Dear Writing friends,
There are many reasons to write our truth.
I have been thinking about this in new ways since I returned from my trip to Vancouver, where Truth and truth is part of an ongoing process of reparation, social justice and healing for so many.
Sometimes we need to write our truth in order to fight oppression, to bear witness to wounds, to reconnect with the generations and stories that came before and lay a path for the generations to come.
Sometimes we need to write our truth because we long to be heard, to grant ourselves the space and time where we can feel deeply listened to. This listening does not necessarily even need to be gifted to us by another person. It might need to come – and perhaps this is more important than any other kind of listening – from a part of our own selves, a part that acknowledges that we have never before made space to sense our way into those filmy or shadowy or swirling zones of experience inside us, those feelings and images and thoughts that we have not yet named.
This is why I love the writing that I do for myself alone. Writing helps me to slow down and listen to the parts of myself that are trying to speak.
Sometimes even slowing down is not necessary. Sometimes, it’s when I pick up my pen in the crackling heat of my anger that my body finds a mouth and makes itself heard. Sometimes.
Whatever our reasons, this urge to write into and towards our personal truth takes courage. It is tempting not to go there. The time is not always right. It’s not always helpful, as I’ve written about here.
Often, we need to go quietly, on soft paws, our bellies to the ground. Sometimes, we need to approach things sideways, to tell it slant, as Emily Dickinson advises:
Tell all the truth but tell it slant —
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind —- Emily Dickinson, ‘Tell all the truth but tell it slant’ (1263)
How about you? What approaches have you found helpful or unhelpful in listening to and writing your own truth?
We’ll be exploring writing towards and into our personal, felt truth at our next Dear Writing Together workshop on Saturday 24 February: WRITE YOUR TRUTH!
4.30pm - 6pm (UK time).
I’d love to see you there.
The rest of this post is the Sunday Writing Experiment for paid members.