Knitting the giant sweater of life

When I was little I always wanted to be a writer. Well, that's not entirely true. Before I wanted to be a writer, I wanted to be a pirate like Captain Hook, a detective like Sherlock Holmes, a righteous thief like Robin Hood. I wanted to fly to Neverland, walk through a wardrobe to Narnia, and ride the Mystery Machine.

Even earlier than all that I would pretend to read magazines, sitting in my diapers on a blanket in the grass, take important phone calls and take important notes. At least that's what my mother tells me, and I will have to take her word for it—I was probably playing at being editor of a famous literary magazine—because my memory does not stretch back that far.

Memory is a funny thing. Looking back now at 28, I feel like I have lived many lives. As I browse the archives of my brain, I can recover bits and pieces. Only after forcing myself to sit down to finally write with the intention of doing the dreaded task of sharing my personal thoughts, exposing my insides on the internet do I realize that those fragments of memories stretch deeper down, they have long roots. They are like long threads in the massive sweater of life.

I pull one and the sweater unravels, but it's okay, because I still have that beautiful thread and if I learn to knit, I can still make something nice of it. I suppose the process of writing is finding that common thread while learning how to knit. What I now knit may end up a knotted mess, but I can always go back and knit something nicer.

This is what I will be doing now. And you are welcome to watch me knit.

The other day I was reading an article by Chuck Palahniuk that listed other metaphors for writing. They were all quotes from other people who do this thing called writing and reading these metaphors, one more vivid than the last, I started to feel better about my fear of sharing my work, which, if I am really honest, is the reason I have never really shared anything I’ve written in my life up until this point. One of the metaphors was that writing a first draft is shitting out a lump of coal–slow, painful, but when it is out, you feel relieved. I read that and felt better about what I had started writing here on Fika before drifting off-course to procrastinate, which is how I found the Palahniuk article in the first place.

Writing a first draft is indeed shitting out a lump of coal, and at one point after writing the first half of this little post, I felt that I could never hit publish. If I did, the next thing I would publish would be an apology for sharing something so boring, unfinished, unrefined. However, that was yesterday, and today I feel better about it.

The reason for that is, as I was saying, that I always wanted to be a writer. And I always wanted to be discovered, published, and admired for the words I put next to each other. But I never published anything, never shared anything out of fear. The fear came from being judged perhaps, but the reason I held onto my drafts was that they were not ready, not perfect, a bad first introduction for the world to who I am, and so on.

There was a moment in primary school when I felt like my time had come. I would always let my imagination go wild on any essay I had to write for class. But it was only at the end of the school year that my teacher came to me, shook my hand, and said: "I had no idea you wrote so well! Why didn't you say something?" I felt appreciated and seen, even if ultimately, the feeling the praise left me with was disappointment that it takes four years of writing to get the praise you wish for, and you don’t even win an award for it.

But there is a lesson in there somewhere, and perhaps even another metaphor for writing I can find if I try hard enough. Something about a lump of coal being a diamond in the rough, an uncut gem that turns to a forever diamond in the hands of an expert. But to keep this simple I will end this article here with the final conclusion that writing is indeed like that. It takes a long time to get to the point where you feel pleased with what you have done, if ever. And because it takes time it is neither too late to start nor ever too early. When you start is not even important. The important thing is to continue.

Now that I’ve accepted that waiting around for inspiration and writing to get the praise of others gets me nowhere, I have finally decided to publish something, which is a big step to take, and a very necessary one. After this, the important thing is keeping at it. Write, write, write and the words will come. Share, share, share and eventually, I believe you will let go of self-doubt. Or at least some of it?