Ta·bu·la ra·sa. A Latin term for the idea that humans are born as a “blank or clean slate” with no innate knowledge. We learn from life experience as we grow. Plausible?
Well, as writers do, I checked with Merriam-Webster and found a nuanced alternate definition. Their tabula rasa meant “smooth or erased tablet”. Still, it refers to the mind in its original state before outside influences. Do you believe there is a uniform original state that is blank for each of us as we enter this world?
Is there a totally blank page in writing, and in life?
In teaching a writing for business seminar at Vancouver’s Douglas College (now called a University), I simplified the all-important, and for some, anxious moments of starting, by saying that every piece we compose has a beginning, a middle and an end.
Let’s look at that start
Every writer knows the terror of the blank page. It stares back at you. On the screen, it may come with a blinking cursor, ticking the time and daring you to prove you’ve got something worth saying. Life does the same. You’re handed a body, a clock already ticking, and no script. The challenge is the same in both cases: stop waiting for the perfect start to begin. It’s going to get messy no matter what. The words—and our days—only take shape once we commit.
The secret is that the opening first page may be blank. but YOU never are blank. You bring feelings, experiences, thoughts, and if nothing original comes to you like an inspired thunderbolt, you have opinions. Right or wrong, they are a start. If you have nothing to say, do as author Natalie Goldberg advises: Write I have nothing to say. Or, write about the food you just had or want to have. It will prime the pump, as Stephen Covey often said.
Leap and take action. Continue to leap and learn.
The Illusion of the Perfect Start
One of the biggest lies writers tell themselves, or others believe happens, is that the right beginning will arrive if they just wait long enough. Some call it inspiration. But beginnings don’t arrive—they’re made. So, still others know it is perspiration from the time and work we put in.
Draft after draft, writers learn that a rough opening is better than none at all. Inside the writing game, the players know it as ‘the shitty draft’. I call it ‘the first pancake’. You arrange all the equipment, heat the pan and spoon in the first drop of batter. That first pancake often goes to the chef only or a nearby pet, but it doesn’t end its life on the serving platter. It’s the test run, no matter the experience of the operator.
Life mirrors this. Many people delay making choices because they are waiting for certainty. Some are waiting for permission, but we will deal with this super important piece in a future blog.
Start the business. Take the trip. Tell the story. Clarity comes only after movement.
Freewriting and Free Living
Writers often beat the block with a technique called freewriting. Go ahead. Try it: spill words on the page with no editing, no judgment. The point isn’t quality, it’s momentum. You may have heard of Julia Cameron’s ‘morning pages.’ Or Pomodoro’s timed writing. There’s even something called The Most Dangerous App in the World that encourages you to write continuously because when you stop for more than a few seconds, it erases all you have done.
I prefer the manual and more gentle advice of Natalie Goldberg in her book, Writing Down the Bones. I bought and read a copy of its first printing. Rule #1: Keep your hand moving. Natalie, to this day, writes longhand and has someone else type up her prolific work as a novelist and poet. As a meditator, her earliest mentor, Katagiri Roshi, nudged her into the practice of writing each day and putting the pages away, not to be edited or reviewed, much like Julia Cameron’s first thing in the morning brain dump. Natalie originally started ‘her practice’ under Roshi’s tutelage as running as she was in that state of not knowing her life’s direction yet, but she already was a runner.
Life has its own version: try things without overthinking, experiment without needing every step planned. Both approaches rely on one truth—motion (or action) generates material.
Family History as a Case Study
Take family history writing, something I am now struggling with in my alleged retirement from producing content for clients.
People often freeze at the start: Do I begin with my grandparents? With a migration story? With myself? The answer I am learning to accept is: anywhere. Once I start collecting memories, photos, and hearing voices, the material seems to grow and shape itself. This seems to happen to my friends who write fiction now, late in life and after other careers as writers or even members of the military.
Starting is less about precision and more about breaking inertia.
In my classes, I urged students to stand up and introduce themselves as a start to sharing their stories, at networking events, for example. I used to say: Get over yourself. Essentially, just start, you will be surprised by the new understanding that your commitment to simply starting will take you.
Living With the Blank Page
Every day is another chance to add to an empty page. Is it really empty, though? No baby, no matter how cherubic, floats down to earth to be born blank. We all come pre-loaded with programs. DNA, possibly memories and past lives, or information overheard in utero. Who knows? But certainly not blank.
And about that blank page or screen. You can stare at it until the day ends, or you can write into it—create badly, beautifully, clumsily, but honestly. What matters is that you show up. Words can be cut, shaped, or polished later. Days cannot.
I am dealing with all this myself, yet again, this time as an experienced writer but a newbie senior in life. We will look at ways to get unstuck in upcoming posts.
Do comment on what you’d like to see in future posts or how you manage now as a creative soul.
Takeaway: Stop waiting for the “right” beginning. Go. Write the bad first sentence. Take the imperfect first step. The page—and life—only come alive once you put something down.
