Hungry For More

I get hungry sometimes. Well, not often, truthfully. Mostly I just eat at certain times of the day whether I’m hungry or not. I eat because it’s dinnertime or lunchtime or because I finished exercising and it’s time for breakfast. But there are hours in the day when I think, “I’m hungry.” I’m not, usually. Mostly I want something to do, want to take a bight of life. So, I snack.

If enough time has passed between meals and snacks, I can actually get hungry. When this happens, I say, “I’m starving!” I’ve noticed there seems to be no true stopping place for me between comfortable and starving. I leap immediately to survival mode. I think I enjoy the drama of it. Eating is a bit more interesting when you’re starving, when you must simply must have food.

I have noticed, however, that no matter how long it’s been since my last meal, if I’m writing, I’m never hungry. It doesn’t matter if it’s the morning or the middle of the day or late in the afternoon. Perhaps it’s because when I’m down the rabbit hole of a story I forget about what time of day it is or where I’m sitting or what I’m wearing; all my attention is somewhere beyond my body. I love that place. When I’m in it, I think that someday I’d like to figure out a way to live there.

But it may also be that when I’m writing something is always flowing into me. I don’t have to look for anything. In fact, I can’t. There are no cupboards to raid, no refrigerators to open, no grocery store aisles to roam. I have to let it come to me, and when I let it, when I’m tapped in to where it comes from, it flows and flows. There’s nothing to want, nothing that needs filling. So I suppose I do live where the writing happens, only I lose track of it as my attention wanders to a world of things that have already been made, and away from the source of what’s always coming.

If you like the ideas and perspectives expressed here, feel free to contact me about individual coaching and group workshops.

Fearless Writing: How to Create Boldly and Write With Confidence.
You can find William at: williamkenower.com