Write Hard And Clear
About What Hurts...
Ernest Hemingway
And that is what I have been trying to do. Repeatedly.
Since I first started writing as a kid, the whole reason I wrote was to explore what hurt. Sure I wrote things down about things that meant something to me, some boy I liked or some wonderful thing that happened to me, but really, truthfully, what my soul found in writing was an outlet for the pain.
It is hard everyday to get up and write about what hurts you. But for me, it is harder to live my life without writing it all down. It is in the examination of all the things in a life that cut you, bleed you that everyone can relate to. Writing about what causes pain, also gives you a forum to write about what heals you also.
It has often been said by many, “we are all broken, that is how the light gets in.” But I disagree. I think that light is already in us. We are born with it. It isn’t something that filters in later. It is innate. We are born with a light that can only be extinguished by death...but there are a lot of deaths in a life. One final, permanent one. But there are a million other little ones every day. Places where life cuts us, causes us to bleed. Some of us can experience those wounds fully, heal them and move on. Others of us, completely and totally are destroyed by the cuts, small and large, that come to us in this life.
Writing is my way of bleeding. It is also my way of healing. I write because I feel pain, I also write because it is the only thing that brings me relief immediately. Getting the pain, sorrow, loss, depression, rage, confusion, down onto the page, makes me lighter. Makes me freer, makes me understand that there is hope. My effort to communicate my suffering, in fact, increases the chances for me to decrease my suffering. The fact that I may also help you by sharing my pain, a soulful bonus.
Writing about what hurts helps me to explore the pain...not so as to increase its hold over me. Or to ensure that I not miss any of the pain. But to ensure that I am present in my life, all my life, especially the painful parts. I used to run at the first sign of pain...guess what this method does? Creates more pain! I didn’t realize that trying to avoid pain, actually increases the pain.
Today, my sole wish is to continue to be stalwart in my willingness to lay myself bare. Feel the feelings, suffer the loss, take one on the chin. Most of it, so far, has not been fatal. There have been little deaths of me along the way. Little parts of me that are laid bare, and silently evaporated into the mist. Parts of me that are not healthy mostly. In fact, there is nothing that I have lost of me, that I actually miss. The evolution of Erin has been one where subtraction reigns supreme. The accumulation of loss far greater than the accumulation of merit. In fact, the loss has created rich, fertile soil for the merit to grown. All the things taken from me, released by me, refused to me, salvation in daily dose.
Writing is painful. Writing is bleeding. Writing is how I have come to make sense of this crazy, beautifully hard thing called life. Writing out my heart, pouring of my soul is how I have come to make peace with myself, and in so doing, built a bridge for you to walk toward me, forever toward me. Please do not be alarmed at the painful, sometimes bloody mess on my banks, the fact that I can withstand and weather my own, only gives promise that one day, given the opportunity, I can stand tall and comforting on your sanguinary shore.
