writers block in my journal

dear diary,

i haven’t been writing anything. i haven’t even been reading anything. and you know why this is so big for me? because i measure my worth according to how well and often i do these things. apparently if i can’t be an intellectual for a week, i feel behind - which is very understandable, for a lot of reasons.

most of my emotions have been confusing, unsolved, like i’m in a stage of transition. the numbness of the same days passing by. the confusion of my own self. it’s all been so hard to navigate.

i’ve been trying to force meaning out of it all, a revolution, maybe. a thunder-stricken realization. but there’s been… nothing. and i think that’s the point.

i’ve figured that if the tangled wires that are my thoughts cannot yet form a polished, tangible article a - i might as well just write them as they are; tangled and unfinished.

sometimes i’ll wake up thinking i don’t even want to write anymore. there have been days i felt i had ‘outgrown’ the identity, as if being a writer was a title i earned. i’m learning now that that is just what my mind projects, and has been projecting for a while. i had been taking this craft too seriously, measuring my worth by the length and ‘value’ of my pieces.

i want to stop pretending that i feel completely detached from how often i write. or the ‘quality’ of my ideas. i am very much validated by these things, even against my own will. i also want to stop pretending that i am one thing, and that i always have to be one thing.

i think i had forgotten what writing actually was. somewhere along the way, it became articles. publication. consistency. something to prove. i stopped listening to what my soul actually had to say.

and maybe i had been defining “writer” far too narrowly. i thought it only counted when it was polished enough to publish. i had put myself in a box i didn’t realize i could just walk right out of.

but my goal has always been to be real. to share what is real. i’m still the same girl. i’m still learning and expressing through different ways. i’m not ‘outgrowing’ anything. i’m still a writer. i write in my notes, in my journal. i write birthday cards to my friends. i start sentences i never finish. i write.

and i write wether or not my dashboard reads ‘23’ or ‘58,676’. i write anyway. and i will not write something revolutionary every time. in fact, i may not write something revolutionary at all. but fortunately, that has never been my why.

i had mistaken silence for absence. the words never left, i just stopped recognizing them as my own.

it’s okay. i don’t need the thunder-stricken realization. all i need is permission; to be as confused, patient, and honest as possible.