The great writer Caleb Pirtle paid me a visit yesterday, and as such things go, we soon dove into a conversation about the nitty-gritty of writing. I told Caleb about my health and writing aha moment, and he said he once heard another author say that a first draft was like sitting across the table from one person and telling a story.
“Well, what I’m talking about is different than that,” I said. “When you talk to another person about your writing, you shade it based on the relationship you have with that person. You put a filter on it to make it palatable to the person across the table.”
Caleb thought about it a second, then came out with this: “Yeah, unfiltered writing is the only true writing, the writer’s authentic voice.”
And that is the rub, the heart of the matter. The writing that explodes out of your heart before you can put a stranglehold on it is the writing this site is about. Unfiltered, springing from the deep well of your soul.
I believe we will find that the purest and most healing writing will always be words written for an audience of one and that one person is you, the only one in the world who feels the words, has had the experience, the one who dares to plunge deep within himself until he strikes the base rock of his spirit.
Happy writing, my friends.
Comments