“The art of writing is the art of discovering what you believe.”
~ Gustave Flaubert
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Gustave Flaubert’s quote just sparked me off thinking how my own writing is a direct reflection of who I am. The more I write, the stronger my convictions become, the more I write, the stronger I feel about who I am and what I have to say as having value for others.
The more I write, the more I find my way home. To me and all that I am not just as a writer, but as a compassionate human being with much to share from her own journey and those of others she has witnessed.
I do believe Flaubert was right. It’s a good thing I cannot stop because I have miles to go before I have written myself all the way home.
What do you think about the above quote?
Do you discover more about yourself as you write, more about others or both, as I do?
JAM (c) 09Jan2011
Janice,
~~I’ve learned so much about myself thru my writing….It all flows out one way or another on that blank sheet of paper…
When one reads my words, they also discover who I am
It’s like undressing in front of the Universe.
xX Great Post.
Oh! What a great way to phrase it, Kim!
“It’s like undressing in front of the Universe.”
You better snag that quote about writing as your own because it is awesome and says it all better than I did.
Much love,
J
Both, especially myself though. Sometimes words just flow
That’s the way to write! When it just flows without having to yank it out of your brain. Hear you on especially myself… oh the lessons.
I feel the same way about writing. It has been said that writers do not write for fortune or fame, they write because they must. I believe that be true.
I think writing forces us to think, and to find focus. Writing is a deeply personal experience. When you get into that zone, you know the one where words seem to flow without effort, when you write from that place it is as if the essence of your soul becomes the ink flowing from the pen. I don’t know that you can reach that state through any activity other than writing.
Yes, yes, yes. Fame and fortune are the bonus if we ever get there but it is because we cannot stop.
Agree writing forces us to think and focus. I love your sentence:
“it is as if the essence of your soul becomes the ink flowing from the pen.”
That really resonates through my veins. Thank you so much for swinging by with your comments. Going to try to get back in my zone… see you on the flowing side again soon
I agree with you…writing promotes thinking and often critical thinking. Writing also seems to give better form to thoughts than the spoken language. But, I wish I had the skill to compose music. Music seems to give flight to the composer’s thoughts.
Oh, Oh, Oh! Do I have a piece for you. It’s about 20 minutes long, by Marjan Mozetich on Youtube (also on my blog somewhere, can’t remember what I titled the piece). It’s in three parts and called Affairs of the Heart. One need not have the skill to compose music to feel the resounding movements of music. Enjoy, Brian
Also writing does give better form to thought than spoken language, the result of finer editing, I suspect. Ponder this: there are those who can neither compose nor read a single note yet their musical thoughts lift us up where they hear what we can’t. My father could neither read nor write music. Yet a born musician, he was. Just as many writers who cannot spell or employ proper grammar can move us into their worlds so effortlessly, we think the mistakes intentional. Okay, I digress. Just thinking aloud as I am wont to do
What writing does for me depends on what I’m writing. Sometimes it makes me happy, and sometimes it lets me be sad. And then there are the in-betweens.
Well said. It does let us process, actually not just lets me but helps me. Aids me in ways that ruminating and roiling around in my head never can. Best to get it down, good, bad or in-between so the whirring can settle, lol.
I have found that writing is good for the soul! I love laughter, and writing helps me get in touch with my comedic side. But I also love to read others stories that are shared, and i praise people for sharing some things that others would never dare!
Writing is sooooo good for the soul, so true. Wish I could get more in touch with my comedic side like you and Lorrelee… working on it. For now, I’ll continue trying to share some of the stuff others would never dare LOL Thanks for swinging by, Jeanne, see your pages soon
This is (currently) my favourite writing quote. As I continue to write, however, I may learn something about myself I didn’t previously know and so I might need a new fav.
But then that would only prove the veracity (first time I’ve used that word in a comment!) of Flaubert’s.
Glad you could swing by with your comments. It’s true we learn as we go, rather “grow,” lol, and I love veracity! Reading it in a sentence is almost as much fun as using it in one
I believe that if ever they raise a statue to me (just look at that word ‘raise’… ‘raise a statue’…) they should make it a seated one and put it on a park bench and not a pedestal, so that people won’t have to crane their necks. Make it a statue that is either reading a book, or making notes, or has just paused from either of those to smile at a passer-by. I want to be a griot, I want to hang a sign out saying ‘The griot is IN’. That’s what I’ve learnt from writing, anyhow.
Alternatively they could put it on a pedestal if they really wanted, but my statue would be sitting on it with its feet dangling off the side. The plaque would read: “Please feel free to lean your bicycles here’.
M
LOL, Marie…
You have learned so much from writing that I had to look up the word “griot” to understand what you meant, wise woman
Leaning a bicycle reminds me of Christie Logan in Margaret Laurence’s “Diviners” who said his epitaph should be: He meant well.
I relate to both you and him. I mean well on and off of my bicycle. Thanks for visiting and dropping your always thoughtful comments
Write on, sister, right on.
J
I have learned too much to consider myself an autodidact.
LOL It’s okay, I really don’t have a bicycle either.
I used to. Not allowed to ride anymore since the ice skating concussion when I split the helmet in two (true story). Dr says if I land on my bean again, it’s lights out for me. Right now it’s lights out or I’ll not hear my alarm in the morning, lol. Thanks for the giggles, M.
“The more I write, the more I find my way home.” Exquisite, Janice. I read this and said, Yes! I get it. T’is a good thing you can’t stop; some of us are addicted to this blog of yours : )
For me, writing began as a healing journey to Self, each journal entry, poem and essay like the tender peeling of an onion. I find the more I learn about myself, the more I learn about others. Sometimes, I get caught up in the craft, writing what I think others want to hear instead of writing from my heart. And the learning continues.
Cheers!
M.
Hi, Mary Ellen!
So glad you enjoyed. It’s amazing how many people begin writing as a healing journey and it just grows and grows from there. There is a danger of getting caught up in the craft instead of writing, as I am wont to do myself quite often, but I think it’s also needed to inspire us on further. Some days I think I can write nothing more at all of value to anyone or myself in any way and then I read something from one of you, my comrades in blogging and whiz… the ideas spring forth and I’m off to the pages again. Thank you for visiting and for your always welcome comments. We learn together, sister-friend
Janice
With writing I have developed a personality of my own, learnt from mistakes (my own and others) and helped me overcome pain and loss. And sometimes writing about something bad that happened to me by twisting the unpleasant situation into a fantasy story is kind of… consoling.
Beautiful way of processing life’s experiences, both good and bad. Glad you are so attuned to what power writing holds for you, MD. No wonder I love reading your pages so, so genuine, so “you.”
Writing allows me to talk in a more leisurely manner, and I talk, as long as it is more than regurgitation, in order to find out what I think. Of course, this requires me to listen to what I’m saying.
Ah. I see wise master, the cycle of the pattern of the fractal of now. So true, writing comrade
(with a giggle)
Still learning,
Grasshopper
Nothing too spectacular. But that’s how I see writing to learn.
Writing to learn is the best writing of all. What we first think, then write becomes what we share of ourselves and what we are becomes clearer in every syllable. It is a fine journey we are on.
Writing is the only way I can process and let go of so much, that if I didn’t have it, I would surely be locked away.The past nearly six months that I’ve been blogging, I’ve learned so much about myself and others that it is overwhelming. Overwhelmingly beautiful.
You just said it so well. Overwhelmingly beautiful. I’m just over nine months here and it’s been an educational, eye-opening experience unlike anything I’ve ever learned or taken part in. All wonderful thanks to writers/thinkers like yourself. Says she who resists technology at every turn and is now a self-confessed WordPress.com addict. Thanks for all of your sharing and for swinging by my pages again, Miranda, see you soon
Inner Chick – you undress in front of the universe, but how do you know how the universe is reacting?
Kvennarad – I agree with you about the Flaubert statue. He looks insufferably proud of himself. I would like to sidle up and say, “Excuse me – your flies are undone.”
His quote is a good one, though. The key point is that you discover what you believe. In other words, some things you though you believed may come into question as others turn from tentative to powerful.
My only reservation is that I don’t think my writing (Oetry) is a complete picture of me. It’s the part of me and my approach to the world that I think I can write well about.
Hi, Simon,
Thanks for swinging by and dropping your thoughts. I’ll leave the others to answer for themselves if they wish and agree the Flaubert quote is good and was the point. That “insufferable pride” is the statue/photo I chose is rather ironic, LOL.
My question for you is, is anyone really ever capable of presenting a “complete” picture of themselves? I evolve minute by minute which means, while my innate character and values are steadfast, who I was a few minutes ago now knows something new. Sometimes, no, most times, I write not because I write well but simply because I cannot stop.
Janice
POETRY, not Oetry!!
LOL