It was sophomore year of high school and it happened like this, I’m pouring poetry from my fingertips, filling my journal with more ideas than I can keep up with and then nothing. It just stops and suddenly it becomes painful to pick up my pen. It was the hardest year of my life, I called it “writers block” because I didn’t really know what else it could’ve been. But when the months slipped by and the motivation was still lost to me, I had the revelation that maybe the passion was gone. It seemed as though I was stuck in a pivoting black hole, not sure what I supposed to do from here and I was scared. I don’t think I’d ever been so scared. Six years of dedication wasted on something that was just going to leave without a trace, like a bad ex-boyfriend. The one you tell your grandkids about.
Talking about it wasn’t an option because I didn’t fully understand what was happening myself. Not to mention the fact that no writing wants to admit they’ve lost their passion to practice their art because that in itself is a type of disgrace that’s hard to live down. Not being able to pick up my pen because of what? I just don’t have anything to say anymore. I don’t know why it happened either. It’s easy to blame it on stress, but a part of me wonders if this was my creative subconscious finding a way to tell to take a break. To stop forcing things out of myself that weren’t ready to come out yet.
I wish I could sit here and describe some life altering moment as to when I finally got my passion back but the truth was, it just sort of happened. A moment I didn’t even realize was happened until I took a step back and realized I wasn’t scared anymore. I was lucky, because when this happened was when I needed it the most. Writing assignments were being handed out left and write, and there was nothing inside of me to give back and be proud of. Until that one night. It was around three am and I couldn’t sleep so I pulled out a book of old writing prompts I’d picked up from the thrift store. On and off I would pick it up hoping that one of them would spark and interest inside of me. Well, who knew a Thursday night could be so lucky. The particular prompt asked me to start each paragraph I wrote with a quote I liked. There was nothing special about this prompt, but I noticed that even though it was slow at first as I begun to write, pretty soon I couldn’t stop. I’d gotten to use to over the past few months only writing a few sentences before feeling drained. I suppose you can imagine how I felt when I looked down and noticed two pages of my journal completely filled. It was euphoric.
–Sierra Lunsford, Website Editor
As a child, without even realizing it, I grew up to find that writing was my passion. It started by writing small stories in class to having a small journal, to later auditioning to Douglas Anderson my freshmen year. I never personally had my work ever checked, so I went out on a limb by going by my own terms. When I auditioned I later found out that I did not get accepted, and when someone gets rejected because of his or her writing, it puts a lot of negative thoughts into their head. I lost in touch with my inner voice and my writing, because I lost the confidence that I had in the first place. My work never being judged, the first time hurts. I always thought “man this is it, there’s no point anymore,” but as freshmen year started to go by, I still found myself making notes on random pieces of paper. Usually it was little poems, and sometimes it’d turn into stories. That’s when I realized that this is what I want to do, and this is the way I stay in contact with my emotions. I was never the kid to tell someone how they felt because I always felt that I did not have a strong voice to make a statement, but in my writing I did. I remember clearly that I got made fun of for having a journal or being into books. And I find that funny because as years went by, now it’s “different”. Again over time, when I entered sophomore year for this school, that’s when it really hit me. I’m not trying to sound like a typical student that says, “oh, it changed my life,” because I did the changing but having classes that finally explored more regions for me, helped. I started to view things more creatively and studying more people on the way they behave. Ideas for writers spark anywhere, and for me it was; think different, write different. I’m glad that I did not give up on it. I experience a lot of emotions with detachment and hurt; with writing that’s how I stay sane. I take what I know and how I feel, and turn it into a piece that I know when I grow older, I will look back at. A writer can have their times where they leave their writing, but it’s in our blood. It controls every aspect in our life, and that’s what makes us different.
To be a writer does not mean that that piece of you is always going to be accessible. Sometimes, you can go weeks or months without feeling the need to put anything of value into this outlet. Often times, it is a certain circumstance that takes this fire from you. Ironically, this becomes a cause of misery that works as fuel to start back up again on the individual’s journey as a writer.
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