When I'm not writing, I'm a bit of a crazy person. If I write in order to organize my inner life--to know what I think, feel, believe--when I'm not writing, my inner life is like a closet into which everything has gotten stuffed; messy drawers overflowing with junk I should have given away years ago, a jumble, a mishmash. Hard to sort out what to keep and what to toss. Every thought I have, I chase for a few minutes, like my dog chases a tennis ball. Oh, that seems like a good idea! Oh, wait--no that! No, hold on--that's better! I am easily influenced. When I'm in this state, I can be convinced of almost anything. I should write a screenplay, say. (For which I truly--unlike my husband--have no gift.) I should write a sweeping historical novel. I should write a modern, tight little novel in multiple points-of-view. I should write another memoir. I should write a book about writing. I should write a hybrid of fiction and memoir. Stop me, please.
The thing about this state of being is that it can either be enormously fertile, or self-destructive. A writer can breathe into the emptiness, can wait patiently as the parade of bad ideas and externally-driven silliness sweeps by. A writer can, in the words of my former teacher Grace Paley, take baths. Or a writer can tighten up, get anxious, over-eager. A writer can start thinking about things like the marketplace, in which case, a writer will be sunk. I've seen it happen over and over again. This way leads to manufactured ideas, reeking of fear and manipulation. Ideas that will eventually lead to a brick wall, or a desk drawer, or (worse still) a bad book. The only solution for a writer not writing--a writer who is not yet ready to write--is to accept the avalanche of feeling, to welcome it, even, the way that when we meditate we welcome our thoughts and feelings with a sense of self-compassion. Oh, I'm thinking that. isn't that interesting. Okay. Now, back to the breath. The book will come.
