The Candle In The Dark

There is a light that shines
where no light shines.

There is still love
where there is no love.

There is a loudness, if you listen.

If you look,
you will find,
a heart that can play every sound. 

The Good Fight

I no longer fight my pain or
my frustration or my anger.

I sit with it.
I put my arm around it.
And I say,

“There you are old friend.
What do you need to tell me today?”

And I let it cry on my shoulder.
And I let it be.
And I don’t hold who it is, against it.

Today is the day.

*Dear You,

Today is the day that Every Word You Cannot Say* is officially available at bookstores across the world. You can order it from Barnes & Noble (this is an exclusive version with a cloth hardcover and a letter from me), Amazon, Indiegogo, Books-A-Million, Book Depository, Indiebound and you can walk straight into Target and buy a copy.

Thank you for your time, and even if the name is different, I always wrote this for you.

My best,

Me

Intentional Dissonance means to be confusing on purpose.

“Awe.

It’s a feeling he misses. He made lists of things he wanted to feel when he was younger, big things, small things, ice, snow, the sand at the beach, someone else’s hands holding his, feeling him feeling them, a feedback loop of feelings, which is what happens when two people make love. He wanted to feel things that made him feel safe and scared and things that ripped his heart out of his chest, things that made him want to go home and things that made him want to travel, things that made him proud and things that made him regret his choices and he, like all people, slowly ticked these things off the list in his head as he lived, as the world turned until soon, there were very few things left to feel.

He believed the last thing he would feel, would be nothing, as that was nearly impossible to feel unless you were dead or hadn’t been born yet. He wondered what it’d be like to not be able to wonder.”

- Intentional Dissonance

Dear You,

On the surface, Intentional Dissonance is dystopian science fiction book about Jon Salt, a young man obsessed with a drug called Sadness, which is the kind of drug you take if you live in a world that forces you to feel nothing. More than this, it’s a book I wrote about my own struggle with depression.

One of my greatest personal challenges has been to overcome a story I’ve told myself from an early age, that my depression is an important part of my identity and more importantly, my creativity. It’s a story I believe many creative people tell themselves - that their pain is an engine and the driving force behind what they make.

In hindsight, I wrote this book as a way to talk about that idea.

After the book was published, things got worse and in 2013, I stopped writing almost all together because I felt like if I wanted to write, I needed to be in pain and the two things became the same thing. So I stopped because I didn’t know who I was if I wasn’t a writer and some part of me knew that what I was doing wasn’t healthy.

A good friend that I later married, and today I have a beautiful daughter with her, convinced me to look for help and I started going to therapy and slowly but surely, I came back to me and I started to see things as I believe they really are.

If you are a creative person, and I believe that everyone is creative, then you should know this - your talent is not your pain. Your talent is your talent. We romance the idea of the tortured creative person because it’s intriguing but while sadness and depression can be productive emotions, I can honestly tell you that the most resonant, beautiful things I’ve ever written have come from a healthy place.

While the chronically depressed, obsessive poet hiding behind a mask might sound intriguing, and this does seem to be what can best be described as a marketing strategy by some of my contemporaries, it is not healthy space for the reader or the writer to stay in. If you art isn’t helping you move through what you’re feeling, then make different art.

Or at least, that’s my philosophy.

Intentional Dissonance is only 99c in December on Kindle (click here).

If you read it, let me know what you think. I hope you’re well and I send you my best.

- Iain S. Thomas

I Wrote This For You, Wherever You Are

We have some incredibly exciting news.

The I Wrote This For You books are now being published by Andrews McMeel, the same publisher as Rupi Kaur, Lang Leav, Amanda Lovelace and many, many more incredible poets. This means that I Wrote This For You, I Wrote This For You And Only You, I Wrote This For You: Just The Words and I Wrote This For You: 2007 – 2017 will all be available in more places across the globe. I have it on good authority that even here, on the tip of Africa where I live, stores have already ordered in excess of 2000 copies. That means that whether you’re in the Philippines, or England, or anywhere else, it should soon be easier than ever to find these books, for yourself or for a friend. I’d like to thank Kirsty, Allison, Holly and everyone else at Andrews McMeel for their hard work in putting this all together. You should also keep in mind that if you do manage to find an I Wrote This For You book with Central Avenue down the side, that’s about to become a collector’s item. Michelle and the team there helped us get to where we are today and I am forever thankful for her hard work and dedication.

 I can’t wait for you to see the new books, thank you for reading and for being you,

 Me.

Listen To The Kindest Voice In Your Head

We're busy working on several different things right now that don't allow us to update the blog regularly, so I'll be posting some of the letters that I send to my email list every now and again. 

__

Dear You, 

I just wanted to let you you to know that today, there will be difficult things to do but I also want you to know that you'll get through them. And I want you to know that there is not a single difficult thing that you’ve faced in your life so far that has stopped you from getting to this point. You have overcome worse and for that, I salute you. 

How do I know?

Well you’re reading this, and so I assume certain things about you. I assume you will find a pen with ink in it when you need it. I assume that some ridiculously stupid piece of admin will frustrate you almost to the point (or past the point) of tears but you will persist and even if you don’t actually get the thing done, you will move the boulder forward just a little bit, which is the only way boulders move. I know you’ll try again tomorrow. 

Get enough sleep tonight so you can do that and throughout your day remember: 

I make myself of me. And I listen to the best parts of me, and to the kindest voice in my head. 

As a way to say thank you for giving me some of your time, below is a link to a small book I put together called Two Words.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/yh5ep3ymwtf7bxe/TWO%20WORDS.pdf?dl=0​

Each page is only two words long. There are 50 pages. I hope you enjoy it and if you do, share this email with a friend and encourage them to sign up for more like it, here. 

Your kindness is the reason I get to do what I do. Thank you.

And thank you for your time, 

Me 

_________________

Want to support me? Buy my books here or sign up on Patreon here, or, just forward this on to a friend who needs it and ask them to subscribe by clicking here.

The Impossible Flower

Love the unlovable. 

Climb the unclimbable.

Defeat the undefeatable. 

Break the unbreakable. 

Become the you they said you could never be. 

Every single day, wake up and find the thing that cannot be done, and do it.