A start… (#1)

Posted by on November 2, 2013 in Uncategorized | 8 Comments

4:37, November 2, 2013 – I wake up with a strong feeling which takes a form, I need to write.

We never know with certainty why we are doing something. We can only make stories about it; most often we believe them. But this time my story is pretty much convincing to me. Yesterday, I had a phone conversation with my son. He is a creator and he was sharing with me his hopes that a recent contact would finally open the doors to the realization of a project he values a lot. He then asked me what was going on with my own project of writing a book – about a year ago, I received an email from an important Parisian editor (my native language is French) asking me if I would accept to write a psychology book (I am a psychologist) and I said yes. When I received this offer, I was pretty much excited since I have a long idealizing story of persons and institutions. But, I informed my son that I had dropped the project after a few months (the editor wasn’t very happy and I don’t like people being angry at me). This surprised my son since he read many writing projects I had undertaken (many years ago, I had another offer from a Montreal’s editor). So, I had to explain to him what happened (this is a frequent human characteristic, we have to give reasons on why we are doing or not doing something).

Since I am not a procrastinator (in fact, I am rather the reverse!), the reasons have to be found elsewhere. The first reason that came to my mind is that I simply have no extra time. In my case, writing takes time and I am already extremely busy. I am a psychotherapist, a supervisor, and I regularly give conferences / workshops (nearly once a week lately).

The second reason is that one of the greatest pleasures in my life is to learn. And, since I am a slow writer, I have the impression that I am writing from a place where I am not anymore; like, once I wrote the fourth chapter, I would have to rewrite the first one. Also, writing takes over reading time, which is my main source of novelty and pleasure.

I often say to myself (and to others), what is, is. So what is in my case? I get the regular feedback that I am a good lecturer – I would translate, I am a good storyteller who relies on hard work to prepare its slides, the spinal cord of a lecture. I created thousands of them, in French and in English. Slides are more flexible than a book. You may modify them a few minutes before a lecture, even during a lecture.

Moreover, I have hundred of notes that I write spontaneously. In those moments, writing becomes an urge. I need to put into words what emerges from we never know exactly where.

That’s how I was trying to answer my son’s question. Then he told me why don’t you write a blog? Well, I always take in account my children comments, they know me well and they are part of a world from which I am nearly gone (I have always been an outsider anyway). But it also reminded me that a young colleague made exactly the same suggestion many months ago; he is part of a supervision group I have in Quebec City. His wife even offered me to organize an eventual blog site.

And this morning, at 4:37, I woke up with a strong feeling that took the form of I am going to write a blog!

But even if we usually have to explain why we do something, I am pretty sure that we never cover the full range of the spheres of influences.

Thus, I am pretty convinced that my recent readings of Siri Hustvedt’s book Living, Thinking, Looking: Essays, has something to do with that decision. I nearly finished one of my book project and the idea was similar (without her beautiful narrative style though – what is, is!), writing about human nature from a very opened perspective, including philosophy, sociology, literature (as to her), psychology, neurosciences. Well, I don’t write like Siri Hustvedt, but I feel the urge to write anyway and my usual audiences appreciate what I am saying while speaking. Why don’t give it a try in a modern way (on the internet). This also takes place at a moment of my life where writing a book has lost its mythical appeal!

pcousineau