Why Do I Write?

When I was young, my mother said to me, ‘The problem is you think too much.’ 

Harsh but true. Yet I believe that life is a process of inquiry and reflection. A writer owns his story by the way he thinks, and the ability to write well comes from the ability to think well. “I think, therefore I am,” said Rene Descartes in his Meditation on First Philosophy.

So why do I write?

I write
to pay attention,
to find the sense in my life,
to define who I am,
to remember those I have loved,
to put the past to rest,
to understand,
to heal,
to forget,
to prepare for change,
to let go.

I write to give voice to thoughts and feelings I had not yet defined.

I catch the world in my fingertips and scatter it into the universe.