole heart.

So with that, I’ve also come back to writing. It’s to be part of my release; a gift and tool God has given me, and with His guidance, I will learn to use it in a healthy, freeing way. It’s so therapeutic to organise my thoughts on paper, cataloging and working through every little facet, philosophy, observation, and question and framing them with words. I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to realise how badly I needed to do it.

It doesn’t matter if these words are never read, yet if they are, I’m hopeful that maybe they help someone feel a little bit less alone, or reassured that they’re doing better than they think at this thing called life. I pray you hold my words with grace and mercy; grace to sift the grain from the chaff, and mercy to blow the rest away with a breath of kindness. I may say some untrue things. I may say some things that look harsh, or bitter; crazy even, but they aren’t meant to be. These words are not foundational concrete in my life, but more like that spare bedroom where you put everything you don’t know what to do with and cannot throw away.

I’m cleaning house, and once I’ve cleared away everything, I’m going to make sure I don’t let it get that full again.

I'm setting the words free.
"Tears are words that need to be written." — Paulo Coelho
"I write to discover what I know." — Flannery O'Connor

I will speak only what is right, guarding what I speak. Like a watchman guards against an attack of the enemy, I’ll guard and muzzle my mouth when the wicked are around me. I will remain silent and will not grumble or speak out of my disappointment. But the longer I’m silent the more my pain grows worse! My heart burned with a fire within me, and my thoughts eventually boiled over until they finally came rolling out of my mouth. (Psalm 39:2-4)
Beautiful words stir my heart. I am speaking of royal things. My tongue is like the pen of a skilled writer. (Psalm 45:1)

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