Passion Lost

Pursuing one’s passion should be effortless.  It should be something done second only to breathing.  It should not be work nor should it require discipline.

People who genuinely pursue their passion immerse themselves in their craft constantly.  Hours gently shift into days when one is creating.  Musicians have often played for hours at sheds or concerts.  Their love of music supersedes the need for sleep.  Painters often collapse from exhaustion unwillingly when they are in the throes of a creative trance.

So if writing is my passion why do I often forgo writing in favor of watching television or surfing the internet.  My red sofa is more familiar to me than the keyboard of my laptop.  My only typing limited to the name of a website or a Google search term.  I’d much rather watch a movie on the Hallmark network than to bring my own imagination to life.

My mentor at work tells me that I have a gift and I’m wasting it.  He tells me that many people struggle to conjure what was given to me by God.  He tells me that I have so much promise and the ability to make money with the stroke of keys or a blot of ink.  I don’t even need money for a business start up.  My business would require no overhead and profit as soon as the first manuscript is accepted.  Out of a five day work week, I think he tells me this all five days.

I wish that it were that easy.  I wish that I could awake before the sun, start up my laptop and write well into the early hours of the next day.  I wish that I would have to set reminders for eating.   I wish that bathroom breaks would be unwelcomed.  But it’s not that easy for me.

When I was a child I would incessantly.  Writing was my escape.  Writing was my friend.  Writing didn’t judge or tease me.  Writing didn’t care what I wore.  Or that I was a nerd.  Or that I had big glasses.  Writing was mine.  I would sleep a lot because sleeping would enable me to create stories in my head.  As an adult I still find myself going to bed just to allow my imagination to create.  It was solace in a difficult world.

As an adult, I write sporadically.  I started a blog to encourage me to write.  Well I’m lucky if I can churn out one entry in a month.  This year, 2012, is the first year that I have written consistently.  Consistently meaning actually writing.  For years I have floated through without writing more than a Facebook status.  I called it a mean case of writer’s block.  I didn’t want to think about writing.  In fact I loathed the very idea of doing so.

What I don’t understand is why.  Why is something that used to be so much part of me so distant from me now?  Why do I no longer take comfort in turning words in poetry and prose?  Why is it a chore?  Why do I now have to be disciplined in order to create?

These are questions to which I have to find answers.  I believe if I can figure out what happened and why my relationship with writing is so strained, I will be able to write consistently and well again.

My friend/writing coach/writing group leader is helping me on this journey.  She tells me that I have to take one step at a time.  I have to start small.  Start by writing a little something every day or every other day and build up. 

But I have to want to do it.  I have to find the will.  I have to find my voice and keep it this time.