When something just isn’t working
On letting go of one project to make room for another
“We shall go on to the end. We shall write in France, we shall write on the seas and oceans, we shall scribble with growing confidence and growing strength in the air. We shall compose our ideas, whatever the cost may be. We shall write on the beaches, we shall write on the landing-grounds, we shall write in the fields and in the streets, we shall write in the hills. We shall never give up!”
– Me, paraphrasing Winston Churchill as I psych myself up to write
“I don’t want to be a product writer, penning a bit of a look at the world. On the contrary, I crave risk, difficulty, and danger. I am hungry for reality, for tasks and deeds, and also for deprivations and suffering. May I ask you to abandon any attempt to coax me back? It would lead to nothing.”
– Also me, inspired by Herman Hesse as I contemplate my life
I love a winner. The hero, the inspiration, the guy who single handedly rises above all odds, defeats the bad guy with his wit and stunning good looks and an unlimited magazine of bullets, and walks off into the sunset with the girl. That’s always been my kind of story, and man do I cry at the end. Maybe it’s because I didn’t really know who I was, didn’t really have a worldview that explained my place, that I found it easier to mold myself after those storybook winners than to do the hard work of figuring out what I wanted and why I was here. Sure, I could have read Proust or Camus and contemplated the point of my existence, my place as an idea and an animal in the world. Or…I could have simply watched Captain Miller in Saving Private Ryan1.
It’s not difficult to imagine which route fifteen year old me took.
I don’t regret that decision, even 25 years later. While my happy place today is on my couch, ink stained fingers inquiring of a book, at 15 I’m not so sure I had the maturity or courage to undertake that quest. I had no internal map. I could either follow someone else’s lead, or wind up dead in some ditch. “The government regrets to inform you that your son is dead because he was stupid.”2 So instead, I found the most inspirational badasses the world had ever known, from Achilles to Captain Miller to Chuck Yeager, and decided I was going to be like them. If I didn’t like who I was, I’d become someone I did like, or at least admired.
Lately I find myself thinking about that experience of self creation, or at least creation through imitation. Maybe I’m inspired trying to teach my son — being responsible for his education has taken on new meaning as I homeschool him, because you know, I can’t just do anything average — or maybe it’s because the place I’m in now feels disorienting even as I’m emotionally healthier. In my late 30s, I traded assurance and confidence for a calling towards Truth. I can wish I had made this change earlier, learned to like myself earlier, given up all that before, but that’s mostly the ego talking.
My ego does enough talking as it is.
My journey now involves letting go of that ego. Or maybe I should say recognizing it for what it really is. I can’t will it to go away — in Buddhist terms, that’s attachment. But I can look at it honestly, see it for what it really is, and recognize that my essence is not that.
As I do, the old heroes and the old stories keep coming up. There’s the story about success, about being a winner, arm circling my wife’s waist, and sailing off into the sunset while the world burns without me. There’s the desire (the deep seated need really) to be important. To do something worthy of this life, maybe even to be remembered in the history books. And then there’s the identity I built to accomplish all of those successes. The identity as someone who never quits. I never quit. I’m a winner.
I realize I’ve held on to that identity for far too long.
Maybe the best thing I can do is quit. The only way I know to really move past an old identity is to blow it up, to let it burn and watch something new arise from the ashes. As almost every major religion teaches, we must die before we can be reborn. My identity as a writer is mixed in with my identity as a winner, but I’m not sure that mix has a future. In fact, it’s the obstacle I can’t seem to get past.
But I love writing. It’s maybe the first thing I’ve found in my life that makes me feel at home in my body. It fills a creative need in my soul that was too long dormant. It’s become the way I see myself, that which I really am. I won’t quit writing. Not yet; not ever.
Over the last 18 months, I’ve written myself into existence. No longer imitating others, I’ve found the courage to let go of many of those old stories. I’ve figured out what it means to be alive, through pain, suffering, joy, love, and even simply okayness. I’ve told old stories and let go of old tales. I couldn’t have done that without this project. But as you may have noticed, I’ve been posting less lately. I could tell myself it’s because I have less time to write while I’m homeschooling, but I also realize this project no longer excites me in the way it used to. I’ve told the stories I wanted to tell, and I’ve grown beyond the man who needed to tell them. It’s time for a new focus. It’s time for a new project.
So yes, I am quitting, in a sense. And I’m moving towards something new.
I have no idea what that next project will be. I’m stepping off into the unknown, but I’m excited to figure it out. Hopefully with you. Some ideas that feel really alive to me right now include:
Discovering how to live in radical non-alignment. Inspired by Ched Myer’s Binding The Strong Man, I’ve realized how much my search for truth has changed the way I see my place in the world. And I don’t think I can live my life the same way I did. What does it mean to be non-aligned? How do I live not aligned with the systems of our modern world?3 How much can I resist? Do I have the guts?
Maybe this is similar, maybe not, but I keep thinking about the idea of writing as an outlaw.
recently wrote:
“The truth is: we need outlaws. A lot more than we’ve been indoctrinated to believe. The good news is that no one need die, as people did in Jesse James’ time. No Union trains need be robbed, even. Authors can fill the void and ride on horseback into the sunset with pens instead of revolvers. Whether authors have the courage to become the outlaws we desperately need is another question”
and it has me thinking about how far I can go. The question appeals to my soul, and it seems like a hell of a lot of fun.Raising children with courage. Or raising courageous children. I’m not sure what the difference is, but I’m thinking a lot these days about how to raise children that recognize and honor the divine. I want my kids to stand up to the bullshit I see all around me. Not in an indoctrination way, but in the ways that I can give them the tools and background to explore the higher reason of the human soul. Of the divine. I’m inspired by the lives of people like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Father Jacobus, even Hugh Thompson. Not just for their intelligence, but for their courage. I don’t see a lot of examples of that courage in the world right now, but I want to raise my family with it. Right now that looks like a classical based education, but I’m working a lot to figure out what a truly exceptional education looks like while I search for the divine myself. The education I would have wanted if I was mature enough to shortcut my own journey.
Exploring Advaita Vedanta. As many readers may know, I have a bend towards the romantic and the spiritual in my writing. My own personal journey towards Truth (or enlightenment) has landed on the doorstep of Advaita Vedanta. I’d never heard of it before a year ago, and I certainly don’t understand it all, but writing helps me learn. So why not write about this?
Studying the craft of fiction. As my closest friends know, I love fiction. It’s the kind of writing I want to leave. When I write, I want to find something more true than reality can hold. Lately I’ve been undertaking close studies of short stories as I try to write my own. I’m by no means a master, but the process of learning is never ending. Sort of a behind the scenes of a self-taught (learning) author, with the occasional shares of those stories.
I’ll be writing to figure out a new direction, so don’t expect this project to change overnight. But if you have ideas (now or during that exploration), or if you see things I’m missing, I’d love to hear from you. In fact, I’d be so grateful to hear from you. Please reach out.
Just as an admin note to the wonderful paid subscribers, I’ve paused all paid subscriptions as I figure this out. If you want a full refund, please let me know and I’ll try to figure out how that works.
As Hesse’s Magister Ludi said in my paraphrased quote, “I crave risk, difficulty, and danger. I am hungry for reality, for tasks and deeds, and also for deprivations and suffering.” Not to become someone else, but to get to know myself. The project that allows me to find myself is close at hand. But I can’t get there until I end this one. So maybe this is as good of an ending as any.
Even today I can’t watch the trailer without wanting to cry.
Name that movie… this one should be easy.
This same question has been stuck with me since a great conversation in the comments of one of my essays with
I hear you, Latham. But what is writing, after all, if not a neverending process of self exploration? So these moments of pause are necessary and healthy, especially for someone so sensitive and introspective as you. I myself have tweaked my writing to embrace more of the fiction world. I discovered autofiction and am enjoying it very much. I realized that by constructing characters around yourself you mysteriously get to know more about who you are. Quite the infinite quest, I think. So if I were to pick among the alternatives you listed, I’d certainly go towards fiction.
I really think that I will be seeing your name on some form of writing again.
As you work through the form of the short story, I highly recommend the book, "A Swim in a Pond in the Rain", by George Saunders. He's also on Substack.
Your essay left me with a lot to think about. What is winning? How do define whether something is working or not? Is writing and the literary world just another vanity?