Have you ever expressed an opinion strongly, eloquently, perhaps even drunkenly, then when you sat down and began to write, you realize that your elegant construction was as full of holes as a paper snowflake cut with a dull child's scissors? This is an extraordinarily painful moment and a society that doesn't encourage the discipline to work through this pain and work out the truth, whatever it is, will swim in lies and fantasies.
I struggle constantly with trade-offs in this space. Not in terms of censorship, which I deplore, but in terms of finding the most productive ways of tuning in to my positions and then expressing them. Non-written modes of expression (like visual arts) can be so much healthier in that they are less reductive and abstract than language. And turning to the written word can so easily lead to the words choosing themselves, in which case no real insight occurs. I'm not sure what the optimal balance is between embodiment and clarity of communication, but we should all have the freedom to explore these questions with one another.
Love this! I think the lack of written argumentation is at the root of much of our societal turbulence. Respectfully, two similarly themed pieces as reinforcement...
Have you ever expressed an opinion strongly, eloquently, perhaps even drunkenly, then when you sat down and began to write, you realize that your elegant construction was as full of holes as a paper snowflake cut with a dull child's scissors? This is an extraordinarily painful moment and a society that doesn't encourage the discipline to work through this pain and work out the truth, whatever it is, will swim in lies and fantasies.
I struggle constantly with trade-offs in this space. Not in terms of censorship, which I deplore, but in terms of finding the most productive ways of tuning in to my positions and then expressing them. Non-written modes of expression (like visual arts) can be so much healthier in that they are less reductive and abstract than language. And turning to the written word can so easily lead to the words choosing themselves, in which case no real insight occurs. I'm not sure what the optimal balance is between embodiment and clarity of communication, but we should all have the freedom to explore these questions with one another.
Writing helps you discover what you’re actually thinking
Love this! I think the lack of written argumentation is at the root of much of our societal turbulence. Respectfully, two similarly themed pieces as reinforcement...
https://joelelorentzen.substack.com/p/boating-and-practical-philosophy
https://joelelorentzen.substack.com/p/writing-as-congressional-therapy