What Does Writing Do For You?

Today one of my favorite people at the CSC reminded me of something I've known for so long but usually somehow forget. She said that while I can be so specific and descriptive in writing about what I feel or think, whenever she asks me in person how I'm doing I inevitably answer in some quiet and vague manner. I'm not as good of a communicator in person as on the page, she said to me tonight.

Like I said, this was hardly breaking news to me or to anybody who knows me. Not only do I come from a family that internalizes just about everything, but for years I struggled with a speech impediment that stunted my confidence and muzzled me even more. Nurture and nature. And to be really honest, I still struggle with it. Every day. I say this openly and frequently, but getting to the point to where I am today--a teacher, retreat director, campus minister, and a coach--is an achievement in which I take more pride than just about anything else I've accomplished. The achievement isn't in the fact that I've conquered anything. Just that I've learned how to harness my fear.

But why is it so difficult for me to open up to a friend in a one-on-one setting? This is never an issue of literally struggling to speak; that's a perpetual gift saved for other numerous opportunities. I wish I knew the answer, because deep down, I long to have that connection. I long to have intimate relationships. I anticipate one of the greatest and deepest joys of my life will be when I find the woman with whom I will share everything. And I've already received great blessings and graces through real and sustained friendship. So it's not that I desire to ever come off as shallow, detached, or worse, uncaring. In fact, when I look at myself in the morning, I look at someone who strives to be quite the opposite.

So what does writing afford me, the writer? What does it do for you?

One thing I love is reading reflections on the art and craft of writing. But real quickly, I believe that the act of writing inherently puts an arrangement around feelings or anchors actions that may lack any other real nucleus. Once written, words allow the writer the opportunity to get a more objective perspective on things that have rumbled around inside of him or her. Once I see what's on my paper or computer screen, I'm more able to find the words to speak about those very things in a more coherent manner. It's a process.

But thanks to my challenger tonight, I'm re-resolved to taking the same risks in conversation that I do on the page. Even though vastly more people could theoretically read what I post on a blog, the real and immediate presence of a one-on-one conversation is somehow more threatening to me. Threatening and scary, but an intimacy that bonds friendships anew and strengthens ones existing. Two things I can get on board with.