"who i am as a writer"
writing as surrender and self-discovery
In a beautiful piece for
, Claire Nelson describes the process of writing in this way:Sometimes I am able to feel my own soul as something real, like I’m not just my biology or my psychology, like the universe really isn’t absurd or random, like there is a real Truth alive in everything, and in fleeting, earthly moments I can peer into it.
Reading Nelson’s piece reminded me of an earlier season in my life when both reading and writing emerged as deep passions. I had achieved what was, at that time, perhaps my greatest academic accomplishment: acceptance into an exclusive college-level English course offered at my public high school.
Through this course, I was introduced to an incredible breadth of literature: Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, Shakespeare’s Macbeth, George Orwell’s 1984, Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” and much more. It challenged me to read substantively, rather than quantitatively—to engage with the content, argument, symbolism, and meaning of a book, rather than simply read the words on the page. In return, the course taught me to engage with books through my own writing like short reflections, long-form essays, poetry, and creative writing assignments.
Returning from a winter break, the first assignment we received involved responding to a prompt: “Who I am as a Writer.”
Searching through an old hard drive this week, I found my response:
Discovering this short response brought to my soul that rare euphoria of sensing God’s divine guidance over one’s life, that fleeting realization that “the universe really isn’t absurd or random.” While I have grown and changed significantly since writing this, much of what I wrote here remains true.
"I want my words to speak life, even when they come from a place of death... I want people to relate to my words. I want my words to be truthful and honest...I want to change lives by the simple words that I type on a page."
In writing this piece and finding this old document, I felt anew what Nelson describes as “not so much an act of creation as a process of discovery.”
For me, the discovery found through writing looks most often like sitting down with some soft music and a cup of coffee. With one thought in mind, I begin scribbling words on a page, and over time I see where the words take me. It is a process of surrender, of giving up my need for control and allowing a deeper part of me to take the lead. Sometimes the trail is incoherent and aimless and the piece is stored away for another day. But, on occasion, the bits and pieces of experience and knowledge I hold form an idea that can be traced from start to finish. This is what you all see each week in this Substack.
Rarely does this process of discovery involve something material like an old piece of paper. But, this week, the discovery of writing brought me back to a sweet reminder of where this entire journey began—and within that a brief manifesto, a short prayer, of what I hoped my words might accomplish in the world.
Make a place to sit down.
Sit down. Be quiet.
You must depend upon
affection, reading, knowledge,
skill—more of each
than you have—inspiration,
work, growing older, patience,
for patience joins time
to eternity.
— Wendell Berry
Reading:
Tim Keller, “The Fading of Forgiveness” (Comment)
Ryan Burge, “Does identifying with religion make one more civic-minded?” (RNS)
Meena Venkataramanan “Asian Americans are changing the face of American Evangelicalism” (Washington Post)
Watching:
Lewis Capaldi: Tiny Desk Concert (Youtube)
Abbott Elementary (Hulu)
Succession (HBO Max)