Write parts.
Delete parts.
Change subjects.
Put too many subjects together under one roof.
Delete and start again.
***
I am three quarters through the book, The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun.
I'm reading it because my daughter told me to, and I always do what she says to do.
(My daughter doesn't read my blog, so she'll never be able to debate me on the validity of the sentence above.)
I am already happy. A happiness book wasn't something that I would have ever chosen on my own, but through the reading of this book, I have found some interesting challenges that are already changing my life. How fun!
***
We went to see readings by Warrior Writers last night. We listened to veterans from the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars reading poetry and stories which express what lives inside them after their combat and non-combat experiences.
Will write more about that later. Still digesting.
Bought the book, Warrior Writers: Remaking Sense, while at the event.
Going back to "happiness", is this Gibran quote that I found in the Editor's Notes of the Warrior Writers' book true?:
"The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain."
- Kahlil Gibran
From my experience, sorrows have created space for more joy only when I have let them carve deep into my being. The times that I have only danced on the surface of sorrow, without giving it words and life; those are the times that joy finds no avenue for penetrating my heart and breaking it open. Roadblocks everywhere.
Some people might not think that listening to the pain and anger of returned vets would add to one's happiness. I feel happy to know that these brave young men are more brave than any of us thought they were. The bravery is not just found on the battlefield. It's found in admitting one's actions, in facing one's deepest nightmares, in saying the unsayable. I am happy that I got to witness the profound last night.
If Gibran's quote is true, the soldiers in the video below must have a chasm for joy that runs deeper than the deepest ocean. I don't know. But I truly hope so.
- Kahlil Gibran
From my experience, sorrows have created space for more joy only when I have let them carve deep into my being. The times that I have only danced on the surface of sorrow, without giving it words and life; those are the times that joy finds no avenue for penetrating my heart and breaking it open. Roadblocks everywhere.
Some people might not think that listening to the pain and anger of returned vets would add to one's happiness. I feel happy to know that these brave young men are more brave than any of us thought they were. The bravery is not just found on the battlefield. It's found in admitting one's actions, in facing one's deepest nightmares, in saying the unsayable. I am happy that I got to witness the profound last night.
If Gibran's quote is true, the soldiers in the video below must have a chasm for joy that runs deeper than the deepest ocean. I don't know. But I truly hope so.
