Women thinking

On doubt and loving a way through life

Hello friends—

I’m working on a different essay for you all, but wanted a bit more time with it, so I thought I would share an older essay that is new to many of you—about women, self-doubt, and the women philosophers who sought a different way of thinking.

Thank you so much for reading, your comments, your support—it truly means so much to connect with you all.

I go back and forth when I get ready to write. I always convince myself I need to read more. I love reading—it’s a journey, it’s knowledge, it’s daydreaming, it’s puzzling, it’s finding connections and explanations. It’s a kind of flow, trance state. 

Writing, on the other hand, is not. I love it, need it, but it’s always demanding and hard. Hard to put the connections on the page in a way that I feel it in my mind, that isn’t just a description, but a feeling, a sense of questioning, of not knowing but asking more.

But I always surprise myself when I find a declarative sentence looking back at me on the page. I worry I’m trying t…