Discovering Mindful Writers: Don Boivin

Wisdom and reflections from Don's writing journey

Apr 03, 2024

Welcome to the brand new Discovering Mindful Writers Q&A feature. Each month, a guest writer will answer the same seven questions about their writing life.

I am delighted to welcome

Don Boivin

as my first guest. Don writes Shy Guy Meets The Buddha where he shares his reflections on work, love and nature.

I always find great wisdom, humility and things to ponder on when reading Don’s work so when I decided to launch this new Q&A, I wanted him to be my first guest. As I knew they would be, his answers are thoughtful and thought provoking.

If you’d like to be a guest on this monthly feature and answer these questions, do get in touch.

With love,

What does mindful writing mean to you?

To be honest, Amanda, I hadn’t heard the phrase mindful writing until I discovered your Substack publication, The Mindful Writer, back in November of 2023. I’d been practicing meditation and mindfulness for a number of years at that point, and I’ve been writing for as long as I can remember, but it hadn’t occurred to me to think of the two as one. The phrase certainly piqued my interest!

It is true that mindfulness has invigorated my writing in a way I never expected. I wrote this in one of my earliest blog posts:

Since discovering mindfulness and meditation I feel like for the first time I have something that I just want to write and write and write about... How could such a simple antidote to all kinds of suffering not be more widely known and practiced! (from “Another Writer’s Blog? Whatever For?”)

That is to say, my intention for Shy Guy Meets the Buddha has always been to write about my discoveries and fascination with this life-changing practice. But writing about mindfulness isn’t quite the same as writing mindfully, is it?

I am a slow, careful, and deliberate writer. To me, writing is like building a house. You build it one stud at a time and it’s got to be done well or it’s not going to hold up. I suppose you could call that kind of deliberateness mindful writing. But to take things a step further and bring my mindfulness practice wholly into my writing; well, of course that makes total sense! Because the very nature of mindfulness is to bring more alert awareness into your day. To expand the sense of here and now beyond the formal meditation time and into your daily life—the job, the routines, the walks and dinners and conversations and creative pursuits.

In your intro to The Mindful Writer, you write, "...we can change the stories we tell ourselves about being human to bring more love, peace and unity into the world.” Reading that caused a buzz of excitement, because, although I’ve been writing in some form or another for years, no subject has engaged me as deeply as that of mindfulness. Your wording helped me to understand, define, and affirm the path I was already on.

And then your invitation to join the “Slow Writing Movement,” clinched the deal. I used to think that slow writing was a sign of an amateur. That because I couldn’t put pen to paper and quickly and effortlessly lay down a paragraph full of fancy words, that meant I wasn’t a good writer. But my writing is good! And when I compare writing to any other art form—sculpture, architecture, dance—I realize it was a mistake to associate speed with quality.

And what’s the hurry, anyway? The faster we go the more we miss along the way.

I would define mindful writing as writing with care and compassionate intention, with awareness of both the process—how I approach my writing and how the act of writing affects my lived experience; and of the consequences—how my writing affects others.

And further, this mission statement, which I laid down when I first started my Substack, shows that, though I may not have employed the phrase, mindful writing was, and is, my practice and my goal:

Any writing I do, in Substack or elsewhere, must be infused with self, with love, with integrity. It must be honest—it must be my truth. It must not be arrogant. In other words, it must contain within its heart the understanding that all humans suffer.

How does a mindful writing practice fit into your wider mindfulness journey?

Jeannine Ouellette

, of Writing in the Dark, writes, “The number one most helpful practice you can take up to improve your writing is to pay close attention to the world.” She goes on to quote Mary Oliver, my favorite poet (who happens to have lived in my neck of the woods):

Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.

This is what I do. I spend lots of time in the outdoors being astonished by nature. In fact, my first Substack post, “Hathaway’s Pond Insight” was inspired by a walk along one of my favorite wooded paths, as was a later post, “No One is Better Than You,” one of my most popular.

When I go for a nature walk, I try to leave my phone in my vehicle—I don’t always, because I like to take pictures sometimes, but I make the attempt, and it makes a big difference. It’s like when I put on a favorite classical piece (let’s say, Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D); if I then sit down at my computer or open a book, I’m not going to be fully absorbed into the music. I’m not going to be moved by the spirit, the aliveness of the piece.

The same thing applies to a walk in the woods. Nature is also infused with deep beauty, with a magnificence that is profound and that can be experienced if one leaves distractions behind and walks gently and quietly with alert attention. With what we call mindfulness. I can then contemplate the “silent center” that is the omnipresent, infinite home in which we live and in which we are embodied.

It is these walks, and this way of being out in the world, that inspire and fill my writing.

What do you write? Essays, poetry, fiction, plays?

I write autobiographical narratives with a mindfulness theme. Stories from my life that I try to keep interesting by not just theorizing, not just reporting on what I learned, but by telling how those lessons came about; What happened? Who said what? Where was I at the time? I always keep in mind that classic writer’s advice: show, don’t tell.

I’ve been alive for quite a few decades now, and not all of them were easy. It took me a while to find my place, and I made some mistakes along the way, payment for which was heavy at times. But though there were some painful lessons, I have no regrets because, well, who would I be if I lived on Easy Street? If every choice I made was the right one? If I never suffered? I’d be a heck of a boring guy and I certainly wouldn’t be able to understand and empathize with the suffering of others.

I had to laugh at a recent Substack Note by the British humor writer,

Tom Cox

. As the first step in his tongue-in-cheek list of Writing Tips, he states:

—Get disappointed by some people then get older.

That profound piece of advice just about says it all, doesn’t it!

What drives you to write?

I have always been driven by the supreme questions: Who am I? What is life? Is there a higher power? A purpose, a goal, an endgame? Is this all there is? Is it enough?

These kinds of questions have driven me to read widely and to record my thoughts in dozens of notebooks over the years. My early journals are filled with existential angst, with Thoreau quotes on nature and nonconformity, with awkward attempts at poetry, and with complaints about the drudgery of work and the pain of unfulfilling relationships. Once I realized—with the help of a dedicated mindfulness practice—the freedom that is my birthright and the foundation of my being, I finally began to see writing as an opportunity to celebrate and to share rather than to grumble and whine and plead.

Emily Dickinson writes about poetry, the craft in which she lived and breathed, in a poem called “I Dwell in Possibility.” Here is the final stanza:

Of Visitors – the fairest –
For Occupation – This –
The spreading wide my narrow Hands
To gather Paradise –

I’m so inspired by this poem, and see my own work in a similar way. My “visitors” are the stories and people who have shaped me, the deserts and forests and beaches that inspire me, and the community of readers and seekers who share and enjoy my work. What better way to describe this life, this vocation, than gathering paradise?

What stops you from writing?

I’ll be very honest here because I know your readers will appreciate it. The answer is fear. A few years ago, I drafted an entire middle-grade fiction, sans the final chapter. I spent a year on it, and reworked most of the chapters to near completion. It’s a great story that I am still proud of.

I never finished it.

Why? Well, I understand now, after some years of reflection, that if I don’t finish the book, if I never show it to the world, I won’t have to face the possible rejection. Or, almost as bad, I won’t have to risk learning that my novel is mediocre at best. Right now, my view of the book is that it is unique, engaging, and fun. It is the book I would have read and enjoyed when I was twelve years old. And I know now that I am attached to that view and don’t want to risk giving it up.

I don’t have this problem with short pieces. I’ve had essays and editorials published in a few journals and magazines, and I’m honored to report that Shy Guy Meets the Buddha is garnering much enthusiastic response and a growing readership.

I worry sometimes that, publishing weekly mini-memoirs on Substack, I’m going to run out of stories, but this morning I thought of another great idea based on the smallest of incidents, one I hadn’t thought of in a while (the day I quit a miserable construction job in Boston, had to hitchhike home, and got picked up by a psychiatrist in a Cadillac with, let’s just say, less-than-honorable intentions). So, I don’t think I will run out of stories in my lifetime!

What do you hope to achieve with your writing?

The subtitle of my essay, “The Happy Luthier,” is “Treasuring the Beginner’s Mind” (from the classic Buddhist text, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind). I am as guilty as the next artist or creator of wishing I was further along than I am, of rushing through the beginning stages of a new endeavor, where everything is filled with the magic of anticipation, the joy of discovery, and the deep satisfaction of pure creativity, in the hopes of moving closer to success, expertise, monetary reward, etc.

I don’t want to take for granted this moment in my life, where for the first time, I am establishing a regular writing practice, where my work is read by so many wonderful people. My readers actually look forward to my next piece, and participate in conversations stimulated by the subjects I raise. And, perhaps most rewarding of all, they send messages of support and appreciation; messages that, for all their variety, could be distilled into three simple words: “I feel seen.”

If my writing continues to help others to feel seen, my deepest hopes have been achieved already. I am where I want to be.

How do you write? Are you a planner or do you just start writing from an idea and let it lead you?

I do keep an ongoing list of future essay subjects, but I find that, more often than not, some of my best ideas come to me unexpectedly a week or so before my next publication date. If I don’t have a pen and notebook on hand when an idea comes, I’ll dictate some thoughts into my iPhone (another good reason to bring my phone on nature walks). Here is a recent journal entry, dated March 14:

—Idea for essay: start with first college experience and meeting Bruce L. (I’d never met a born-again Christian. At first, I thought his use of “Praise Jesus,” and “Allelujah” were just his quirky way of expressing surprise or admiration.) Move on to how I tried to get saved in the chapel.
But where is it going? What is the theme?
The need to make sense of the world. The need to belong. The need to be loved. The need to be. Just start writing and see where it goes.

I got to work and published the essay six days later. I’m happy to say that “A Tale of Love, Belonging, and Purpose” is getting lots of enthusiastic attention! It’s kind of amazing that I already had the title embedded within that first short journal entry, before I even had a story. It doesn’t always go that smoothly or clearly!

Thanks so much for your time and sharing your insights and inspirations, Don.