"Faith" is what there is when there is no hope.

One only misses being a denizen of reality once that becomes an abstract dream, and that is a problem. You fantasize about it now the way a prepubescent girl does about her prince. Your fantasy is to enjoy twiddling your thumbs on a bus again, to count bathroom tiles, even to visit the post office to discharge a meaningless errand. It is only from the vantage point of what could happen that you manage to do your living, and from this vantage point you claim that you value your life. The luror of what could happen spurs you to go on, while the meat of your life passes you by. So, can it rightly be said that such a person values their life?

You can understand religion now; "faith" is what there is when there is no hope. 

One step removed

The truth is, one only writes when well enough, by which time, the original problem sheds its relevance. To understand is, quite literally, to feel the same. And when things like art and beauty have meaning and inspire, one is just happy enough to write and cannot really correctly remember what it was like to have your will crushed before you or to wonder how many disconfirmations of the natural proclivity to rationalize in the direction of hope it takes to pulverize that proclivity. And so, one will never accurately recreate those fears and sensations.