What comes to mind for me first when thinking into what fuels me to write?
Ok, lets do the fossils, that old trauma, those memories of past pain, embarrassment, fear and humiliation… those parts of me that whether settled and carried lightly now or not… have the capacity to play up, seemingly at random and remind us that as wonderful as life is… those old hurts still fucking sting now and again.
So, we’ll call these prompts that show as a fuel for writing… fossil fuels… they have a tendency to morph into rage, rant, anger, sobbing, begging for understanding and soothing… all sprinkled with dark chocolate drops of shame.
Next thing that shows up here today is the stuff that surprises me… like wow, look at that, a Tory advocating for justice and equality for all genders and none… that type of surprise that so often morphs into a combo of satire, passive aggressive violence and is sprinkled with jealousy.
Jealousy?
Really though?
Fucking jealous of some lost and found born again Tory Daily Mail victim who happens to drop a minuscule fraction of compassion by accident… anyway… I’m running with all of this regardless of where it goes… this writing is running on what shows up get written.
I’m sitting on my roof in the new spring sun and will suggest that this excitement and joy and pride at getting through another London winter without dying or screaming… or just crying for no apparent reason… leads me to allow the tightness of winter thaw and flow today… anyways… moving on.
So what shall we call the surprise type fuel?
The stuff that doesn’t often happen, and catches my attention and curdles like old milk lost in the back of a bust fridge… thing?
Lets call it, road to nowhere fuels… always there, never needs refilling and although it generates gritty unwelcome admissions of weakness and truths I’d rather not acknowledge, these nowhere fuels nudge me towards writing stuff that pretends to be done and claimed as a mission to believe in the value of hope.
Didn’t know this fuels stuff was going to get so messy… gulp… and move on regardless.
Up to now I have gone with Fossil fuels ( yuck ) Nowhere Fuels ( Ugh ) and am feeling the need for redemption.
Lets try bigging up heroes and things I heard someone say on the radio that impressed and enthused me… good stuff… showing up sometimes as a fuel to write about them… and weave their skill, imagination and talent into me as if it were mine… something showing up around calling this theft as a form or recovery from a background hum of low self esteem.
Along these lines let’s go with external boost fuels… tempting to go with words like plagiarism, lack of imagination, clutching at straws, jumping on someone else’s band wagon.
However, they do land with me as a Tetris run buzz, fitting as Boost Fuels.
Engines anyone? No? Ok.
Next type of fuel that leads me write… maybe go with what was it that moved me to write this today, lunch timeish… on a Tuesday… and bringing me to here on the roof in the sunshine.
Lack of Ideas of what to write about… emptiness possibly… need to just write as a distraction from thinking about the stuff going on out there… an excuse to not find a more community based humanitarian interactive way to engage in ways that don’t end up with me just sitting here writing for the sake of anything better to do… and this is switching me back to the previous fuels… so… moving on towards… I find this process of putting stuff down in writing physically more than acceptable and less than ecstatic… and just going with this flow of what is here and wants to be typed up… a bit like playing on games in sea side arcades… something in line with… probably will cost me more than it gives, and, that moment when the pennies tumble and give me ” a win” make me smile and feel that wasting time and money has it own joys.
Pfffughh… steering into guilt free fuels here.
Steering out from the thoughts of the colonial chains that bound others and left me and mine wishing we had spoken out against that with more bravery and guts… towards… wtf I never asked for or designed or promoted or voted for all that shit… leave me alone… let me sit in the sun on the roof and write whatever shows up just for the process of pressing these keys and finding doors that they open and then offer me some relief.
Relief Fuel… the stuff that distracts… eases… soothes and throws up new ways to find love amidst the shouting and balling and challenging and fighting… an almost frantic mediation method… related to escape?
Primal scream therapy without the primal or the screaming… kind of. Yeah though, Relief Fuels it is.
Shake it off, keep moving gently on.
Well this little experiment found it’s way here and now maybe fuelled by all of these above… and maybe something about just walking for the sake of walking, using muscles and tendons and shoulders and fingers and legs and eyes and all the squishy flesh and boney bone and blood cells and organ stuff… if here for that… my body as fuel… my moments of freedom that lay empty and offer themselves as places of… whatever is needed.
The fuel mostly around me and those who are paid to throw stuff at me… in these common space circles… there seems to be yet another panic around “where is the rules coming from?” and I can’t dismiss the feeling that maybe that noise has landed beside me here today, thinking about the fuel that fires up the will to write and share and tell and make stories.
Long before I was old enough to understand any of this depth, see beyond the dark… and yes have a greater understanding of what my needs were and how I could find them met, these stories and their offer was there for me… maybe for you too… and you the other you, as well?
And that twitches me into the fuel that says I am writing so that others can benefit from my understanding, from my daring to dare, from my genius and unique capacity for passing on directions that lead us all from the pain of modern rich world culture.
Lets call that, Messiah Fuel.
And hang on, I can hear the songs of angels and dodgy Priests and Vicars and Imans and Gurus and Rabbis laughing nearby, oops.
So, these writing rules that heat me up and cool me down are maybe around and within me before I was born from a womb, and I’ll never know for sure.
While I am feeling fuelled having written this, it has value for me, in the fullest and most gloriously empty way, and in the spirit of being fuelled and perpetually in motion, I have no need to work that out further today… so taking a rest, in the sun, eyes closed.
And breath.
Thanks for jogging and crawling along beside my journey here today, and thanks to the sponsors, those that fuel me, here’s too;
Fossil Fuels.
Nowhere Fuels.
Boost Fuels.
Relief Fuels.
Messiah Fuels.
Note. All the above fuels are freely available at any crisis and any landing from crisis, not far from where you are now.
Rest assured, they are not extracted, are given freely, and are shared extensively among all us humans.