What’s true of writing is true of life.

I’m not usually much for aphorisms or life mottos or what-have-you but I have been finding it hard to ignore the powerful similarities between my hopes for myself as a writer and my desires as a human being.

Here’s what I mean. Writing is, first and foremost (it seems to me,) an act of trust. We begin the process with little idea of where it’s going to go, starting off with maybe the hint of a character from an overheard conversation, a setting that just won’t leave us alone, a thread of plot line that seems worth further attention. Then, for some reason we can rarely account for, we find ourselves perched on the top of a very high hill, the road ahead long and partially concealed by the twists and turns we know are there but can’t actually see. And yet we move forward anyway. We can’t NOT move forward and, however tentative our steps, we believe in the outcome. It will work out. Trust. Trust and hope. A both lethal and necessary combination.

Then there’s the actual writing part. I have to admit, it always reminds me a little of the way vultures circle high in the sky, honing in on what must be the most beautiful fragrance to them, the aroma of dead meat. It’s a little like that for me. I place some words on the page. I write a few more and then I step back to look at them. Often, I move even further away for awhile, maybe even take a walk, start the bread dough for dinner, make a phone call. I circle around physically but also mentally, evaluating those words, shaping them, amending them, imagining where they are going to take me. If the smell is just right, if I’m drawn back into it, if I’m satisfied, then I know I’m ready to accept what I’ve learned and move on, knowing all the time that I’ll be back to check again if it all fits. It’s a kind of integrity – a commitment made to beliefs and values but combined with a willingness... no, a determination, to remain flexible, to revisit, to check in with those conclusions and thereby discover new ways of seeing.

Maybe most importantly, I find that writing is an identity process. Every author brings to it the mishmash of his or her own personal history, experiences, belief systems just like we all do to whatever lives we may lead. Through the writing process, we attempt to strip away persona, embrace the growing pains, arrive at some satisfactory story for who we are and what that means for the choices we make, the feelings we express, the well-being we seek. Writing? Life? Who’s to say there’s a difference?

And it’s often hard to say whether we are helping our characters along in the process or whether they are helping us.