When words are hard

End of July writing update

Sadie in her window bench

Hi there,

It’s me, Lyn.

This is my honest attempt to get back into the rhythm of posting an end of the month writing update. It’s been a few months since I’ve given one, because as you know if you read my candid July life update from last week, things have been a little bit chaotic for me as of late. I feel like I’m regularly saying that: Things have just been kind of crazy. To myself, my friends, my family, here in this space… Sometimes, if I’m honest, I get tired of saying it. Tired of feeling like things are regularly out of control and in total free fall.

I started therapy again after a few months off with a new therapist, whom I am loving. She’s not holding back, and we’ve dived straight into the emotional ocean that needs some serious overhauling. Like really I need one of those ocean trash trawler to do clean up in my emotional landscape. Many big things have been coming up in our work together, some of which I think I’ll end up sharing here so we all feel less alone when I’m ready, but one of the most recent things has struck me as very interesting when I examine my writing process.

I write less and share less of my writing when I feel like I don’t have it all together, because I have placed an expectation on myself that I’m supposed to have it all together all the time. That in the moments, I don’t have it all together, I’m somehow failing. And that in these moments of “not having it together,” I don’t think that I should share what I’m experiencing since it isn’t neatly packaged with a bow of higher logic on the top. I get scared—terrified actually—to share the emotional as it unfolds. The down swells in life don’t serve as content magnets. Who wants to read a writing update about how hard it’s been for you to write?

But then, as my therapist has suggested I do, I started to try to poke holes in this belief. What if I just write something and I just let people read it? What if it isn’t perfectly packaged, but rather authentic to where I’m at? And what if that resonates with someone even deeper than “having it together”? None of us have it figured out. I shouldn’t be so hard on myself as a human or as a writer that often times I don’t.

So, sticking with my theme of candidness from my last post, here’s the writing update. Or lack of one.

I haven’t written very much in the last few months. Back-to-back break-ups and moving meant that almost all of my energy was sucked into survival. I had to get through the changes that were rapidly unfolding in front of me. It didn’t leave a lot of room for me to be creativity and sit in my deep emotional space to story tell.

And then, truthfully, once some of the major changes settled a little bit, I found myself dealing with a small depressive episode. Of course, it makes sense. So much change so quickly. Nothing is the same, and almost all sense of stability just continues to evaporate. I followed my heart, and my heart got crushed. And the changes still aren’t done, which leaves a bit of an oppressive feeling behind. It’s hard to stay grounded in the present when you can feel the ocean slowly yanking the sand out from underneath your feet.

I am okay. I’m working with my therapist. I’m staying connected to loved ones and friends. I’m taking care of myself and I have an incredible partner who is taking great care of me. I’m owning this stretch of being down in ways that a younger version of myself wouldn’t have been capable of. Like all dips down, I know it ends and you come back up out of it.

But I’m sad and apathetic and homesick.

And that makes writing… Really fucking hard.

My goal in July was to get back into my manuscript. To at least sink back into it even if just for a little while. And I did this. I wrote a few pages. I reconnected with my characters. I reminded myself that I really, really love this story and that I really, really want to tell it.

And then I had to grant myself a lot of grace. Which I’m, well, not really that good at. Working on it, but definitely something I have great discomfort doing. However, I didn’t really have a choice but to give grace to myself.

The emotional work that I’m doing within myself, my life, my career, my relationship, my future… It is all so much that I just don’t have the emotions left to tell my story in the way I really want to. There’s short bursts where things come to page. But I’m so emotionally fatigued most days trying to keep my head on straight that I can’t put any additional words down. Maybe it’s because my writing is so close to my heart and comes from such a deep place of intuition inside me.

I’m kind of scared to share a writing update that’s hey, I’ve been sad and haven’t written very much in a while. I actually almost didn’t post this at all. But I think that it’s important to do so. Even if just for myself to honor where I’m at in this chapter and be able to look backwards and see myself trying. Because at the end of the day, I am trying, and I keep trying, and that is enough.

But I hope that maybe this resonates with a few of you out there. Maybe you’ve been in a similar position before. Maybe you’re in a similar spot now. No writer is alone in the patches of time where the words do not come because your headspace just isn’t empty enough for them to manifest. We’ve all been here. It’s a hell of a lot easier to get through it together.

So here’s my virtual hug from me to you. One day and one word at a time, my friend.

August is coming.

xoxo, Lyn