Rhythm and routine.
A poem, a song, and some thoughts on staying vulnerable.
I wrote a poem when I got to my office desk this morning. It’s not very good, but then again I only spent a few minutes scribbling it down. Sometimes, I pull out my notebook before I do anything else and put down whatever comes to mind as way of warming up for the day. It acts as a sun that burns off the brain fog, and also serves as a great way of avoiding emails and spreadsheets.
Occasionally, I hold a small funeral for the years I’ve spent as a cog in the machine and could have otherwise spent doing things that make me feel most alive. Many before me have done the same though, and still led lives of great worth: there are certainly silver linings, I just have a penchant for dramatic self-reflection.
Until not so long ago, I thought that everything I wrote had to be publish-worthy as soon as possible and that if it didn’t come out how I wanted after the first pass or two, it wasn’t worth continuing work on, but I don’t see it that way anymore. The piles of journals in my closet and amount of unfinished drafts I have here is both unsettling and promising: it reminds me that good ideas live within me and that it is mostly a matter of focused application and engaging more honestly with the rhythm and routine of writing.
Poem from a Thursday morning:
Drip. Smell. Hear the coffee. The sound of potential. See. Feel. First light slowly stretching, across yards and down streets. Breeze. Birds. All the Earth rises. Stretch: mind and body. Face the day with hope. (14 May 2026, 0737)
It feels like I came to this mindset too late in life, but better late than never, however overstated, always rings true. Letting go of perfectionism is benefitting me in every area of life.
Writing is always how I’ve processed the world around me. When I was younger, it was through lyrics. Songwriting went so naturally with my interest in guitar and it felt like an effortless way to breathe life into emotion.
One of those songs, “Burden”, turned 13 yesterday and deserves to be shared:
The burden on my heart won't fade, No hope to lighten this load. Picturesque as it may be, this desolation brings me to my knees. And it's no one's fault but mine. The ripple of the ocean's water, as your ship sails away. I cannot break my gaze though I've lost you. I wonder where you will go? I wonder where you will go? I've wandered for too many miles, In the fog of my own mind. There's nothing like that colour green, I see it again a thousand times. And it's no one's fault but mine. Climb the mountain, burn it down Flood the valley to begin again. The ripple of the ocean's water, as your ship sails away. I cannot break my gaze though I've lost you. I wonder where you will go? I wonder where you will go?
Along the path to now, I gradually grew up. Sometimes the process of becoming an adult naturally hardens you, and any vulnerability you previously had disappears. It isn’t just felt in rising cynicism, but also, in a disbelief in yourself that can grow weeds around your hopes and dreams, obscuring and smothering them.
It doesn’t happen overnight; it is more like the death of a thousand cuts. Eventually, it can even feel childish to express yourself in ways you would have had no apprehension about when you were younger. If you are not careful, the natural joy, awe, and wonder of being human fades away and you become like those all-too-serious adults you told yourself you’d never emulate.
Look at the children though. Does their “childishness” not look like joy to us now?
Negative experiences, the harshness of others, tough breaks, and the process of having to take on more responsibility can callous our more sensitive side. We learn that if we ignore the parts of us that have been hurt or need attention, it’s not so hard to carry on. Meanwhile, they sit dormant, arising when we least expect or desire them; usually interrupting us when it’s most inconvenient.
It is the attention to those parts though, that heals us.
With that in mind, I come back to the basics: sitting and writing; being honest with myself, even when I do not have a specific direction. I am reading a wider variety as to have more to draw on; more masterclass examples and stories to turn over in my mind. Exposure to a breadth of literature also leads to a well-defined sense of taste, which is important if you want to know what moves you, why it moves you, and what you should be contributing to the world artistically. Be consistently curious and you will better know what you’re uniquely qualified to speak to.
In rhythm and routine we will find joy and downstream of that, results. In vulnerability and honesty we will find the things most worth saying, and downstream of that, healing. You have to genuinely love the craft before any ambition of success. If you are able to derive pleasure without an audience, you have already won.
I realise this afternoon, how content I am, and that what I want most is simply to devote more time to the act of reading, the process of writing, and to take deeper pleasure in this wondrous little life of mine.
Revisiting my old writing has been hit or miss, except for the poetry, which I have been reposting and revamping with commentary 15+ years later.
"Sometimes, I pull out my notebook before I do anything else and put down whatever comes to mind as way of warming up for the day." Definitely better than scrolling through the phone first thing in the morning!
I have learned that I can kill an annoying song stuck in my head by listening to Herb Alpert. But pretty much anything joyful, mirthfull or silly will do. Writing is much the same. One cannot create with the problems of world tugging on each elbow. Get up and dance. No one is watching. And if someone is, so what.