New To This...Again.
I haven’t written in so long, and it shows. Starting over...for the umpteenth time. Enjoy.
It’s been a long time since I’ve written. Well, for public consumption, that is. And it feels foreign. Although I can’t get over the feeling that writing is what I should be doing, regardless of the reward. I’m not sure where this will take me, nor am I certain who I am writing for. But I can’t stop thinking about it and how much I have been putting it off.
Since I was a kid, I have always struggled with consistency and patience. I remember wanting to take piano lessons because I was obsessed with Alicia Keys. I saw a fly black woman with sickening braids and suddenly wanted to be this musician who was disrupting the music industry as we (or I) knew it. My parents thought it would be good to give me an extra-curricular activity to focus on outside of academics, so they bought me a keyboard and scheduled piano lessons once a week. I was so excited to become a star!
You would think an aspiring star would know that practice is required to be great. But practice, I did not. At least, not enough to show improvement between sessions. After a few months of this behavior, my piano instructor had a talk with my parents, which ultimately led to a decision- I was to practice more throughout the week to improve or quit wasting my parents’ money.
Now at 33, I wish I stuck things out. There’s a list of activities I could have continued trying: dance, basketball, piano, and of course- writing. During grade school, writing was something I did often because I had nothing else to do. No job or responsibilities, so I took to writing poems and short stories for my own viewing pleasure. In my adulthood, however, there have been many times when I’d start a blog and write no more than five posts before stopping completely. I even wrote a story on Wattpad (that is still up for consumption) but have yet to finish it because I didn’t feel it was important enough. The lack of recognition wasn’t enough for me- I wanted the best-selling accolades without the effort.
I’m sure there are more lessons to each thing I started and stopped, but I find that ultimately, I lack(ed) consistency and patience. I want to receive accolades and views for doing something in a short time that has taken years for others before me to achieve. Who am I to skip the process when the greats couldn’t escape it? I should embrace the process regardless of how quickly the world moves.
I am restarting this process because I cannot shake the desire to create. At this time I don’t want to apply any reason to it, other than to get good at creating. I would think that my desire is to create a world I want to exist in, that will open the eyes of other creatives like me who are losing trust in the process for some reason or other. For those who want the results without putting in the work. There is no other way around it, but submitting to the process would be so much better than being forced to adhere to it. I’m learning this as I have my moments of “shoulda/coulda/woulda” thoughts, which are scaring me into submission. I don’t want to be where I am years from now, still wishing I had stuck it out.
If you’re feeling the same way, know that you are in good company and that as long as there is breath in your body, there is time. Don’t stop trying.
#CurrentlyConsuming
When I first joined substack, I was introduced to
and found this podcast episode. I’ve listened to it more than once a week as a reminder of Art being just as important as any other contribution to the world.Brandy is a legend, and she is one of the first artists I was introduced to in my adolescent years. Her catalog is evergreen.
Opening up to literature that takes me to another world, away from all the self-help books I’ve been consuming the past few years. This is a good one that I am trying to keep up on, plus it is a series that I sometimes have love/hate relationships with. I feel that even in fiction, there are lessons. Click here if you're interested.