More on Writing

Write. Even if it's no good. You don't have to show people everything you write. Writing has more purposes than just recording something to be read. I'm all for free-writing. (Don't, you know, turn it in and call it an academic essay. But don't be afraid to just WRITE first and refine later, instead of trying to do them both at once.)

"Would God have given us a mind if he'd wanted us to waste all this paper writing down what's wrong or badly put? But that internal thinking process lacks a dimension which writing provides. When we just think inside our heads, the cycle of language is incomplete; we are prey to obsession. The thoughts, sentences, images, or feelings that play in our heads continue to play round and round. But when we write down those thoughts or feelings, the sterile circle is often broken: they have a place on paper now; they evolve into another thought or even fade away. Writing is a way to get what is inside one's head outside, on paper, so there's room for more."
--Peter Elbow, "The Shifting Relationships Between Speech and Writing"

Writing is the Muggle Pensieve.