Writing From Life Experience

Notes on a Tadpole Tank

When I was maybe thirteen or so (not really sure), we had a fish pond in the back yard, just a small square one, about three feet across and three feet deep, with a little fountain in one corner to keep the water circulating. Every spring, well into the evening, you could hear the toads singing out there. You almost never saw one, but it was surprising how many little creaky voices joined in their chorus.

I got my old aquarium out of the basement, put it on my desk, and made a mound of dirt in one corner—a nice chunk of earth covered with moss. I shaped this headland so it sloped out across the aquarium (now a terrarium), with one high side that would be dry land, and the rest would become sea floor. Or pond floor I suppose. Then I went out and dunked a big jar into the murky water and poured it in to create a little corner of pond. Then I caught a bunch of the sprightly, wriggling and fast-swimming tadpoles that teemed in the murky water in early spring. My idea was to watch them grow and turn into toads, like my own little wildlife documentary that I could check in on when I wasn't at school or doing other things.

One thing that surprised me is that after a while I could recognize each individual tadpole. They all looked a little different, but what really stood out were their personalities. There was an unusually big one who was really aggressive. I probably named them, but I can't remember the names now. And I also no longer remember the personalities of the rest. But the important thing is that these little squiggly black dots with pointed tails actually took on life, personality, and individuality right before my eyes. It was only because I had them right there in my room, and I paid attention to them every day. The very act of paying attention to something makes it grow much larger in your perception. Sort of like zooming in on it, only it's an internal, mental thing rather than literally just getting closer. Oh, I got close too. But the real focus was of my attention.

It became so fascinating that I quickly decided I had to write down what I was seeing so I wouldn't forget about this. Unfortunately, the writing itself is long gone now. But this became my first taste of journaling about my life and things I experienced.

The point of the above story is that I wrote from my own close observations. I had nothing to base my style or approach on—I don't think I had read any wildlife documentary stuff, though I had definitely seen documentaries on TV. Maybe to an extent I used an approach like a narrator would in one of those. But that just covers the approach and the style of the writing—not the content. Everything I wrote was directly from my own observation, and I was actually surprised that I had so much to write every day—I was afraid I'd run out pretty quick. But each day I sat fascinated and watched, and each night I had quite a bit to write about.

This was a really positive experience for me, and an important one. I really believe it set the tone for my journaling, though I stopped when those tadpoles turned into toads (the ones that survived—not all of them did), and I don't think I journaled again until a few years later.

That was another important milestone in journaling for me. I was taking a literature class, where I read a couple of Charles Dickens stories among other things (I mostly remember the Dickens). I really liked that class, it was different from any I had taken before. More like certain college courses, because the teacher didn't give us any real assignments or homework, just said he wanted us to read, to choose our own books, and to keep a journal about the reading. The journals didn't count toward our grades, he didn't want to see them or for us to read from them to the class or anything. They were totally private, and he wanted us to just write anything that came to mind about what we were reading. He said it was a very good habit, and that he hoped we would continue to journal afterwards. I know I stopped for a while, maybe a decade or so, but I always remembered that old journal, and I did start journaling again. It became a near-daily habit, for something like thirty years now.

My first dozen or so entries in that literature class journal were really rough and brief. But a little ways in I started to get into it and write more. I credit that class with why I write the way I do, in Evernote (my journal now) and here on my blog. I became a discovery writer, writing to go deeper into my ideas and to develop them stage by stage. That becomes very addictive, at least for me it did. I suppose I was always a discovery writer by temperament, and discovered it then.

A little bit of wisdom from Freud is highly relevant here. In his pioneering explorations into the depths of human nature, he would use three sources:

• Self-reporting by his patients,
• Observing their actions (and noting clues to when they're lying or telling the truth), and
  
• Delving into his own inner experience.

These are the only ways to discover anything as inner and elusive as mental phenomena. It's inside of us, it has no physical form or substance, it can't be sliced up and put under a microscope or weighed and measured. It's only available to us through direct inner experience, listening to others, and paying attention to their behavior. What more thorough way to study inner experience than by these three methods?

A patient's own perspective may well be skewed, because they want to present themselves in a positive light, and they might have blockages or fear of really admitting certain things. But by observing the same inner state in his own mind and observing the actions of his patients (and paying attention to things like Freudian slips etc), he would get three very different perspectives on it. By comparing and contrasting these, he could pretty reliably arrive at a good idea of the mental state he's trying to understand.

As an example, I'll use passive aggression, something I've already mentioned a few posts back. When I notice somebody who seems to be acting passive aggressively, I can look inside myself to a time when I did it myself. When I was young there were definitely times when I was a little shit. Even when I was older it happened now and then (I'm not proud of it, and it hasn't happened often since I was a child). So there are two of Freud's exploratory perspectives. And often you get to hear people's excuses for their shitty behavior, in that petulant tone of voice, and you can remember saying just such nasty things to your mom or dad, and the resentful attitude that goes with it. These three perspectives give you a very well-rounded understanding of how it feels, how it makes a person behave, and a lot of other things a writer can really use.

Sorry, that took a lot of words, but it's vitally important, especially when it comes to writing, because—

Our subject matter is human beings.

Not so much their bodies as their inner essence, their character, their personalities, and the way they interact with each other. ​

This is what story is.

And what we need as writers to learn and practice comes largely from our own personal experiences with people. That is the Rosetta Stone that allows us to understand what really happens inside people's heads. Not just their thoughts, but their feelings, emotions and reactions as well. What drives them—whatever coping mechanisms they came up with as children to survive the family dynamics. Things like this shape people into who they become. And yes you can learn about it through study, and I recommend that. Psychology is basically the study of human behavior and motivation, of their interaction styles. But not everyone is interested in psychology. I certainly have no interest in most of it, but there are certain very specific aspects of it that draw me in, and I like to learn more about those now and then.

You have to find your own way in, follow your own Yellow Brick Road. ​

It isn't already laid out for you by somebody else, it lays itself out brick by brick as you learn about writing and about people and their foibles. You can't predict where it will lead, or by what circuitous route it will get you there. You can only follow where it meanders. And frequently you're on your own, the road disappears under soil or brush, or there simply is no road for a ways, and you have to navigate under your own recognizance. But after a while you'll spot another glistening brick, maybe just a little corner sticking up from the dirt, and go toward it. Then you'll see more, and then it's a road again.

What all that means is at times you won't know where to look for a direction, but trust and keep moving, and you'll find your way again. I'm talking about trusting your own intuition and decisions, even when you have little data telling you what to do. You have an inner guide. It's your own sense of direction, and it's perfectly tuned to you. The more you allow yourself to rely on that, the more you become your own writer—your own person—your own artist. If you're not following your muse, you're following some predetermined path laid out by somebody else, and that won't take you to your own destination, but to theirs.

Writing about those tadpoles, I had no guide to how to do it. I was entirely on my own, I devoted myself to watching them, so it was reality I was guided by. Not somebody else's idea of how to write about tadpoles, but my own observations of the real things. That has more authority and authenticity than any amount of study done from books or websites about tadpoles. And the same is true about people. Sure, study human behavior through psychology, or sociology, or whatever means you want, that's all valid. But don't let that be your only guide. Supplement it with your own experiences. We all have countless memories of interacting with people and seeing them interact with each other.

We know how we felt, we can extrapolate how they probably felt, what drove them, what they hoped to achieve, and we sometimes hear their side of the story; their explanations (true or otherwise) and rationalizations for their behavior. So you've got those same three POVs Freud used so well—your own inner experience, your observations of other people's behavior, and their self-reporting about what was going on in their heads. All three of these things are now yours, your own life experience, and it's all made entirely of the stuff character and story are built from.

It's an unbelievably nice night outside for the end of February. Close to 60 degrees. This afternoon it was over 80! If Indian Summer is a burst of summer-like weather in late fall, what do you call an early burst of summer, before it's even technically spring yet? No idea, maybe both are Indian Summers. Maybe I'll look it up. But anyway, I couldn't resist going out there and just sitting in the back yard (basically in the woods) and basking in the beauty of it all. My mind wandered along all kinds of weird paths, and suddenly I was thinking about what I wrote above. And I had insight into one part of it that I had never connected up before.

It's about the self-reporting of other people. As I said above: "We sometimes hear their side of the story; their explanations (true or otherwise) and rationalizations for their behavior."

It occurred to me how much we can learn from this if we pay attention. I was thinking in terms of some really nasty behavior, along the lines of passive aggression or manipulation. And I realized if someone tells you their rationlizations for this kind of behavior, and if you're comparing it to your own inner knowledge of times when you've done similar things, you can really see things about them they might not realize they're showing you. For instance, you can hear what they blame you for, that you know you aren't responsible for.

And if it's someone you've known for a long time, and you've heard similar stories from them many times, you can see even more clearly into their motivations. Even better if they're complainers and like to tell stories about their run-ins with other people, because now you can add a new item to Freud's three categories—self-reporting concerning their interactions with other people (not just with you). It seems complicated, but really it's pretty simple. It just takes a bunch of words to say it. This is one I had never even thought of before.

The incredible power of observation

Because I liked to draw at an early age I learned to pay close attention to things around me, mainly visually. That's what drawing is—you look closely at things and figure out what they really look like, if you're interested in realism anyway. And you also learn to see the structure and texture, the color, the patterns, the variations and similarities of things.

Of course those observation skills also pay off for writers, the difference being it's more than just visual now. It isn't any particular sense you pay attention to, it's your environment, using all the senses. The environment and the people around you.

I've always had a keen interest in my environment. I used to love when mom would take us to the museum in St. Louis, all those huge echoing spaces with shiny floors, and the constant low murmuring of the crowd. Not just any murmuring, but a very particular type—people are in awe of their surroundings, partly because of the massive architecture, the rich luxurious materials like marble, polished wood, and carved stone, and the incredible works of art, but also because it's a certain kind of public space where it's expected you keep quiet and behave yourself. All of this comes across in the sights and the sounds. A hushed awe and appreciation, occasionally broken by unappreciative children (or in some cases adults). And in a big space like that, with so many polished surfaces and big windows, the light does crazy things. It's like you've entered some huge kaleidoscope filled with intense sights, sounds, smells etc. And then there are the textures—not that you can feel most of them, but in seeing them you know what they would feel like. All those statues of concrete, stone, cast bronze or carved wood. The paintings with surfaces piled thick and rough in places, and smooth in others, with canvas texture showing through here and there. And the sense that you're glimpsing things from the ancient past—objects that were once idolized, that people were willing to give their lives for, and that other people were desperate to destroy. All these intense ideas come rushing in on you one after another. It's more than just sensory perception at this point, it's whirling ideas about the history of the objects, and thoughts about all these masses of people gathered here in near-reverential awe—some of them anyway, and some really aren't feeling it. And that sparks ideas about how different people are, how some are in touch with these deep sensations and ideas and some are oblivious to them.

All of this, if you're sensitive to it, goes into your story worlds. All it takes is to open up, notice the things around you, pay close attention to them, and let them well up inside your awareness and transform your sensibilities. On the trip home, and for days afterwards, those sensations and ideas are still whirling inside you. It's like you're in two worlds now—your imagination is alive with the memories, but at the same time you're aware of the much more mundane world you're moving through—your ordinary world of familiar sights and sounds and sensations. Not that some of those don't grab your attention now and then, because they do. There are sudden revelations of intense beauty and marvel even in the drab everyday world.

I think it's mostly about allowing yourself to feel awe and appreciation for the world around you, that you're always immersed in.

And that sparks an idea about all the things I've written about the visual imagination. It isn't just visual, it's sensory. All the senses participate. You can't really separate them, or at least I can't. It works the way the dreaming mind does (of course, how else could it work?)—it's built from all your sensory perceptions and thoughts, feelings and ideas, all merging into... I don't know what to call it. A living mass that's moving and filled with wonder. It's synthetic thought (putting things together), as opposed to analytical, which dissects and separates in order to study. Maybe it's the difference between an artist and a scientist—a poet and a stock broker. Ok, that's not entirely true. Most scientists, and certainly the really good ones, use both analytical and synthetic thinking. Einstein arrived at his theories through thought experiments that were as amazing as I believe Jung's 'dreaming with eyes open' was (his Active Imagination sessions). I suspect we all move normally through both modes of thought, but some of us favor one over the other and lean hard into one, while probably discounting the other and demonizing it (the way I tend to do about analytical thinking and AI). I doubt it's really possible to do only one or the other, they're native modes the human mind uses all the time. But it's also an unfortunate terndency of the human mind to see things in simple black and white dichtomoies, and to demonize one while valorizing the other.