Writing from the Deepest Place

A reflection on listening to the quiet voice that says "I need to write." + A poem by Tanner Olson.

My home office at our hold house. Oh I miss this set up.

I’m grateful my friend

Tanner Olson

wrote a poem inspired by this piece.

PSA: You’ll find a poem near the bottom written by my friend

Tanner Olson

and inspired by this piece I wrote. If you don’t want to be encouraged or filled with hope, then don’t go check out his work 🙃

I've always wanted to play the piano. When I hear pianists like Joep Beving or Olafur Arnalds, something happens within me that is hard to put into words.

Music, particularly the style they create, has a way of transcending me beyond myself and into the depths of myself at the same time. I don't fully understand it, and it feels difficult to articulate, but my body and soul know exactly what it means.

Recently, I realized that writing does a similar thing for me. Not every time I write, but sometimes it does what that style of music does for me, and I imagine what creating that music does for them.

Maybe the keyboard is my piano. Maybe it’s yours too. Not in the sense that my writing is to the level of art their music is, but in the sense that the keyboard (or pen) takes me on a journey I couldn't have known without surrendering myself to the writing. In the same way, I imagine they go on an unexpected journey when they surrender themselves to the keys.

Sometimes I notice a small voice quietly say, "I need to write." It’s hard to articulate that to someone in a way they would fully understand unless they too have a similar quiet voice that says, "I need to write." I would like to believe that we all have that voice somewhere in us. Maybe it's just a matter of how connected we are to it.

I can't say that I always stop what I'm doing and surrender to that quiet voice and see what he needs to say. Sometimes the dishes need to be done or bills need to be paid or my daughter needs the full presence of her dad or my wife deserves cuddle time or I need to just breathe and be still.

When I do hear that quiet voice and give him space, a type of music is created. Maybe it's not music that you like, but it's music that does something for me in a way that I didn't know I needed. Isn't that what truly matters at the end of the day?

Frederick Buechner, my favorite author, said, "The only books worth reading are books written in blood." I haven't written a book, but I have read books, and Substack letters, that are written in blood and they move me the most. And by "written in blood," I think he means, or at least how I understand it, it's writing that comes from the depths. Beyond the thick skin and bone. Beyond the layers of rational thought and intellect. It's writing that comes from a place within that can only be found by surrendering to the quiet voice that says, "I need to write. Come explore with me."

That's the type of writing worth reading, to me anyway, because no one else can write from that place but you. In other words, it's a one-of-a-kind unique place in the vastness of the world that holds within it a type of beauty and mystery that can only be accessed by you.

And when you access it, something happens in you that is difficult to articulate, yet deeply needed. When you write from that place, from that deep place within, it invites others to experience something in them which also is difficult to articulate, yet deeply needed.

When you slow down enough to listen and surrender to that quiet voice, music is created. 

Also, you never know just who might need to hear that music. Just like Joep Beving and Olafur Arnalds and all the other composers who make beautiful music don't know who needs to hear it, they create it anyway. 

Because, I imagine, at the end of the day they need it most.

Here’s to surrendering to and creating what you need most and trusting it will fall upon the ears, or eyes, of those who need to experience it.

How might we deepen our awareness to listen to the small quiet voice that says I need to write? Whether its write a post, or to write a book, or to journal the words nobody will see, or to write a letter to a loved one. Whatever it is, may we surrender to the voice and listen to the music created.

With care,

Blake

Poem by

Tanner Olson

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More to the Story by Blake Roberts

I’m so grateful you take the time out of your busy life to read these words. When I launched this letter a year and a half ago I didn’t know what to expect. I still don’t to be honest.

I’m a therapist by day and spend most of my time journeying into the depths of peoples stories and trauma. It’s heavy work but holy work and I’m honored I get to do it.

When I write, it does something for me. And my hope is that it does something for you. I hope it invites you to be curious about what is below the surface for you. That it speaks to you in a way you didn’t know you needed.

Thanks for being here. Be kind and stay curious.

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