30 Till 30 | Writing is Hard
I honestly started writing before I knew where I was going.
Writing for me, like reading, is a form of escapism. A way for me to disappear into my own mind, or preferably a character’s mind and act like I know what I’m doing. In that world, I can make mistakes without consequence, control the narrative without input from anyone else, and ensure that happy endings are well-deserved and within reach. But over the years, I’ve felt disconnected from the escapism and rooted deeply in reality. Writing — as I used to approach it — stopped being fun. It became about solving an issue instead of creating a world to lose myself in. My anxieties and issues now, compared to when I was in my early twenties feel so much more dire. I used to struggle and stress over pining for some basic undergrad who won’t love me back — what I wouldn’t give to have that be my only stressor these days.
I note the difference, because those collegiate issues felt easy to write away. Even better was that they were all topics that have been written to death in every sitcom and romcom known to man, so I wasn’t reinventing the wheel — I was plugging and playing. But now, let’s just say that my problems aren’t so easily solved in a short story nor has it been written by anyone else. In a pessimistic light, I’m leading life without a roadmap and I don’t know where I’ll end up. And on the optimistic side, my life is unwritten and I can make it what I want to be. Even as I’m writing this now, I feel compelled to have a lesson that I’ve learned or some hopeful line at the end of all of this, but I honestly started writing before I knew where I was going.
And thus the perfect metaphor has presented itself to us—just keep writing. It’s the quintessential note from every editor and every person with a lick of self-awareness: just keep writing, just keep moving, don’t worry about the missteps and the typos, just keep pushing forward. And that’s what this blog has been for me, a format that’s essentially forcing me to keep writing for a month straight. ‘Forcing’ maybe isn’t the right word, but that’s what it feels like; and while I might not enjoy writing every piece this month (let’s face it, some are harder to write than others and it shows), I am still proud of myself for having written anything at all.
Will I keep writing after the project is over? Probably not to the same magnitude, no. I’d like to say I would be; I’d like to say that this project helped me rediscover my passion for writing and I am forever changed. I can’t guarantee any of that. But I do feel closer to the writer I used to be, and that’s good enough for me.
