The more I write in this series the more I ask myself why is it that I'm doing it. Seems like a silly question, but not one I've yet been able to answer satisfactorily.

In my initial post I identified my reason as just wanting to pick back up a hobby which in the past had given me a lot of satisfaction. I still think there's some of that but it's also more. I could write posts only once in a while (maybe three posts a month/one a week seems reasonable) and still feel like "I'm blogging". But why do I write so much? What is it that really motivates me to come back again and again?

When I ask myself this question, some obvious answers pop into my mind:

• I want to improve at writing (but why?)
• I like the idea of creating a body of work that somewhat documents where I'm at on any given period
• I want to share values and ideas that resonate with me, and in so doing try to make the world a better/nicer place
• I want to share my problems and general awkwardness, and connecting with other awkward people so we can realize that being weird is okay
• I want to feel seen, there's definitely some fishing for validation

But is that all there is? I get the impression that there's something more. Especially that first line: "I want to improve at writing", seems to speak out to me in some incomprehensible language. Maybe it's just a normal desire to "tell stories" (or essays in this case)? Something that probably has a very strong evolutionary basis.

...

I remember when I first started this blog, my main intention with it was to use it as a sort of stepping stone towards learning to tell short stories. The idea was to cut my teeth on simple stuff, blog posts that have no real end except to exist, and so improve my self esteem enough as to then feel I had the "permission" to write stories.

Interestingly enough, I no longer feel that drive, or at least not as strongly. I still love stories, and still think they play a core role in how we see and understand the world around us, but the drive to "create them" is almost absent. Nowadays I just enjoy prattling about random stuff. Which, to be honest, is also its own kind of storytelling right? When I tell you about things that happened to me, or ideas, or etc, I do it (or try to) in such a way that it's engaging and hopefully sometimes has you asking "and what happens next".

...

So yeah, maybe I'm looking at this whole thing backwards. Maybe my core priority when I sit down to write is still to tell stories, but these have shifted under my feet and now permeate all the space around me. I'm immersed in them and as such I don't see them anymore. That's why I forget that, in the end, these are all still stories, it's just that they're not stories about beings from space, or elves, or dragons. I guess one could say that every kind of writing blooms in response to the yearning to tell stories. It just requires a bit of reframing on our side for us to realize what they actually are.

This reminds me about one of the best lectures I've heard from Kurt Vonnegut. In theory it's a lecture on storytelling but he never says anything specific about it. He doesn't go on to talk about the explicit nature of a story, or comment on structure, or give any kind of advice. Instead, he flips the whole thing in typical Vonnegut style and uses the opportunity to tell a series of "happenings" from his own life. On the surface these are pretty mundane: going out to buy a single envelope, grumbling about the death of typewriters.

When I first listened to it I remember that for the first couple of minutes I was thinking "oh but when is he going to get to the point? when is he going to tell us what it takes to be a great storyteller?". Soon after, however, I was completely enthralled in his retelling of these seemingly random occurrences.

It wasn't until after I finished watching his talk that it dawned on me that he showed everything there is to show about storytelling, without really saying anything specific about it. Rather than give a recipe list or strategy he showed us what a great story looks like. More importantly, he showed us that ANYTHING can be a great story.

(This is, incidentally, the same lecture where Vonnegut's famous quote originated from: We are here on Earth to fart around, and don’t let anybody ever tell you any different)

Perhaps that's what "being human" is all about? We definitely tell stories to ourselves all the time. About who we are, what we like, what we don't like, how we're being wronged, how we're succeeding, etc, etc. We also constantly tell stories to each other. Stories are the glue that allows us to communicate with one another, and with the world at large. They're the medium through which we make sense of and understand the world around us.

Perhaps "living" is itself the act of telling (and creating) a long story.

So yeah, maybe that answers pretty satisfactorily my original question of why do I keep coming back. I like to tell stories :)