WRITING has always been a cathartic experience for me. It started when I was about seven. I was extremely shy and did not take to making new friends easily. Alone time was wonderful to me — I could draw in my little corner without interruption, daydream about being a doctor or actress while I gazed out our living room window. Because I didn’t talk much, there were a lot of emotions unexpressed within me. Drawings didn’t cut it. So I turned to words.
There were blank sheets of paper before me that one day. I took a pen and began writing. Days passed and I filled many sheets of papers with poems and illustrated stories. My Mom delighted in my new hobby and brought home scratch paper from work. I filled the papers with short stories, haikus, limericks. I felt free.
How did a 7-year-old find freedom in words? My parents regaled me with stories from their childhood, fairy tales and stories they made up themselves. By example, they taught me the beauty of reading and how it’s a fantastic playground for the imagination. Our household help shared stories of the provinces they came from. My younger sisters and I played a lot of pretend with our Barbie dolls. There were so many stories all around me. I wanted to create my own. I wrote about butterflies and fairies, little sisters, a guy eating the buttons of his shirt. I wrote and wrote and wrote. It felt good seeing my childlike daydreams come to life in words.
As I grew older, I came face to face with teenage angst. Ah, the teenage years provide such fodder for writing! Poems and stories had a mix of richer themes: the angry frustration of not being understood by anyone, the exhilaration of first love, the pain of having your heart broken the first time, the world-shattering betrayal of friends, the incomparable joy of sharing secrets with trusted ones… It was a rollercoaster of themes. I had turned to diaries at this point. Gone were the days of writing on my Mom’s scratch paper. There were secrets in my writing now, and to share them with my family was too embarrassing.
Why write? I write to release my thoughts, my emotions. I am much better at the written word than I am with the spoken one. When I speak, I stutter and stumble on my own words. But when I write, everything flows with more truth and beauty. I am in love with the written word.
If I don’t write in one day, I go nuts. Writing can come in the form of a blog entry, a little quip or a poem. I have to write. I have to let my thoughts out. I have to let the stories out. There may or may not be people who read them, but I have to write. It is my release. It is my therapy.
In writing, I have connected with others. In writing, I have come to help others. It is both a passion and a means to actualize my personal mission: to inspire and help others. Writing has helped me release so many bottled-up thoughts and emotions; perhaps I can help inspire others with some of the things I write.
I love to write. And for as long as there are words, my ode to writing will never end.
October 13th, 2008 at 6:26 am
I had an unhappy childhood, my teenage years were tumultuous, my parents were ultra-conservative, i survived by showing off a brave face to my friends, classmates, girl friends and most of all, reading, and music.
The past continually haunts me and it gives me sadness, hatred and sometimes self pity. I have a penchant for writing, particularly, poetry. I never thought that i would be discarding my baggages of the past by writing poems, unconsciously, i wrote poems in order to release the demons that haunted me. I’ve come across a book of poems by ANNE SEXTON and i found out that what i was writing was a confessional type of poetry, simply called “confessional poetry” I’ve wrote many poems and i discovered that i was relieving my self of my “unpleasant past.” By putting into paper, re-reading it, it gives me pleasure that i have confronted those inner demons, wrestled with them, and i emerged VICTORIOUS. I’ve wrote those poems in my 30s, until am still writing. I am already past 50 (an aging rocker?) and i am happy. thanks for writing poetry.
September 4th, 2008 at 10:30 am
wow!! release the tension… new inspiration to write again. when I’m writing I am me. that’s it!! help to weigh things out and lighten the burden.
like your thoughts.
keep inspiring others through writing and sharing. that’s really great!
July 22nd, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Nicely done. As a pro writer, film and tv commercials (right now writing spots for Mercedes-Benz) I 100% agree with your assessment of the passion for the words. If my fingers don’t fly early in the morning on the keyboard, my brain doesn’t work properly all day. Some need their cigarettes or their booze, I need my words. Best of luck with your words and your flow. Just remember, the more of this magical world you see, the bigger you live, the better your stories.
July 18th, 2008 at 4:17 am
Wish i can pick up writing like you. Try to post in some blogs but guess am a long way from.
Heard on 98.7FM last night that if our country seriously develops young musicians like China and Korea, our noontime shows would be recitals and concerts and not lascivious ones pretending to be game shows.
See my blogs; they’re still empty!
July 13th, 2008 at 8:56 pm
hi.. i would want to write… its something i’ve been meaning to do for ages now.. i have managed to start writing about life but somehow i can’t seem to finish it the way i would have wanted.. when i am at it, i feel like a very old flourescent bulb when turned on.. i cannot get past the sputtering promise of a lingering brightness, the darkness always wins, the mind goes blank just when the muses are ready to impart their elusive smile..
maybe, just maybe, am inspired by you guys, again…