Know Yourself
So, you really want to be a writer
So you decided you want to be a writer…now what?
I hope, sharing my continuing writing journey will help someone start writing and have some nuggets for the established ones.
I want to ask why people want to write. It is not that people become tired of talking, so one day, they decided to publish a grand literary work. Communication is a basic need for humans, but communication does not always mean expressing oneself from the deepest corners of the heart, and there enters writing. In one way or another, we want to give voice to the sometimes bubbling joy and, more time, the tumultuous waves in the ocean of grief and pain inside us.
Writers are known to touch the sensitive nature of life in words amidst a good chuckle or a tragic event in life or just admiring the finer, beautiful verses of this universe in poetry.
For me, my writing journey started after extenuating circumstances that left me with a sea of unexpressed emotions, feelings of pain, and grief that no dam could stop and spilled onto pages filled with words. One of the quotes to sum up how I started to write is from Quentin Tarantino ~
"A writer should have this little voice inside of you saying, 'Tell the truth. Reveal a few secrets here."
And another one from Alice Hoffman ~
"Writers don't choose their craft; they need to write in order to face the world."
Many of my fellow writers I have worked with have shared the same sentiments about writing and their journey. More often than not, we are trying to give a voice to our inner world, that is, looking for a way to find expression in the outer world.
And to give expression to the inner world it is a step in the right direction to get to know ourselves. Self is vital in self-love and self-care. But how to know oneself is a vast topic I often speak about when working with my clients in the coaching practice.
Some concepts that can be applied to becoming a writer and helping me can be summed up into two words- self-awareness or being conscious of what makes you as an individual filled with the zeal to get out of bed in the morning, your conscious feelings and emotions, your inner strengths and weaknesses that fuels your character, your desires, what made you smile today, or what made you uncomfortable. It all begins with the self before it transforms into words on pages as a writer. Being self-aware will give you the confidence to start your writing journey, but you will also be able to apply that awareness to your writing by better empathizing and understanding the topics and situations you want to write about. You will also be able to write and respond to the readers' feedback.
Self-awareness can only be accomplished if we turn inwards and focus on our conscious thoughts and emotions. This was the most important lesson for me as a writer, graduating from hesitations about writing to being a writer on platforms like Medium and others. However, we must remember that most of us fear looking inward. We fear who we will find inside of us because most of us bury the real us deep inside under the cloak of distractions and expectations from others. Sometimes, a painful memory or traumatic experience further buries the real us, never to surface. Writing was a process that helped me discover myself as if peeling the layers of an onion and helped me move through pain and grief.
This also reminds me of the poem by Charles Bukowski, where he describes the courage needed from within to be a writer, and the few who are fated to be a writer are also destined not to lead a tranquil life. A few lines from the poem: So you want to be a writer.
if it doesn't come bursting out of you in spite of everything, don't do it. unless it comes unasked out of your heart and your mind and your mouth and your gut, don't do it. if you have to sit for hours staring at your computer screen or hunched over your typewriter searching for words, don't do it. if you're doing it for money or fame, don't do it.
He further goes on to say
when it is truly time, and if you have been chosen, it will do it by itself and it will keep on doing it until you die or it dies in you. there is no other way. and there never was.
So there you have it if you want to be a writer!
Next, submitting an article or your writing. Let us talk about it.
I wrote an article or a few lines or poured my heart out, but my heart is pounding like a drum, and I don't want to press 'submit.' It will be public as soon as I submit it, and my friends, family, and everyone will see it. Yikes!
I remember when I wrote my first article. I hesitated to submit, not because I doubted my writing but because I was afraid to put myself out there. What got me through was the message my article delivered. As the saying goes, if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?
If you believe in your message and have something to express that can help your reader on a similar journey, please hit that submit button. You will be amazed at the responses you will get from total strangers. Knowing that your words touched someone or helped someone is the biggest and single most motivating factor for writing for me.
An article I wrote a few years back is one of the simplest examples of writing I could give on why we should overcome the hesitation to submit. At a time when I was in pain and being an admirer of Maya Angelou’s work, her poem Still I Rise inspired me. The poem is empowering, and we feel the power of love for oneself flowing like lava through our veins as we read her words, and that is exactly what I wrote, filled with emotions. I wrote a few lines on the poem and included Dr. Angelou’s poetry in the article. To my astonishment, the article- “This Maya Angelou Poem is All I Need to Save Myself — Every Day.” reached about 400 K readers, and I received messages like this one:
“I’m a single mother in my early 60s. I fell with my face flat in the gutter and almost lost my only child almost five years now due to actions of people closest to me and loved dearly. Though I’m still on the ground, I have managed to crawl out of the gutter. Thank you so much, Priya for sharing Dr. Maya’s poem in such an inspiring and powerful way. With this in mind, “Still I Rise”.”
And,
“I’m an RN and grad student sitting in temporary housing (I’ve been asked to leave my home), my phone is not working; I’m wondering what my next move is and worried about myself, will I see my family ever again, will they be ok until I can get to them. Thank you Priya and of course my humble thanks to Dr. Angelou for reminding me that “Still I Rise”.”
The only reason for sharing these messages with you all is to share how powerful and humbling writing can be in the same breath. The fear of failure, on the one hand, or the fear of success, can be both a hindrance when it comes to submitting your writing. The lesson here is to do it anyway. We do not know what anyone is going through and how your words will touch someone. Focus on yourself and the message you want to deliver because if a tree fell in the forest and no one heard it, did it really fall?
Lastly, show up. I recently had to move in less than a year unexpectedly. And I had no dedicated time to prepare for the Medium Day talk. And I talked from a fort of unopened boxes. But I knew that I should not back out but show up. There will always be circumstances around you that will affect you in many ways, but the trick is to manage yourself in a way that you can be there effectively. So show up and submit!
Again, to quote Bukowski ~
“You will die a fighter, you will be honored in hell. The luck of the word. Go with it, send it.”
So go ahead and hit that submit button.
Next, you took the plunge or a leap of faith and submitted an article with all your heart. Now what?
There is self-doubt; for some, the imposter syndrome kicks in, and for me, the yelling in my head said, “What did you do?” “Unsubmit,” “Delete,” etc. I badly wanted to hide and pretend that it wasn’t me who submitted the article. The best thing about writing platforms like Medium is that it invite everyone to write, from beginners to seasoned authors. One can mostly write about anything from anywhere. Hopefully, the external views and short poems will start counting towards earnings, but nothing prepares one for the internal psychological chaos of self-doubt. To overcome this phase, I always reminded myself that I am learning and growing. Alongwith it, I also embrace seeking help and wisdom from people in the field. Knowing when to seek and accept help is also the key. I do not claim I know everything, but I am open to learning. Also, remind yourself that there are moments when we have doubted ourselves, which is normal! This is what makes us human.
Somehow, you managed to get past the chaos in your mind, and you see a like or claps and a comment on your submission. The heart wants to explode! You read the comment and now….engage. Engaging with your readers boosts your learning and, in turn, skills for writing and confidence. It will also instill credibility and trust in your readers for you as a writer. And gradually, you will find the engagement rate with your articles increasing. Engagement is not only beneficial for you as a writer, but it offers a chance for the readers to know you more. And when writers comment and engage in each other’s articles, we create a healthy ecosystem of give and take. A deep understanding of how a writer gets established with the reader with the help of a unique bond formed between readers and writers and writers and fellow writers. This is a win-win for everyone and, of course, for the platform we choose to write.
The above is the gist and sentiment of my talk from the Medium Day, and thank you to those who were present and shared their feedback, comments, and questions. I also had a good time speaking from my heart and representing the publication Be Open. I am a writer and editor for Be Open, and I invite all of you who are reading or will listen to the recorded talks to be a writer for Be Open. As the name says, the publication accepts writings on diverse topics and subjects and loves to work with new and seasoned writers. I have the absolute pleasure of working with A Shayens Abran, the publication’s founder, who has built the publication from the ground zero. Big shout out and gratitude to Shayens!
The Medium Day hosted 200+ sessions on varied topics like technology, the business side of operations, culture, and my favorite of being a writer. The day was buzzing with interviews, panels, workshops, and talks. Many of us were present on #mediumday and had the opportunity to listen to our fellow writers, editors, and Medium crew. The sessions also became available recently on the YouTube Channel, and here is the link for all the sessions Medium Day 2023 You Tube Playlist.
I am extending the invitation again to write on Be Open, and please feel free to reach out to me at the social handles posted for any further questions or discussions.
Copyright Priya Tandon-The Soul Sutras 2023
Connect @ Facebook.com/thesoulsutras