Many of us are lucky to have people around us who understand or at least support our writing habits and dreams. But even with the best support, sometimes it feels like my writing is silly in the face of so many other pressing world problems. How do you keep writing when it seems inconsequential?
Do you ever feel like your writing doesn’t matter? As we write letters or emails to legislators, fight injustice in our communities, work to preserve the environment, or tamp down panic in the face of a new illness, some days writing feels inconsequential.
It’s easy to forget why we keep returning to the page each day. Especially when we’re distracted or sick or in crisis. But we can address the difficult things in our lives and still make a little space for the life-giving practice of writing.
I spent some time this week thinking about why writing is so important to me and reminded myself why writing matters.
3 Reasons Your Writing Matters Right Now
Ever wonder why does writing matter? Or worse, does writing matter? Here are three reasons writing matters. To put it more boldly, here are three reasons your writing matters right now.
1. Write to remember the past
Remembering the past can be comforting, painful, and every emotion in between. But those memories often give meaning to our present lives.
I lead brainstorming activities with my students each year, helping them step back in time to pluck story seeds. I’ve had them draw a childhood home and annotate the special places. We’ve described childhood bike wrecks and trampoline injuries. They recount building forts and going camping and all kinds of other shenanigans.
Flannery O’Connor once said, “Anybody who has survived his childhood has enough information about life to last him the rest of his days.” She reminds us that growing up provides us with a rich understanding about life—enough to get us through any current difficulty.
I’ve written those childhood exercises with my students for years and I always discover something new down those old roads that offer hope. We write to remember who we've been and what we’ve learned.
2. Write to process the present
My grandmother passed away a couple years ago, and I received dozens of spiral notebooks with her records of daily life. Everything from details about the weather and what she’d planted, to meetings she’d attended and quilts she’d worked on. She told herself jokes and made to do lists and worried over her children and grandchildren. Her notebooks were the place she processed life.
Some of us, like my granny, journal to process life. Others write stories to help us make sense of the world, identifying problems and solutions, revealing everyday heroes and villains.
Those stories give us language to recognize shared humanity, even as we experience life in different parts of the world and universe, settings we may never visit with characters we may never meet except in our imaginations.
3. Write to imagine a new future
In episode 3 of the Character Test podcast, Shawn Coyne talked about the importance of telling better stories to help people live better lives.
It stuck with me, because we sometimes perpetuate problems by rehearsing them using old scripts. For example, I hope by now we’re pushing back against harmful stereotypes in stories that always put certain ethnicities in the villain role or only present women as helpless damsels in distress.
We need stories that embrace the complexity and fullness of people, which requires imagination in some contexts where prejudice and “the way things have always been” tend to dominate.
It comes down to how we respond to the uncertainty around us. At the end of the podcast, Coyne stated his personal code: “When a difficult event comes, the choice for me is the question of whether to create or destroy.”
Stories Matter Today
Stories connect us and help us make meaning of the time we have here on earth. Whatever challenges you are facing today, don’t discount the power of writing.
What keeps you writing when it feels like it doesn’t matter? Share in the comments.
PRACTICE
Set the timer for fifteen minutes and choose one of the exercises below.
Past: Take five minutes and draw a childhood home or place you remember vividly. For me, it’s my grandparents' acreage. Then, for ten minutes, walk through it in your mind and on the page. What did you learn there and how did you learn it? Write one memory beginning with “I remember…”
Present: Start a journal list of your day. Include the mundane and fantastic and everything in between. Choose one event and explain it in detail—what it entails, why it matters, what it means. (One time I did this exercise, I started with “folding my six-year-old’s laundry” and it ended up reminding me how much little things matter.)
Future: Make a list of three problems bothering you today. Drop a character into one of those problems and give them the agency and guts to change that world for the better. Don’t make it easy—the more obstacles they overcome, the better.
When your time is up, share your writing in the comments below. And if you share, be sure to leave feedback for three other writers!
“Do you want eggs and bacon,” Michael’s mother asked as she walked in the kitchen. Michael shut the pantry door. A hot breakfast was always better than a cold one. She put several slices of bacon in the cast iron skillet.
Michael took out the egg carton out of the fridge. It felt light in his hands. When he opened it, he saw there were only four eggs. “Do we have more eggs in the garage fridge?”
She screwed up her face and shook her head. “No.”
He set the eggs on the counter.“Who was at the door?”
She frowned, like she was angry. “Some guy asking to cut down the dead trees in the front.”
“What did you tell him?” He knew the dead trees in the yard bothered her. She kept saying all it would take is one good storm and the tree would crash in on their living room.
She cracked the eggs and put them in the bowl. “That I didn’t have the money right now. He wanted to know what my price was that I would pull the trigger on.” She smirked. “I said, how about free. Free is all I can afford right now.”
Michael laughed, but Mom wasn’t laughing.
“Your dad’s clients haven’t paid us for the end of the month yet.They’re waiting on other people to pay them. So they haven’t paid us. So, we don’t have money.” She shook her head. “Sorry.” She smiled at him. “Everything’s fine,” she said as she whisked the eggs in the skillet.
To Michael, everything didn’t sound fine.
“Tell your brother his breakfast is ready.”
“Aren’t you going to eat?” Michael asked as he went upstairs to get Mark.
“Not right now,” she said.
Michael came back down to the kitchen. His mother poured black coffee and let the dogs out the back yard. She sipped her coffee and pretended to watch the dogs. He knew she was worried about money. He had watched her do this before. She would prepare meals and wouldn’t eat until everyone had eaten. Then she would eat whatever was left over.
Michael took part of the scrambled eggs and put the rest on a plate for his brother. He thought about the money he had made from mowing. “Mom?” he asked.
She blinked and raised a questioning eyebrow.
“What if I buy dinner tonight?”
She smiled. “Thank you but you don’t need to do that.”
“No, I want to. You and dad do so much. Let me do something for you guys. Chinese or pizza.”
Mark came downstairs and grabbed his plate. “Ooo, I want Chinese.”
Mom gave Michael a gentle nod. “Chinese sounds perfect. Thank
Present: Start a journal list of your day. Include the mundane and fantastic and everything in between. Choose one event and explain it in detail—what it entails, why it matters, what it means. (One time I did this exercise, I started with “folding my six-year-old’s laundry” and it ended up reminding me how much little things matter.)
Journal List (7/17/22)1. 5:00am: Wake up.2. 5:15am: Watch Resident Evil on Netflix/Data Entry for a Planned Game
3. 7:30 am: Back to sleep4. 8:30 am: Breakfast for the fam5. 12:00 pm: Nap…6. 1:30 pm Lunch…7. 2:00 pm Play video games/destress8. 5:00 pm Dinner 9. 8:00 pm Dungeons & Dragons w/friends online10. 12:00 am: Bed
I’m choosing 9. Dungeons & Dragons.So, it’s hard to explain without a lengthy(ier) post.But basically I on Discord, log in voice chat with 5 other people from around the world (all of whom I met online). We open a computer program called Fantasy Grounds, and join the hosted game of the “DM” (story-runner for the game).And then we play a game, role-playing our characters actions against a specific threaten described to us by the DM. We roll dice to determine the outcome of our actions. Combat, and problem-solving. And we all joke, work together to survive against monsters, and figure out a way to stop the threat to the (in-game) world.This is D&D in a nutshell. While it may sound weird for some… the social interaction, the bonding over deadly threats, and companionship we experience over the course of an adventure… well, it really means a lot. It makes you a better person. You learn about yourself and others. You make friends. You get to live out the fantasy of being a hero and fighting monsters and sometimes even saving the world! It gives you another life to live… in more than one way.If I hadnt had Dungeons & Dragons during this pandemic, I might’ve lost my mind from staying cooped up w/no socialization. It really is the most important thing I do on the days I play. It makes me happy. It makes me feel like I matter. It gives me purpose, when sometimes nothing else does. The players rely on each other to show up to each game, so we can continue our fight against evil. In a way it’s a social contract, but at the same time, it’s having great fun with great people. It’s an experience I think everyone should get to enjoy at least once.And some of my best novel characters have come from these games. So D&D is so important. Friends are important.