When We Write Where Our Passions Take Us We Get Braver.
Or we quit. Don't let that happen.
Just to let you know, today’s essay is a repeat of a piece I published here in July, 2024. I changed the title somewhat, but it’s a piece about passions. I can safely say I know something about writing about my passions, since that’s all I seem to be doing lately, whether it’s benign or it’s, erm, political.
I’m a great believer in repeating prior posts that seem to fit again and might bear repeating. This one does. It’s about writing where our passions take us. I’m still sensing some fear among those of you who do want so badly to express yourselves in this climate of angst and confusion but haven’t quite got up the nerve to let all hell break loose and just go for it.
I could tell you to just go for it, but I don’t know what you’re going to write. I don’t want to be responsible for something gone horribly awry because “Ramona told me I should”, or, worse yet, lawsuits… So I’ll ask you to read what I wrote below and then you make up your own mind.
Don’t be shy about joining the conversation in the Comment Pit. We’re all friends here and this is a notorious safe space. And, as I’ve said a thousand times before, I live for these conversations!
Writing With Passion About Our Passions
No apologies. No holding back. Be brave. Get braver.
(First published July 27, 2024)
See that subtitle? I wrote that as much for me as for anyone else who writes and then publishes whenever passion strikes. We are creatures of our hearts and thus can’t help it. We’re writers by choice and by training, but that doesn’t mean, when passions overtake, we have any control over where our writing leads. It leads to those places that are so important to us we have to get them out there.
We follow where our passions lead and then we worry. All of us. Even when we think we’re being brave and we write as if we’re brave. And it comes out as if we’re brave.
We worry because something tells us there’s a point where we can go too far and we’ll have lost those readers we most want to reach. But will we? Do we? What if some of them go? What if others stay? What if still more come aboard?
What if we finally figure out how futile it is to try and figure this out when our passions are still with us, still wanting to be read and to be heard and to be seen?
I’m coming at this today because I’m in the throes of passion most fraught these days—political passion. It may be the most controversial; it’s certainly the most contentious. We’ll never all agree about our politics and we tend to take our differences personally.
Toes will get stepped on. Feelings will be hurt. Alliances will be broken, some never to be repaired. The disappointment in us, if our readers disagree, will be palpable. We go in knowing all of that, yet we do it because the moment is here and our passion for our message is far more important. But it makes us nervous, nevertheless.
Because a big part of who we are as writers, the thing that keeps us going, is always, always, always the need to be read and liked.
At my Substack blog, Constant Commoner, where my earlier posts have been about my life in the boonies, my widowhood, and the changes in my life since then, I do it as friend to friend. I can go for long periods without writing about politics, and when I do, it often comes as a surprise to some who are new to my pages and have only read the softer pieces.
When the activist side of me comes out, often with a roar, it has to be jarring to some. But the truth is, I’m a political animal and have been for all of my long, long adult life. This somewhat cozy side of my writing life is new for me. I’ve been writing political opinions for dozens of years and I can’t stop now. Especially not now, when I see my country so at risk. It’s a matter of working to save it. That, for me, supersedes everything.
If I risk losing readers over it, it’s a risk I’m learning to be willing to take. But it hasn’t happened. Not here. Not in numbers great enough for any kind of concern. If anything, Constant Commoner is growing in ways that, frankly, have astonished me. I won’t go into numbers because I don’t go into numbers, but my growing readership tells me I’m doing the right thing. For now.
I had no idea when I began concentrating again on politics that so many readers would engage and then subscribe. Our passions are high and they’re aligned. I couldn’t be more relieved. But my story is different from yours or anyone else’s, and that’s what I want to address.
The writers who hold their audiences best are the writers who have confidence. With enough confidence, any level of passion will work. Passion builds confidence. It’s a twofer.
Is there a risk? All writing is a risk. Will it be worth it? It’s passion we’re talking about. There are no tangibles. You write with passion because in those moments before you sat down to write you were overwhelmed with feelings. Caution goes out the window. Exhilaration sits down beside you. You’re giddy over what you’re about to write. Words form. It all comes out…
How terrible if you were to stop now to think about how strangers will feel as they read it. It’s not about them, it’s about you. They’ll either come along for the ride or they won’t.
But you, lucky you, have channeled that thing that makes your piece have meaning. It breathes. It glistens. Its name is passion.
I’m here for the long haul, but I’m going to need your help. I need subscribers, both free and paid. If you can afford a monthly subscription, I would be so grateful. This effort takes time and money. If you can’t, or would prefer to remain on the free list, I completely understand. Please share any of my pieces with those who might want to join our community. Writers strong!
I first made my reputation as an American pioneer in writing about the Second Generation, the children of Holocaust survivors, and only wrote my first published story, or, continued it, through the encouragement of my college mentor who had me read each section to her on the phone. It won a prize, made me a lot of money, and opened endless doors. The subject matter both scared and thrilled me.
Even though you wrote this in 2024, it feels like it’s only become more relevant. You remind me that writing is for me, first. It takes courage to write with passion, especially about the things that matter most to us. The way you weave political conviction with personal experience is a gift, Mona. It’s exactly the kind of writing that cuts through the noise and reaches people. I know your work is touching more hearts than you can see. It always touches me.