Preface: Gratitude Series

Gratitude for Writing as a Contemplative Practice

Write. Find a way to keep alive and write. There is nothing else to say.
— James Baldwin

Image taken in Rwanda during a self-created “writing retreat.” Miso Soup is in the mug.

Writing is a gift. The thing that has kept me grounded during this pandemic as well as the 3 years preceding it in which I felt an increasing sense of turmoil as social justice concerns grew alongside general instability.

Pen to paper tethered me to myself, a self that predated parenting, as motherhood tried its best to consume me. Writing held my hand through mass shootings, a slew of wildfires and much more.

Yet, even as I wrote more and more during that time, I kept those words and pages to myself. They were written for me, for my own sanity.

When I write, I feel relief, my pain disappears, the courage returns. — Anne Frank

However, writing can be both: for me and for others. There is value in both, in the writing we keep for ourselves and in the writing that we share. I proudly pressed publish on Sept. 21st and that first piece in response to forced hysterectomies in ICE detention facilities reignited my medium page and remains a favorite.

Today, I share my preface to a Gratitude Series overtaking my page this month…