Writing as Self-Realization: Private Writing

Sometimes it seems as if the only time people write is when they are forced to write. Whether it's that paper for school or the looming email to your boss, writing can be tedious. It can be work. But, only if you make it that way.

"Writing as Self-Realization" covers the idea that, yes, writing in today's world can be the last thing on your to-do list, but, in fact, it can also open new doors to ideas. One can realize a different part of their selves and discover unity and coherence in life. There are many ways to achieve that through writing, but one, easy way is to focus on private writing.

Private writing is exactly how it sounds. It's not your Facebook status or text to your friends, its private-- for your eyes only. It's taking off the mask that one wears going through life and putting the raw emotion down on the page. Sometimes, by doing this, you can open up yourself to thoughts and ideas that are far beyond what you've seen before. The results of finding what is within ourselves can be surprising, defining, and comforting. But, to accomplish that, you have to first start writing.

The text states: "It is surprising what we may find within ourselves and about ourselves through the mere act of uninhibited writing. Not until we begin to write, often, do we know what we are going to say. Once started, however, once over those first strange inhibitions that impede the flow of thought, we are likely to find that we know more than we thought we did; that we do have an idea, after all; that words do come to mind, in spite of our fears that they would not. And sometimes to our utter amazement thoughts come to us in pleasing form-like Minerva, full-born on the crest of a wave." 

What that is trying to say is that writing privately and for self-realization doesn't have to be technical or precise or perfect. It can be flawed-- it can be you or whoever you want to be. You have to let the free thoughts flow from your mind to the page despite fears and anxieties. There doesn't have to be an ulterior purpose or goal-- thoughts for private writing can start with the tiniest grain of sand or start as the Roman goddess Minerva did-- fully formed and ready to fight.

From this, we learn. We become aware of the deeper self and the true beauty of what it means to sit down and write.