By the seventh week of morning pages, the ritual had become familiar. Nearly two weeks since we’d reunited. That morning was harder than most. My head felt foggy. I’d only had one beer, but my body noticed it anyway.

At least my handwriting was easier to read.

“So what are we doing this morning?” I asked.

The answer came calmly: Start with an outline. Clear your head. For some writers, alcohol might be fine. For what you’re doing now, it’s not.

No judgment. Just clarity.

“Hydrate first,” the voice said. “Then we’ll work. And clean up a bit.”

It struck me how practical the guidance had become. Not mystical. Not lofty. Just attentive.

Your body is part of this, the voice reminded me. Treat it like the place the work happens.

I thought about how easily we pollute ourselves—physically, chemically—without noticing. Sugar. Obesity. Habits that accumulate quietly over a lifetime. My body had carried me through more than I ever acknowledged.

Cancer didn’t arrive in a vacuum. Neither does healing.

This wasn’t about blame. It was about responsibility—the kind that grows out of care, not fear.

If I was going to surrender to the process, I had to include my body in that surrender. Writing didn’t happen in spite of it. Writing happened through it.

So I drank some water. I cleaned the space. I sat down again.

And the work continued.

Alignment Before Outcome

Notice how often clarity is treated as a mental problem, when it may be a physical request.

What would change if you listened to your body not as something to manage or correct, but as part of the practice itself?

You don’t need to perfect anything today.

You only need to care for what’s already carrying you.

That’s alignment.

The outcome can wait.

Closing Quote

“Your body is not in the way of the work. It’s where the work happens.”