Aliveness Knows the Way of your Book
How noticing turns into writing, and writing turns into sharing.
When you read my Substack, this sentence won’t be unfamiliar to you:
‘You don’t start writing a book. You just notice that one is already being written.’
It’s in the way you talk about something that keeps pulling you in. That itch of aliveness. A subject that sparks movement in how you think, where you go, who you seek out. Maybe it's something you only whisper to yourself. Maybe it’s already leaking into conversations, notes, voice memos.
That’s the book. All of that. It’s the observation of that.
You see that something is going on. It might feel too early to call it a book project. But if you're writing, even if just for yourself, and you feel the urge of sharing... then it already is one. As soon as your attention rests on it, something shifts. The book noticed you noticing it. That was all that was needed.
And then, something else happens.
You begin sharing stuff. A quote, a messy idea, a past conversation, a question. It doesn’t really matter. Suddenly, it’s not just your book anymore.
The richest books are shared conversations. They seem to begin in private, but they actually start and deepen in public. They’re shaped by the invisible hands of response and reflection. When we stop holding our writing so tightly, others can hold it with us.
The way to write a book is to keep noticing what’s already alive. To speak it, scribble it, live alongside it. To see that the book is here, whether you walk with or without it.
Insightful!!