The Joy of Writing: Connecting Thoughts and People

Some years ago someone asked me this question over coffee, and I found myself stumbling over the answer. This wasn’t because I don’t love writing. It was because isolating what I love most felt like trying to pick a favorite star. It is a combinations of things that make my life enjoyable.

After a few days of thinking it over, I keep returning to one thing. It’s the way writing lets me think with my hands.

There’s something almost physical about the process of getting thoughts out of my head and onto paper or screen. It reminds me of practicing kata in karate; those deliberate, focused movements where every gesture has purpose. Writing has that same quality. Each sentence needs to flow into the next with intention. Each word placement matters. The rhythm of good writing feels like good technique: precise, controlled, effortless only after countless repetitions.

I love that moment when I’m struggling with a paragraph. I rearrange sentences like furniture in a cramped apartment. Suddenly, everything clicks into place. It’s the same satisfaction I get from mastering a difficult combination in the dojo. It also happens when I sit in meditation and my scattered thoughts settle into stillness. That instant when chaos becomes clarity.

Writing also gives me permission to be curious about ordinary things. Why does morning light in Toamasina different from dawn in Victoria? What makes some conversations with strangers in train stations stick in your memory while others evaporate? When I’m writing, these travel moments aren’t just experiences—they’re material. They matter because they might become something that helps someone else see their own wanderings differently.

The mindfulness practice I’ve developed over the years has changed how I approach writing completely. Instead of rushing toward a conclusion, I’ve learned to sit with uncertainty. I now notice when my thoughts are forcing themselves rather than flowing naturally. I pay attention to the spaces between words the way I notice the pause between breaths. Sometimes the most important part of a sentence is what you leave out.

But maybe what I love most is how writing connects me to people I’ll never meet. Every time I publish something, whether it’s about finding inner quiet in a bustling Asian market, or discussing the parallels between martial arts discipline and creative discipline, I’m essentially saying, “Here’s how the world looks from where I’m sitting.” Does any of this ring true for you? And sometimes, often enough to keep me going, someone writes back to say yes, it does.

That’s the real magic. Words on a page becoming a bridge between one mind and another. In a world that often feels fractured and noisy, writing still offers that basic human exchange: one person saying something true, and another person recognizing it.

So what do I most like about writing? It’s the way it makes me feel less alone in my own thoughts, and hopefully helps others feel less alone in theirs—whether they’re sitting in meditation, practicing forms in an empty dojo, or watching sunrise from a train window in a country whose language they don’t speak.