Writer's block

I wrote all the time when I was in high school.  It was a way to avoid speaking and sharing.  It was an escape from being awkward, unsure, unknowing.  It was a little release from all the things I couldn’t understand.  I wrote when I felt alone in my twenties, when things were hard and didn’t make sense.  Drowning in my own emotions of disillusionment and confusion it was my plea for answers, my cry for help proving to myself how devoted I was, how willing I was to do whatever it was going to take to make things better, taking comfort in seeing my compelling fervor on paper. 

As long as that meant not actually speaking out loud how much pain I was in.  Bearing my soul on paper was always something I could do, it was always available to me. 

When my life blew up and everything came crashing down in my early thirties I hit writer's block.  And not even just writer’s block, I was actually totally averse to writing at all.  It was completely counter intuitive.  I was in more pain then I had ever experienced before but somehow I was able to start saying the words, start facing my feelings and thoughts and bringing them into reality.  I didn’t need writing like I had before, I had started to show up outside of my mind and writing all of a sudden felt foreign, felt awful.  I loathed the notion of writing down my process, my process was eating me alive and more real then I had ever wanted it to be, the last thing I wanted was to see it in print. 

I felt compelled to start telling my story, to share my pain, my world, my loss.  My story flew out of my mouth with such ease it was frightening.  I hated it, I hated it and I needed it somehow.  In some way, as much as I cringe looking back on it now, it was my path and part of my healing.  I don’t tell my story in the same way anymore, I don’t dwell on the moments that acted as concrete evidence of the chaos I was feeling.  Back then I was  the single shooter with only my scope to gauge my surroundings.  The only information I had was the information that came through that scope.  I see things so differently now, I see things from all sides, all the lenses, all the colors.  It wasn’t just me there, it wasn’t just my pain and my patterns.  There was so much more to it, so much more to see.  So much more to learn. As there is now. 

I’m never free from the constant unraveling of what was, what is and what is coming.  So much more makes sense in an unknowing way, in a letting go of really knowing way.  The uncertainty is familiar now and brings a level of comfort.  Originally I was compelled to write to free my mind for a moment, to distract my mind from itself and force my thoughts and feelings into my physical reality when I couldn’t form them into spoken words.  It was for me. I realize now looking back how alone I felt, how lost and scared, how unsure I was. 

I write for different reasons now. I write to say it's been my experience that taking heart and little steps, even through complete darkness, is possible and it helps. I write to say I see you. To tell you there is light just up ahead, that I believe in you and you got this.

It is my prayer for you, wherever you find yourself, that you find the courage to take one little step after another. You may not believe it yet, but your future is so bright. Eyes up ahead and keep going my friend, you are worth every effort.

Forever in your corner,

Jenny Xx