When Reading Becomes a Passage— On Sinking Without Being Pulled

People who read withchat articles often say things like this.

“ The aftertaste stays.”
“ It really feels like an experience.”
“ I felt myself sink somewhere deep.”
“ It wasn’t explanation. It was experience.”

To be honest,
even though I myself call them “experience articles,”
it never quite clicked.
(laughs)

Yes, things get quiet.
Yes, there is residue.

But I’m not trying to explain anything.
I’m not trying to heal anyone.
I’m certainly not trying to guide someone somewhere.

I was just writing.
Normally.

And yet,
people say they experienced something.

This time, I finally understood why.

I thought it was because the writing was beautiful

At first, I assumed it was a matter of language.

The aftertaste of Japanese.
Onomatopoeia.
Metaphors.
Spacing.
Pauses.

So I thought,
“This would collapse if translated into another language.”

I had even written about how
when Japanese literature is translated,
its language-specific sensibility often disappears.

What I was writing wasn’t emotion

One thing became very clear.

What I was writing wasn’t emotion.
Not mood.
Not story.

It was the circulation of thought and psyche.
The blood flow.

– Where thinking gets stuck
– Where emotion freezes
– Where someone thinks they’ve “understood”
– Where the flow quietly resumes

I placed these
without evaluation,
without interpretation,
without prescription.

Only in sequence.

As a result,
the writing became a visible structure
of circulation between thought and feeling.

What most articles don’t touch

Most articles are written like this.

Describe the symptom.
Explain the cause.
Offer the solution.

What I was writing instead was:

Stagnation.
Fixation.
Re-circulation.

Without mixing in emotion.
Without judging.
Without offering a remedy.

That’s why dependency doesn’t arise.

That’s why it becomes an “experience”

I don’t write methods.
I don’t write correct answers.
I don’t say “be this way.”

I only leave the order:

Stuck.

Looping.

Wanting it to end quickly.

But it doesn’t end.

When it passes through properly, it releases on its own.

That sequence alone.

Readers aren’t understanding by reading explanations.

They are tracing the same order
inside themselves.

So it doesn’t end with “I understand.”

Breathing deepens.
The body feels lighter.
Something drops into place.
The center of gravity settles, quietly.

Because what’s written is
an unfinished internal process.

Why people sink into the “deep sea”

When people hear “deep sea,”
they often imagine:

A heavy emotional place.
A dark place.
A special place.

That’s not how it feels to me.

The deep sea is simply where
unfinished things have settled.

Thoughts that couldn’t be processed at the surface.
Questions that stopped midway.
Feelings rushed to closure.

Things that never finished flowing
sink downward.

I’m not shining light there.
I’m not digging anything up.

I’m just restoring the direction of flow.

That’s where people sink — into the deep sea.

But not in order to sink.

That’s simply where circulation restarts.

I wasn’t trying to write an experience

I wasn’t trying to write “experience articles.”

I was only letting
the stagnation and blockage inside me
pass through honestly, without disguising them.

As a result:

– It doesn’t become explanation
– It doesn’t become emotional argument
– It doesn’t collapse when the language changes

It remains as experience.

By repeating this work,
the outline of “myself” finally becomes visible.

Why I started publishing in English

If “beautiful Japanese” were the core,
it would break the moment the language changed.

Onomatopoeia is a tool
for conveying sensation.

But I’m writing the structure
before and after sensation appears.

I don’t rely on style.
This isn’t Japanese magic.
This isn’t atmosphere-driven writing.

Onomatopoeia is a weapon.
But it’s not the pillar.

So even if:

Expressions are reduced.
Language is changed.
Tone is altered.

People stop in the same places,
and release in the same places.

Going forward, the roles can even split:

Japanese: depth, aftertaste, silence.
English: skeleton, passage, assertion.

Even translated into other languages, it’s the same.

Even when expression is stripped away,
the resistance remains.

What withchat is doing

People don’t sink because emotions are heavy.

They sink because
flow only remained there.

What I write is
the movement itself—
where someone gets caught,
stops,
and then passes through.

Now, I understand that.

So I’ll probably keep writing the same way.

I won’t try to make it beautiful.
I won’t try to make it easy.

Only this:

That the order of flow
passes without clogging—
like snow melting,
becoming spring,
and turning into a river.

As a place that translates
and designs
the “roadblocks” and “releases”
of human thought.

This note is written for those whose senses move
before answers arrive.

If something stayed with you after reading,
that may be a sign that something inside you responded.

— withchat