Lately I have become aware of the importance of writing only things of substance. My pieces, I have recently decided, need to have merit. If they are going to exist, be created, and read, then they need to be worth the time. This doesn't mean they have to be exclusively serious, it just means that I don't wish to waste any one's time.

Once you begin reading something, you usually commit the energy and time to stick with it. You are searching for something. When you read the headline or the title, the opening paragraph, you are deciding whether or not to proceed with the piece. Will I find nourishment? Will I learn something new? Is there information here that will advance my understanding of the subject? Or, even, will I be distracted in a pleasurable way, entertained?

We are not in fucking school anymore. Nobody is making us read anything. (And curse them for doing so back then!) We read what we want to read. We don't want to waste time with fluff or bullshit, lies, misinformation, tackiness, didactic trash. We want to be educated, uplifted, fostered, cultivated by the stream and tiny black symbol clusters. We want to be transformed, even just incrementally. Ideally we want a little bit of magic.

And words can be magic. It's one of those things. I think the word I am looking for is; ethereal. 

We may not even be quite sure what we are seeking before we begin to read something. We just know that we'll know when we find it. We become like detectives, sifting through the evidence in front of us, searching for clues that will add up to a reasonable deduction. We want to crack the case and the case is life itself. Cause, face it, we are actively living in and fully engaged in an ongoing mystery. One that is yet to be solved. Who knows what we could stumble upon in our investigations - through reading, or writing for that matter.

Writers are adventurers. Leaders, mostly solo, the advance party, trackers. We are curious, we like to analyse, build, invent. We work with concept. We are fuelled by imagination. Often we enamoured by the musicality of words and phrases. We ride the sets of thoughts like a surfer does the waves. The more practiced and adept we get, the bigger the surf we take on. Unlike the physical realm, there is no fear involved. Nobody ever got injured writing down their thoughts. But it is about confidence. The more we write, the more we are able to attempt with the next one. We get bored with what we have done, said, thought and written already. We seek new horizons. Not always new, though, sometimes it's the familiar that holds the secret riches. In this case we go deeper. We delve. Nice word: delve.

And the whole time, whatever it is we are doing, writing about, we are rewarded with tasty treats that pop into our heads and are expressed though our hands. Our minds get to reflect their magnificence. Our higher selves are offered an outlet. If we can get out of our own way, we can occasionally tap into the sublime, the wonder, the exquisite soulful limitlessness that resides within us all but is mostly disguised and interrupted by the static of daily living.

In this sense, writing is truly of the most pure pursuits available to us. In tandem with reading, it is an activity that can lift us up out of the ordinary and transport us, offer us a bridge from what is to what could be. We have to return eventually, to our homes in the physical realm, but for the time that we are away, we are liberated, suspended in the divine dimension of unlimited possibility. 

And that is a nice place to be.

Sometimes it's best if I just start writing here, as soon as I get home. The moment I sit at my computer. Because if I start to read emails or check out facebook, I will often get distracted. My head will get filled with things not of my choosing. That is fine sometimes but it is important, too, to empty your head. To throw a bucket attached to a rope, throw it in, let it fall deep down. Let it splash on the bottom. See what you bring up from the well of your subconscious. 

Writing is as easy as that sometimes. It's just about doing it. Getting started. Hopping on the bull or the horse, or the bike, or whatever imaginary mode of transport you wish. Just get started and keep going. Whether what you write will be any good or not, of interest, of merit - well, that is a separate issue. But at least you will end up with something. Something that you can work with. Something that you can later edit, craft, into something better. 

It is sometimes called 'automatic writing' and it's a technique used by many. I used to employ it, prodigiously, in the creative writing workshops I ran. It was interesting the way some would take to it immediately, like runaway trains, and others would balk, resist, be their own worst enemy. The trick is to let the right side of your brain take over. That's the creative, expressive side. Hush the left side, tell it to sit quietly, go to sleep, it's time to be critical, to judge, to impart it's need for order and perfectionism will come after. It will get it's chance at the editing stage. Right now it's all about non-judgement, flow, release. 

When a writer (or an artist of any sort, for that matter), is able to get out of their own way and do it with ease, that's when the good stuff is allowed to come out, that's when the magic appears. It's the sweet spot, the zone, satori. Like everything worthwhile, it takes practice, lots of it, but it's worth it. You find yourself as a conduit, the voice, the hands of a higher power. You no longer even have to really think after a while. You just do your job, your duty; you just keep on writing whatever is there.

And because it is so smooth and easy, there is a great pleasure in the act itself. You are no longer questioning or judging - you are just as much enjoying the natural thrill of riding a wave as any surfer, relishing the free fall as much as any sky diver and getting lost in the moment of complete focus as any athlete of calibre. It is a thrill, it is a magical experience - available to all, I might add. I've had people come to my classes who started out stilted and clumsy and uncertain and left with a new outlook, a fresh confidence, a love of the play of the mind using just teensy letter and words sprayed out in sequence. I witnessed some amazing transformations in just a short period, when students where coaxed into dropping their guards and letting their minds dance, freestyle and ungainly at first, with their pens, only to eventually find that within them was insight and intelligence, poetry and lyricism, well beyond what they ever imagined. 

I believe there is no, should be no, separation between good writers and bad. There are only those who do and those who choose not to. My job was to encourage the 'um, maybes' into walking to the edge of the plank and just diving in. It's an addictive thrill.

Of course, some people have natural talent, some are more practiced, inclined, and that is why we have great books. But everyone, has the opportunity, the talent, to at least record something of merit, surprise, meaning, joy, if they want to. Some of the most amazing pieces came from the least likely candidates in those workshops. After a few hours of exercises, we'd do twenty minutes of free writing, with minimal direction and guidance - just a few starting words. Some were reading out jaw droppingly good short essays and stories. Or provocative. Like the masseuse and artist, in her late twenties, who wrote about her sexual encounters. Boy, did she wake everyone up during the readings. It wasn't so much the sex that invoked attention, it was the HONESTY. (And the sex.)

Like the bike courier, who had never written before, who wrote with such gorgeous flow and cadence in such a free and enriching style that the whole class felt like they were witnessing the reincarnation of Dickens or Poe. Like the old fella, what was his name? He shocked everyone. Had he really done that? The story he just read out - it sounded real. Too real to be fiction almost? Him? Wild and crazed urban adventures like he said? And he never let on. Was it him or his imagination? It didn't matter. We all just want to escape. We all want to believe. Writing transports us. And when you are the writer, you are driving the vehicle.

In some ways, it's the freest you'll ever be. Am I trying to turn you on to it? Yes. Why? Because it's a delicious drug. Somewhat addictive. Is it harmful? Fuck no, it's good for you! Too good to be true? Yes. Just like the stories that are in you, waiting to come out.

It pains me to think about all the books I haven't written. There are so many in there. So much waiting to come out. Intricate plots and characters diverse flow through my mind on a daily basis. I love books! I love reading! Hell, I even love writing! So where are the books? All the books I haven't written?

Will they stay in me until they come out? Or will they fade gradually, disintegrate, dismantle, vanish in a crowd of other things called distractions, called living, called demands of daily existence?

New ones seem to appear quite easily. Ideas, at least. Maybe it's all incubating, just waiting for my burst of rigorous self application, dedicated word production. 

I can live with that. I can believe that, even. Like a spring being pushed down... when the time is right... release! Book one, two, three.... Soaring up and out into the consciousness. All the thoughts and feelings, concepts and scenarios that reside inside me, along side me, abide my lenient, procrastinating ways.

An artist needs time. An artist flourishes with an overflow of non-commitment, excels at leisure, jerks at pressure, winces at expectations, scoffs at demands. Even from self. Leave me alone. If it's going to come out, it's going to come out. 

Who gives a shit about ambition? It's a fucking joke to imagine that you gotta strive for success. Fuck success. What we want, what we need more than anything is authenticity. Is real. More real than ever before - felt, lived, experienced, conceived - and then, at the right time, in the right light, with the right intentions, pure intention - expressed. Like the birth of a new sun. A new universe. 

To be false in any way, to be motivated by anything other than divine inspiration is just chewing time. And chewing time is fine, practicing, partaking in things that humans do; no worries. 

But the real stuff has got to come from the source. And that is not on tap. That is not accessed through will or demand. That is given to the worthy few who have shed enough skins, who have suffered their share, who have practiced and practiced and practiced their craft until they become conduits. Conduits for a higher purpose. And that purpose is enlightenment. The advancement of human consciousness. A worthy pursuit. A rewarding escapade.

So, what of me and my books, I wonder. What of the hundred millions other meez, all thinking and feeling the same thing. Will we find salvation? Will we finally pen our personal, poignant, powerful tomes, the ones that reside inside us?

It does not really matter. Because if we don't, another will. Then when we stumble upon their works we can smile and sit back in comfort and glee, content with a reflection of our own inner voices that while not a splitting image, is damn close enough. Yeah, we can all relax, you see. Whatever needs to be will be.

Don't bother to hold on to anything.

Not your things, not your concepts, not your

It's all impermanent. Like everything; forever changing, evolving. And, in fact, it makes sense to surmise that the quicker you evolve the stronger you will be.

So much, so much, holds us back. Mostly things that we ourselves feel we can not let go of. 

I am speculating here, not giving a sermon. I am going with the flow of my own stream of consciousness to see where it leads and, if perhaps, there is something worthwhile at the end of it. 

Writing as discovery. Writing as play.

As a side bar, since we are talking about writing, I borrowed a big fat, squat, chunky book from the library last week called 1,001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. I actually took it out for some sketch ideas for my comics, but as I have been leafing through it, it turns out to be a fascinating compilation and even in a single page synopsis, reveals much about each piece of fiction and it's author. What struck me is how most of the featured writers are visually eccentric, charismatic, striking or mysterious. Writers create worlds that did not previously exist. They bring mini worlds into our world. They offer up places to go and characters to get to know. I have found this book to be immensely inspiring, insightful and motivational. What a noble pursuit. What a gift to humanity, a wonderful legacy a well crafted and enduring work of fiction is. 

Anyway, I have taken a tangent. I was talking about holding on and letting go. I was riffing on the subject. Seeing if I can surprise/educate/liberate myself with some automatic writing.


As you get older, your priorities shift. Your motivations change, your needs morph. You are lying in bed and thinking back on activities a decade or two ago, some still fresh in memory, present in influence on current character/behaviours, and you realise that since those times so much has changed - circumstance, cast, location.... reality! ..... that it may all just be a story. But it was only just yesterday! It happened! I was there! 


Meaningless. It's gone. Life has shifted. Everything is different now. 


You have to catch up with yourself. You cannot linger too long. What about now. Now is going to be the memory of ten years from now. Are you making it worthwhile? Or are you wasting time re-running old clips?


Take stock. Be rigorous. Be ruthless. Don't keep what is no longer of any use. And that includes concepts. In fact, especially concepts. What use are the old ones? This is now, now, now!

Past a certain age there is more and more that cannot compete with the highs of youthful delights. You can't be as wild, you can't fuck as much, you can't ride high on ego and delusion and drugs and induced micro oblivion sessions. You can't run as far or as fast - to things or away from them. You can't delude yourself into believing that you are going to change the world. You can't get caught up, lost, in romantic notions, fantasies of perfect results or days of wasteful, hedonistic indulgence. You just cannot. You have come head on up against one of the undeniable realities of existence - we get older. Then we die.

And at a certain point of getting older, even getting older becomes something precious. You want more of it - as challenging and, in some ways (if you are using the old, un-adjusted ways of thinking) less ostensibly enjoyable (on the surface level) as it is - because well, the next phase is... is.... death. And no matter how diminished it may be or may get, it has to be better than the alternative.

Right? The inevitable alternative.

So, between being young and being old (as in debilitated level old, compromised old) there is a stage of reckoning. 

I was this and that. Now I am. 

A level of acceptance is necessary. One could call it a degree of surrender. A letting go.

All that is left is what is to come.

Let it go. Face forward. Peer up ahead. Not too far. Not the edge of the cliff. What's left of the journey. Do you want to go somewhere in particular? Amble? Rush? Take it as it comes? It doesn't matter. 

But what does matter is what you feel matters to you is treated with respect and reverence. You need to honour your higher self. And you can do that by bolstering your present self with as much dignity, passion, thoughtfulness, care, time and joy as you decide is necessary.

The game is not over. Not by any means. It has just changed completely. Its not that the rules have been rewritten. It's that you need to rewrite them. Gulp. Right?

What did you expect? Easy? Nah, save easy for when you are dead. 

Now is the time to really awaken and embrace all the fucking beautiful and wonderous shit you can.

Be astute, be open, be willing. 

You have been given a second chance. 

Sure, in some ways it's not as loaded up as the first chance, but at least this time you know it's not going to last. So you can make each moment count more.

Ready? 

You were born for this!

I stumbled upon this piece today. Joan Didion wrote it in the year of my birth. 

Coincidentally, today is my birthday. 

I am featuring it here because of my respect and adoration for the freakish and profound writing talent of Ms. Didion. When I read her work, like that of other writers I favour (Joyce Maynard, James Salter, Raymond Carver), I think: this is writing at it's best - precise, lucid, insightful, magically poetic. And I feel uplifted, inspired, informed, enlightened.

Click on the picture to link to the full piece, if you wish to see what I am talking about. Then, if you want, come back and finish reading this entry. I'll put a few dashes and make a line here, to delineate the text and encourage you're temporary visitation of the Vogue article from 54 years ago.

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I'll never write that well. Not ever. I don't have that kind of mind. My composition is nowhere near as rigorous, my thought-process-compilation not as unequivocal. But I appreciate it immensely. Mine is more a free style of writing, 
lackadaisical, meandering, unselfconscious. I am like a friendly, playful scribe, largely untrained, but with passion and perseverance to make up for it. And, too, lately, I am on a mission. I seek to find and celebrate truth and beauty and investigate the beauty of truth. I aim, here in these pages, to humbly uncover the sweet grandness of the ordinary and exalt the sticky, cumbersome reality of the everyday existence of the outsider, the artist, the overly sensitive sentient being that I embody. In my journey is a reflection of your journey. I unashamedly investigate the unpleasant side of small triumphs; the pathway of multiple failures, the cloudy sky of indecision and misgivings, the daily sufferings of the inquisitive, unsatisfied mind.

In this sense, I share something with Joan. We are both artists seeking to direct the spotlight of our perception onto ourselves. Reading her piece the first hour into my birthday somehow brings me a feeling of comfort. It reads like a whisper and a well wish from a wise and somber friend. It's like a small slap - on the face? on the back? - that bolsters my resolve to create things - images and words - of substance and value. Why waste time with anything else? There's joy to be had in wasting time just the way I always have: playfully and with conviction. 

Fifty fours years I have been around now. Time for me to pull up my socks? Ha. I don't wear them.