Finding Your Voice

As I have immersed myself into writing, I have found that many writing advisers put forward ways to help emerging authors to find their voice. One of the obvious ways is ‘simply’ to write. This can be done once you have overcome the fear of the blank page, your internal editor “Don’t write that!” and found a topic or story that you feel compelled to write. It all sounds so easy, yet the practise alternates between sluggish sentences and whirlwinds of notions fighting for their space on the page.

For me the process has involved more than just a discovery of my writing style (and that is still developing.) There has also been an uncovering. This has been an internal peeling of layers; finding out what is important and a greater sense of who I am. Not all of it has been pleasant and much of it has centred on voices - whose voices am I listening to? Am I allowing my voice to be heard? Which voices will I choose to follow?

The three most helpful activities that have helped me through this process are finding time for silence, talking with trusted friends and making writing a regular discipline. There are so many voices filling up the spaces of our lives. Thanks to social media, everyone now has their opportunity to share. It is in the silence that I able to fully reconnect with myself and to the One who created me. It has been so precious to have regular times connecting with friends who know and love me. This blog came out of the decision to write regularly and to set myself a weekly deadline. Nine months later, I am revising my first non-fiction book and working on the voices of my characters for my novel.

It is not just writers who need to find their voice, we all do. To find and accept those passions that make us unique. To dig deep inside and discover the gold that lies within. Each one of us has it. Each one of us has value to bring to our families, friends and communities. So often our voice remains a whisper. When it does, people don’t hear it and we run the risk of being ignored, overlooked or shouted over. Your voice deserves to be heard. Not more than any other voice, but we need to hear yours.

When you’re aware that the other person in a conversation is wearing shoes or even boots because your words are being trampled on, your voice is not being heard. It’s the indecision between saying what you really think and saying what you are expected to say. It’s being sure that even if you come across as a selfish slob, you are not one. All too often I fear my voice will be too loud, too demanding or misunderstood. I am learning to recognise that even among the millions of voices vying for attention; mine has the right to be heard. So does yours.

It might help to ask yourself “Where am I holding back?” “In what instances am I biting my tongue and then regretting doing so?” “Where could I speak up a bit more?” You may think you are only one small voice, but lone small things DO make a difference. A lit candle in the darkness, impacts upon ALL the darkness not just the area closest to its glow. The darkness is changed by the light of one flame.

The Heart of the Matter

‘Love isn’t a memory. It’s so much more than that. Love is a world of it’s own that lives in the heart not the head.’ (Spencer, Criminal Minds)

During Mental Health Awareness week I came across a questionnaire by the Mental Health Foundation for assessing a person’s mental health. It was a series of statements that required a response as to how much you agreed with that statement over the last two weeks. Two of the statements in the questionnaire are ‘I’ve been feeling useful’ and ‘I’ve been feeling close to other people’. The isolation that comes from not feeling these two statements is deep and all too common.

We live in communities, physically close but failing to truly connect. Recent experiences of tube travel etiquette demonstrated this reality to me. The carriage becomes more and more crowded but interaction with fellow passengers is to be avoided at all costs. All too often we carry ourselves around protecting our inner selves with fake smiles, make-up and busyness while our inner-self wanders through life unsatisfied, cold and alone.

It’s great that so many are breaking the silence that surrounds mental health. It’s even better when someone struggling with their mental health is able to say so and is met with a response of love and acceptance. These declarations often occur once the individual is feeling robust. Their self-disclosure happens on a ‘good’ day when they feel that can deal with the responses that may come their way. What about the less good days? What about the ‘mean reds’? Many who suffer from depression or anxiety say that accepting them for who they are in their suffering makes a huge difference.

The quotation from Criminal Minds was part of a conversation between a mother and a son discussing her Alzheimers. The mother is worried that soon she will not remember her love for her son. He responds to her worries. Spencer’s conclusion is that love lives in the heart not the mind so their love will be unaffected by Alzheimers. All too often we feed on the stuff going on in our minds rather than on the truths and experiences of our hearts.

Our human experience is often a litany of hurts, rejections and failures. As children we learn the rhyme ‘sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me’. The truth is often the words do greater and longer lasting damage than sticks or stones could ever do. Our words and actions have a profound impact. Having read the responses of some who regularly suffer from mental health problems, it was encouraging to learn that regular responses of love, understanding and acceptance did make a difference.

We have an amazing tool at our disposal – words and acts of love. Enabling another to feel useful, creating a memory and atmosphere of closeness could make a world of difference, not just to those suffering with mental illness but to anyone’s mental wellbeing. It may be a simple as telling someone you are here for them. It could be as grand as planning a special treat for someone. This is not love in a gooey romantic sense but love as Aristotle described it. He said, ‘to love is to will good to another for the other’s sake’.

I plan to keep taking steps towards acts of love for the good of the other. I choose to dwell on the experiences of my heart rather than the doubts and questions of my mind.

The Benefit of the Doubt

 

Doubt generally conjures up negative connotations. We link it with mistrust and feel offended if the doubt is directed at us. In the arena of faith, doubt is often seen as its direct opposite, yet many who express deep faith profess to have doubts and find comfort and even impetus through them.

‘Doubt isn’t the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith.’ (Paul Tillich)

‘If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.’ (Rene Descartes)

Descartes, who is probably more famous for his ‘I think, therefore I am’ quotation than the one cited above was the Father of Cartesian philosophy – the idea that all existence should be questioned in order to be understood. Whilst we could get caught up in a mind bending exercise to argue that this is not some dream existence (although perhaps after Trump’s inauguration yesterday, some people wish it was), I am happy for now (especially as I write) to assume both your existence and my own.

Asserting doubts is the beginning of self-autonomy. As toddlers our common refrain would have been ‘why?’ I remember the common response being ‘because I said so!’ This response is the reassertion of dominance. For some level the toddler is questioning the knowledge and authority of the parent. Whilst dealing with this can be frustrating it is a necessary path to curiosity and independent thought.

In a world of post-truth perhaps doubt and questioning are our greatest allies. The educational system in this country is being blamed for not nurturing critical thinkers and independent learners but surely this is something we could all do with developing further. Tweets and posts have become ‘gospel truth’ that we either choose to believe or ignore. Perhaps we need to give less credit and time to gossip columnists and social commentators and instead give more attention to those who are prepared to question the status quo.

During this last week I went to see Martin Scorsese’s ‘Silence’. I was really impressed by Andrew Garfield’s portrayal of a Jesuit priest. I then discovered that in preparation for the film he completed the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises. In a recent interview he was asked about faith and whether he had doubts about God and the after-life.

‘…And I think a life of faith is not a life of certainty. A life of faith is a life of – of doubt. And I think it is so healthy to doubt. It’s so health to doubt oneself, it’s so healthy to doubt any assumption we make about how to live. And I think – what I say when – what I mean when I say certainty scares me, certainty starts war. Certainty starts war on behalf of ideology. Certainty of the ‘I – I know and you don't.’ That's the scariest thing to me and what – what a human being is capable of doing.’

Andrew Garfield Interview

This is the kind of doubt I think we could all do with considering. Doubt that questions my assumptions. Doubt that allows for your view as much as mine. 

What do you think? 

What are the benefits of doubts? 

Would critical thinking benefit teenagers, our society?