Self-authorisation

I printed out these words a while ago, to remind myself of the most simple form of agency we have as humans.

“Being a flourishing human being is an act of perpetual self-authorisation.

No matter who you are.

Only you can authorise yourself.

You do that by be-ing well, by constant discovery.

No one else can authorise you.

No one.

This doesn’t happen overnight.

It’s as gradual as the improvement in your living.”

It’s my adaptation of a sentence from Verlyn Klinkenborg’s book about writing¹. In his version, you’ll find ‘writer’ where I wrote ‘flourishing human being’, ‘writing well’ instead of ‘be-ing well’ and ‘writing’ instead of ‘living’.

It’s an interesting approach not only for writing, but creating anything at all - a body of work, a company, a family, and a life worth living.

1. I like the book and recommend it.