Feb. 14, 2002
Several weeks ago I opened up the daily paper and scooted my eyes over to the want ads. I was looking for a job.
I had come to feel like I was a burden by not making money when I really could be. I had a big surgery that was coming up and had to be paid for, there were things around the house that needed to be fixed or upgraded, and we had various financial needs to take care of. I felt like all I did was keep taking away without putting anything back. I figured I should find some kind of job to make me feel better.
Looking over the want ads in jobs I used to have I started to feel physically ill. I became nervous and unsure, frightened and angry. Every turn of the page my body stiffened until finally I had to run to the bathroom and throw up.
I thought about my reaction afterwards, why it was so strong. I realised it’s because I am a writer. From my head to my toes, no matter what, I am a writer. Yes, I was a fantastic executive. Yes, I do want to have some kind of creative job that I create in my future. Yes I do volunteer as a Docent at the local Arts Museum. But I am a writer first and foremost. There’s no two ways around it.
This realisation has helped me to define my intentions. I’ve been reading artists statements all over the place and every book always says you must declare what you’re intentions are – why you write.
This had been something I had been struggling with because I didn’t know what my intentions were. I only knew I wanted to write.
I’ve had so many different jobs, so many different hobbies and past times and the only consistent thing throughout them all, was writing.
As a child I read madly and wrote so much. I ate up books daily and loved nothing better than to be alone in my room writing a short story. Writing has always been in me.
When I made the decision last April to write it shouldn’t really have been such a revelation. But it was because I had developed hang-ups about writing and what writing and “being a writer” meant. Instead of just being OK with the fact that writing was natural and all I wanted to do, I thought I had to buy into the idea of what writing was. I read so many books on “how to be a writer” that I soon forgot how to be me as a writer. I tried to become something I already was. One day, I just stopped trying. I stopped fighting myself. I stopped listening to other people’s ideas on the subject of writing and began to just do what I needed to do.
I don’t have reasons or intentions for writing. I don’t write to prove anything. I don’t write because I think what I have to say is the best. I don’t write for fans and adoration. Having a best seller or award winning article isn’t on my to do list and I never honestly really thought about making money from it until people started to make an issue about it. All those things do not motivate me to write. I simply write because it is in me to do so. Without writing, I don’t know who I am.
Understanding and admitting all that has been a huge for me and in a way liberated me. It takes some of the pressure off that I feel outside sources have put on me. It’s not an excuse to slack or lay back in any way, but rather permission to move ahead as I need to. Once I understood why I write, I stopped having to live up to some image of a writer or reach some goals set by others. I stopped feeling like such a fake, and began to feel real.
And once I began to feel real, and that I was doing all this because its just who I am, I stopped looking in the paper. There is just no other occupation for me right now. I simply am a writer. There is no alternative.