Writing as a Practice
Let’s Make Some New Magic
Have you ever met up with an old friend you haven’t seen in years and it’s a little awkward because you’re a completely different person than you were back then? Sometimes I feel that way when I write. I remember the season when I truly discovered my relationship with writing and how amazing it was. It was around the same time that my future husband and I became such good friends. There was a lot of magic flying around then. Now, 16 years later, I really want that magic back.
Thankfully, I’m not talking about my marriage! We’re far from perfect, but I wouldn’t want us to go back to those foolish kids for anything! My relationship with writing, though, really needs a revival. It’s not exactly about the words being written or how my skills are being exercised. It’s my heart that’s the problem. As a 20-something living largely on my own and dreaming of the future, my creative spirit soared with possibilities. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. Like diving into marriage or parenthood, we all rush in with blinders and miss the realities we’re headed for until it’s a bit too late. That’s growing up, I’ve learned. Now, as a 41 year old woman, the blinders have come off. The magic of possibility has faded because I now know so much more about it. Frankly, it’s the price tag that I am now well aware of. Whatever your dream of possibility is - money, parenthood, marriage, business success, personal goals - they all cost something. That something includes time and commitment, of course, but more specifically, the neglect of something else, even if just temporarily. I hate that price tag. I want to do it all - mostly at the same time - and for no other priority to suffer. At all. That’s not how the world works though.
So, writing. Writing has become that unfinished puzzle in the corner that you might add a piece or two when you pass by every week or so, but it will likely get put up to make way for something else long before it actually gets finished. I have a healthy marriage that I want to stay that way. I homeschool three amazing children that I won’t risk being a stumbling block more than I already am. Now, more than ever, our health has to be a top priority which takes time and effort. There are so many important things that whisk you into the current before you’ve even given permission. That’s what erodes at the magic that once was. I’ve never been good at prioritizing my to-do list, a stereo-typical characteristic of the AHDH brain come to find out, and prioritizing something that no one else in the world is demanding I maintain takes moving a mountain sometimes.
In one of my favorite books on writing, Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg, she talks about how she practiced meditation for years, but most things in life didn’t make sense unless it was applied to writing. The following statement has always summed up my relationship with the written word:
“This book is about writing. It is also about using writing as your practice, as a way to help you penetrate your life and become sane…To do writing practice means to deal ultimately with your whole life.”
Being a mom (especially one with ADHD) and having any kind of built in practice - prayer, art form, meditation, sacred alone time - is terribly hard. The broken-record phrase of every mom is “Me time? What’s that?” And those who do champion a mother’s self care often get accused of being self-focused snowflakes. There are a lot of hurdles in the way of staying sane within the realm of modern motherhood and I have fallen victim to every one of them over the last 10 years. The magic of writing that has slipped out of my hands so many times since my children were born is to be found in the practice of it. The immediate demands of this fast-paced life has shoved out the slow and steady practice of things and I have to get it back. I say have to because without it I lose clear thought and healthy reactions, the major things needed in all the roles I play in my life.
In this upgraded blogging adventure (name tweak and new website), I am committing to making writing my practice and inviting you to come along with me. As if it wasn’t before, life is just a LOT right now and I don’t think my family can afford for me to get lost in it anymore. Being a highly sensitive person (HSP), there’s no way to avoid the chaos and stress so I have to deal with it. For me, that means writing about it and more importantly prioritizing time to write about it - making writing my practice.
Any tips or suggestions for fitting a new priority into an already full brain?