Last updated on 21 December 2025
Share this
“That’s why I write, because life never works except in retrospect. You can’t control life, at least you can control your version.”
—Chuck Palahniuk
It takes a peculiar kind of self-absorption, I sometimes think, to write about one’s own life.
As much as essayists like me say we are merely sharing our experiences, there is no denying writing sometimes straddles the line between self-awareness and self-absorption. Even perhaps narcissism.
I am aware of this even as I write these words: How do I talk about my experience in life without appearing too self-centered?
The answer, at least the only one I can come up with, is to write genuinely and not be concerned with how my writing lands. This means not to expect any sort of accolades nor care about criticism.
Writing is my life. Like cycling is my life. (Like running used to be.) Like the times I’ve felt brokenhearted is my life. And my relationships with each of my precious adult daughters are my life.
Writing is my life. Like cycling is my life. (Like running used to be.) Like the times I’ve felt brokenhearted is my life. And my relationships with each of my precious adult daughters are my life. My life is my most intimate connections with those I care about. My life is my failures and my flaws. My life is my fear of never having reached my potential and my regrets for the shortcuts I took and the mistreatment I both delivered and endured. It’s my triumphs. My life is the ONE ATP I’ve hit on the pickleball court.
It is not about being arrogant or self-absorbed and it’s not that I completely don’t care what someone who reads my writing thinks. I don’t write to say I’m better than anyone. The last time I looked there are nearly eight billion people on this Earth. Though I may be a “better” writer than some, I am not saying I am a better person than anyone.
“I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.” – Joan Didion
Joan Didion said this about writing: “I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.”
And Flannery O’Connor said: “I write because I don’t know what I think until I read what I say.”
When I approach the keyboard on my laptop or grab a pen and my journal, I usually know perhaps the first line of what I might write. Often it’s only a few words or a phrase that I’m holding onto. Sometimes I have only a general idea.
I usually don’t even know why I feel so compelled to write something. But the notion grabs hold of me and won’t let go. It’s almost as if the need to write is acknowledging the presence of this idea that has a life of its own.
To write honestly and genuinely about my experience, I have to write as close to the bone as possible.
To write honestly about my experience, I have to write as close to the bone as possible. I have to intentionally examine my sense of things. This includes looking at all possible perspectives I have on an idea, Questioning what I believe to be true, How something affects me or those I care about, What doesn’t seem to be true, And how others might see the same idea.
This type of exploration–for writing is truly exploring–requires some level of self-absorption or at least self-awareness.
My therapist used to call this view “the plight of the bright.” She was referring to the ability to go beneath the surface, beyond the superficial, to truly find one’s own truths and to confront them.
That is not to say that I am not often wrong. I’m very fallible and I’ve made mistakes in how I wrote about certain experiences in my life. But my writing serves me there too for it allows me to re-experience the past and to re-examine my take. this allows me to possibly do better next time.
Writing also is about living in the moment. As Alan Watts has pointed out, “one can only live in the present moment because the present moment is all we have.”
Essays like the ones I’ve written on this platform are a series of Kodak moments of my life.
Essays like the ones I’ve written on this platform are a series of Kodak moments of my life. Moments that I can crystallize for later examination. This allows me to take measure of my life and grow through the experience.
As someone who spends most of their waking hours in thought–a compassionate way of not calling myself an overthinker–creating some coherence through writing becomes a tool for mental well-being.
Writing is a way to brain dump all the useful and useless chatter in my head. I learned a long time ago that the mental noise in my head doesn’t cease. Sometimes it’s so loud, like water banging against a dam with dampers closed..
I usually don’t even know why I feel so compelled to write something. But the notion grabs hold of me and won’t let go. It’s almost as if the need to write is acknowledging the presence of this idea that has a life of its own.
It’s as if dumping all the weird and misguided and occasionally brilliant thoughts filling my head onto the screen or into my journal empties the tank and settles my mind.
So, yeah, maybe writing about one’s life experience is a form of self-absorption. It’s my way of making sense of life the way someone else might find peace painting or playing a violin or punching a bag.
Many years ago a writing teacher said something that stuck with me.
“Writers write,” he said. “Everything else is everything else.”
Maybe writing for me is proving I’m alive.
Thanks for reading.
-30-