Writing Toward the Wound

I didn’t start writing for healing. I wrote because I had questions. Because I was hurting. Because the world didn’t make sense and I needed somewhere to put all the fractured pieces.

But somewhere along the way, the act of writing started stitching things back together.

There’s a strange kind of clarity that comes from giving voice to what hurts. In fiction—especially the kind I write—characters are often broken before the first chapter begins. Trauma isn’t just backstory; it’s the engine that drives the plot. What they do with that pain—bury it, run from it, weaponize it—shapes everything.

It took me a long time to realize that wasn’t just a narrative device. That was me, working through my own ghosts on the page.

Neural implants and memory hacks might sound like science fiction, but the emotional core of Iteration is deeply human: What do we do with the parts of ourselves we wish we could forget? And who are we if we lose the memories that made us?

Writing those questions didn’t solve them. But it helped me sit with them. It gave shape to the unspeakable.

So if you’re carrying something heavy—grief, confusion, rage—try writing it down. Not for an audience. Not for art. Just for you. Start small. A scene. A sentence. A breath.

You might be surprised at what surfaces.

And maybe, just maybe, what starts as therapy becomes story.

-Mike