A Manifesto on Authenticity and Truth

Mirror, mirror on the wall . . .

I’m excited.

I feel energized. I feel ready. I feel motivated. I feel compelled. I feel driven.

I am going to write.

I’m not writing to show off. I’m not writing to perform. I’m not writing for money. I’m not writing for fame. I’m not writing for acclaim. I’m not writing for awards. I’m not writing to prove anything. I’m not writing to change your mind.

I’m not writing for you at all.

I know — I know — every English teacher you have ever had has harped on the importance of audience, of being aware of your audience, tailoring your message to an audience, adjusting your style and tone to suit an audience, and blah, blah, blah.

You must know your audience, that’s what they all say.

Hogwash, I say.

If I’m writing for you, then it’s just a performance. It’s just a production. An act. A gig. A show at the local playhouse.

It’s not real.

I don’t know about you, but when I read something, I want it to be real. No matter if it is fiction or memoir or a music lyric, I want it to be real, to be authentic, to be as accurate as possible an expression of that writer’s person or character or the core human truths they have discovered.

I don’t want to play games when I read.

I don’t want to play games when I write.

You shouldn’t either.

Because if you do, you’re missing the whole damn point.

I write because it’s a way of connecting with myself, looking inside, examining what is going on there, looking at it from an unbiased position, like a fly on the wall. With writing, no matter the genre or form, I am able to sort through all the stuff that is brewing inside — that brews inside all of us — and pull this stuff out of the mass of thoughts swirling in there, acknowledge it, recognize it, name these thoughts and feeling and emotions, and then look at them to figure out what is important to pay attention to and what is best to be ignored.

It’s very much akin to meditation.

This is why I am excited to write.