Writing Quotes | Creativity
Writing is Thinking Clearly— 11 Quotes
Thinking clarity equips you to ask better questions
When you are reading and researching, your mind-space starts to get cluttered with every new idea. Your thoughts and concepts are all jumbled up inside your mind. Everything you have learned seems to be right and wrong at the same time. On these moments, you are unclear and doubtful of what to think and what not to think.
As my mental space became cluttered with intoxicating ideas and excessive information, I wanted to have a method, some consistency. I could not keep on going without clearing my head first, as they say.
The greatest gift we all have, and for which we show little gratitude, is that many intelligent and wise people have lived before our time, and they have left us a rich intellectual legacy. We are heirs to this marvelous legacy. They were just like you and me, our past versions. Seeking advice from people who lived before the information age seems appropriate as these people had more time to think and ponder with fewer distractions.
The important thing is to never stop questioning. ~ Einstein
Whatever we read, we give a meaning to it that is entirely personal and unique; our understanding is also our point of view. Here are 11 quotes that I chose about writing and thinking clearly, these quotes may give rise to new questions — I may have failed to ask better questions at the moment, but I would like to succeed in future:
1. Writing is thinking. To write well is to think clearly. That’s why it’s so hard. ~David McCullough.
With exceptional clarity of thought, the writing would become easy. Does it mean that we are trying to clear our thought process when we are searching for proper words to express our life’s meanings, or is it that we are just trying to give verbal form to our pre-existing thoughts?
2. The scientists of today think deeply instead of clearly. One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite insane. ~ Nikola Tesla.
This quote applies to writers as well. Clarity of thoughts is an essential requirement for good writing, and clear thinking has to be learned by reading and focusing on a given topic. Did Tesla mean to say that clear thinking is shallow and for the sane, or did he wish to question the sanity of all deep thinkers?
3. If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough. ~Einstein
If we have a complete grasp of what we are writing about, it is easy to find our words. Does it mean that when we are struggling with our writing, we need to read a bit more and improve our understanding of the topic?
4. When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy. ~ Rumi
Rumi goes on to say, “I want to sing like the birds. Not worrying about who hears about it or what they think.” Is Rumi suggesting that we feel sad because we are not living spiritually, or does he mean to say that it is difficult to give words to our heartfelt wishes and hopes?
5. Great art is clear thinking about mixed feelings.~W. H. Auden
When language fails to express our true feelings, writers search for similes and metaphors to communicate the meaning which only they can see. Does this quote mean that mixed emotions are a writer’s asset?
6. The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns, as it were, instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink.~George Orwell
“A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices,” William Jame said. Does it imply that some of the writers are trying to assert their prejudices as universal truths?
7. To do much clear thinking a person must arrange for regular periods of solitude when they can concentrate and indulge the imagination without distraction.~Thomas A. Edison
Is it possible for us to sit in solitude in this age of communication, or can we disconnect from the digital world for a few hours? The current mindfulness trend may help us to enjoy the benefits of solitude.
8. Clear thinking requires courage rather than intelligence. ~Thomas Szasz
Does he mean to say that even dull people can have clear thinking, or does he mean that most people know the truth but cannot express themselves due to social fears?
9. “Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking.”~ Albert Einstein
Is there a question here? Maybe. Is Einstein saying that reading books makes us slow thinkers, or is he suggesting that we should use our minds to figure out at least some of our problems? Is this what is happening to me? Should I write more and read less?
10. Today, if you are not confused, you are not thinking clearly. ~ Irene Peter.
Every question is a realization of some mystery in our life. The answers will give rise to new riddles, and new issues will confuse us and spur us to know more to find the answers. Or is the quote self-contradictory?
11.“Begin challenging your own assumptions. Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in awhile, or the light won’t come in.”~Alan Alda
Does he mean that we should randomly keep challenging our beliefs about life, or is he encouraging us to live with an open mind?
With the help of these quotes, I was able to discover that I had to rely more on my inner experience to understand reality. The reading and research can never replace personal experience.
“The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience.”~Eleanor Roosevelt
Conclusion
The quotes may have generated different questions in your mind. You may not even like some of them. But you need to know that continuously doubting widespread societal assumptions and beliefs, is a better way not to let your thinking process become stagnant. Only by questioning the foundations of human civilization, can you see possibilities and solutions for personal and social problems. The new and better answers would be your creative contribution to the generations that come after you. It would be your legacy for the future incarnations of you and me.