Setting aside time to write

I am setting aside two mornings per week to write. Something deep inside me needs an outlet for expression, not just because I live a fairly isolated existence but also because my children are not yet riveting conversationalists.  I long to share my heart and its musings in a meaningful way.  I suppose it is a therapy of sorts, an unraveling of the spaghetti that is my brain. 

I love reading works of literature that invite the reader into the inner dialogue of its author. It's like climbing into people's minds to understand how they arrive at their various conclusions. Some of my recent favorites include The Secrets Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert: An English Professor's Journey into Christian Faith"  by Rosaria Butterfield. I also recently enjoyed The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Murial Barbery and The Truth and Beauty: How the Lives and Works of England's Greatest Poets Point the Way to a Deeper Understanding of the Words of Jesus by Andrew Klaven. 

Both reading and writing are an invitation to contemplation and to wrestling with ideas.   Truthfully, I have felt a little exhausted wrestling with ideas the past two years, particularly in light of all the conflicting information that has steamed rolled my direction.  I find myself struggling with the temptation not to think, but rather to stuff every waking moment with someone else's thoughts and opinions on a particular matter. Some of the content I consume is incredibly encouraging, insightful, and motivating but some of it is complete drivel.

It's unhealthy and I am making a concerted effort to invite silence back into my life. Often that looks like sitting in my bay window with a hot cup of tea in the afternoon, just relishing the view. In doing so I find myself more refreshed than I would have if I had spent that time scrolling through Instagram. 

Over the past two years, I have had an uncanny aversion to writing. Even journaling has taken a back seat. I think perhaps,  I am afraid to feel the weight of my emotions and instead, have used podcasts and other diversions to avoid having to sit with my emotions. I know that it is unhealthy and I am making a concerted effort that change that.