Inner Voice

I've been struggling to write lately. Mostly because I have been working on some professional projects that have taken up a great deal of my hours of mental acuity. But also because of some inner writing conflict I'm working through. A couple of months ago I started this new blog, and in the past few weeks I've tried to establish a daily routine of writing not for work, but for me. Until the last couple of days I've managed to maintain. The aforementioned projects are tightening up, so thankfully I'm back. Now that I am, it's time for me to face the conflict. Since I started interacting with my writing circle, I took the plunge and began developing a fictional character (see Tess). Little by little, she has been coming to me in bits and pieces. I enjoy visualizing her and trying to live inside her in order to describe her to readers, but I find myself void of her story. I can't figure out who she really is, what she does, or what should happen to her. In the meantime, I've been overflowing with ideas in response to books and articles I've been reading, observations I've been making, and experiences I've been having. I don't want Tess to be me. I know many fictional characters draw from the author's personal life, and I'm ok with that, I just don't want her to actually be me. I've been wondering how to spin all of this real stuff into the life of my fictional character, and right now I can't seem to do it. Knowing that I need to sit down and write everyday to be a writer, I've put this pressure on myself to bring Tess to life. I've read and re-read my description of her, but she's just not speaking to me. So, for three days I didn't write.

This afternoon I was tidying up a console table that my husband and I moved out of a dusty corner where books and things with no place had piled up. Last week, we put it in the main entry way of our home. It has two small cabinets that had also collected miscellaneous items that at one time had no place. Here's one of the things I found:

On many occasion throughout my life, I have started and stopped journaling. I have some finished cover to cover, and others were started and now cry from the corners of my shelves and drawers to be written in once more. During the busiest times in my life, when journaling seemed to take a back seat to everything else, I would sometimes purchase these themed journals to kickstart things again, and get inspired. I've started a gratitude journal, a dreams journal, among others. But this one I apparently purchased back in April of 2002. My Inner Voice spoke to the first page of this journal on April 17, 2002, less than a month after my 29th birthday. It either stopped talking or I stopped listening soon after because I only filled 8 pages before I put it on a shelf, and then maybe another shelf, and then in a cabinet. For 11 years!  I read the 8 pages, tore out the three inspirational bookmarks that were included, yet untouched until now, and decided it's time to start listening again!

I have been thinking. Maybe Tess is just a muse, a manifestation of my need to be creative. As I've mentioned in previous posts, my writing the past few years has been so entwined with my learning and career goals. But what I've come to realize is that I don't have to write fiction to be creative. I can write whatever I want. In time I think Tess will evolve further, and I may develop a nagging need to tell her story. But for now, I'm ok telling my own. My own experiences, my observations, and my own reactions to the world around me. It's likely that poetry will form, as I have found several poems throughout my journals, and I enjoy reading and writing sensory details. But the only 2 commitments I'm making are: 1. to write and 2. to listen to my inner voice.

Untitled Poem, no date

Written somewhere between April 17th and July 19th, 2002

My Inner Voice journal

A quiet spring day

The warmth of the sun comes over me

Like an old worn blanket

The breeze runs through my hair

And the curls dance around the frame of my face

Tickling my forehead and cheeks

In-tuned with nature around me.