Why do I Write?

When I were asked yesterday by a friend of mine, that why I write, surprised me. Of course, writing is not my job, nor it is helping me to earn little extra (at least not at present), neither it appreciates my existing wealth. But then I wonder, why do we always have to measure the benefits of something in monetary terms?

Writing is a therapy for me. It is a way to vent all the pent-up frustrations burdening my mind into a far less volatile form, paper (or screen). I can address my anger, fear, worry and stress without bashing the person who embodies those emotions for me with a paperweight. Writing serves as a form of cathartic stress relief for me where I finally get to say what I can’t say out loud, in real life.

Writing is a perfect way to get away from the constant low-quality input and output systems of day-to-day life, such as meaningless small-talk and weather conversations, text messaging, Facebooking, checking the mailbox, and most email and many websites. You receive and create barrages of useless distractions that don’t help you or the people you know; sitting down to write lets you get away from it all. It’s important to keep the noise to a minimum so you can focus on creating and receiving strong material, things that are really worth doing. And writing helps in doing that.

In this culture, communication is so often hampered because we don’t know how to express ourselves, whether it is verbal or written. Writing regularly hone the skill of self-expression. It further reduces the chances of being misunderstood or misinterpreted.

Writing things down gives me time to think carefully and reflect on what I want to achieve the most, and develop a clearer, achievable image and plan for that result.

The most important reason among all other is “WRITING HELPS ME IN MEETING MYSELF ALL OVER AGAIN”. Letting words flow out of your brain unedited can introduce you to a part of yourself you’d been censoring from yourself to cope with everyday life. The only way to keep a close monitor on your actions and goals is to write about them. The feelings when pen downed at a place, will constantly remind you about the things that happened and how did you react to those things. And that is why I write.

So the real answer to the question of why I write is that telling stories and expressing experience and working things out in words is, for me, the only kind of creative work and where boredom and frustration have never made me want to give up.