I’m not going to think about this too much because if I do, I won’t write it. 20 minutes tops… here goes:
This letter is not a letter but a rant, a rub, a flag. It’s graffiti across my 40 something belly, ragged in permanent marker so it fades slowly, my shriek with no parachute, sprawled wide, turbulent and free, the dark velvet of Guiness spilling across the bar.
Bartender smiles.
He’s seen this before.
He knows what day it is.
Truth time. The moment after. The glance back when wisdom hasn’t arrived yet. Someone sits down and tries to chat but all you can do is the no-talk-small-talk, either that or ignore him completely. I pick up my pen and flip to a new page.
Strangers think writers are mysterious but probably crazy. Sexy too, but only …over there.
Bartender smirks knowingly at the stranger, then tosses a soft smile to you.
Dear twenty something,
you write.
Dear lost and jumbled, frenetic and free, torn up and trying… so much trying…
Listen, this tearing wildness that screams through you is worth it. All your hunger and heart break and panic for knowledge, to be sure, to contain, to fret, to flee, to love, and crush and blame and run, to transform and drift… just drift, drift
to claim drama by colouring with pastels, breaking them when pushing too hard and then scratching a new image with your fingers. The purple, red and golden lines beneath your nails say it was worth it.
To plunge into the breathless race of belonging, head spinning, drunk with clamoring still – somewhere anywhere.
To recognize how little you truly know. Claiming THIS IS HONEST at 4:30am.
Oh my but you are such a beautiful idiot.
You run.
every day.
Searching for knowledge, to land, to decide to follow through, to stand for something that doesn’t change in the next second. To be anything but what you are, this beautiful…
idiot.
So beautiful.
And you just don’t know it yet.
Dear twenty something, never stop. Running. Fling yourself forever. Press on. This mess. Love. Fucking Love. Risk sounding like a crazy poet jumping rope with yarn of seaweed, be the child woman with sand in her hair.
Dear 20 something – because you’ll never know.
And that’s just so…
idiotic. yes. and beautiful too.
xxT
On July 23rd on beautiful Bowen Island, just outside of Vancouver, BC at Rivendell Retreat Centre, I am offering Writing as Witness, a one day retreat into the story and/or wisdom inside of you that wants to be heard.
The day includes: Walking meditation, Writing, baring Witness to others, and witnessing our own wisdom. The retreat time will be as private or as connected as you want it to be, which means, you needn’t share your writing or insights if it doesn’t feel right.
There will be a few ‘how to’s and offered best practices’, but mostly, the day is a guided conversation with your-self and the ‘practice’ is in the following of how and what you are wanting to have heard.
Journals are provided. Snacks are also offered however, please bring a picnic lunch to enjoy outside (weather permitting).
July 23rd 2016, 10am-4pm, maximum 16 participants.
Cost is $79 for the day.
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TinaO is a writer, speaker and the founder of TinaOLife – a hub for all things worth living for, the workshop Live Your Best Story, and her coaching practice: Tall Poppy Living. She’s also a professional network marketer with a decade in the industry and with her Tall Poppy Living for Network Marketers Coaching Program, she teaches: selling isn’t slimey and marketing isn’t make-believe. You can be yourself and be successful in Direct Sales.
