I’m so glad that you shared what you shared! It’s very heartening and encourages me to keep going, to keep mustering the courage to come out of hiding. And I’m so, so glad to hear that you’ve freed yourself from that very difficult place. I’m in the thick of it and lately I’ve been joking to my friends that I thought I was going to turn into a butterfly, but I think, instead, that I will be turning into a phoenix and rise from the ashes. That’s what it’s feeling like, anyway!
Elizabeth, I very much relate to all the motivations you described. Years ago, I said to a visiting artist (I’m a ceramic artist), “I feel like an amoeba.” What an odd thing to say to anyone, much less to a stranger whom you admire! I often remember that embarrassing moment of honesty because it so perfectly represents what Barbara described as primitive and at the level of survival—my yearning to be seen and to even exist! It rose up, unbidden (well, not by my head) to express itself with words that were painfully revealing. I do feel driven to write and to create, despite massive inner resistance and constant self-critiquing. There’s something inside me that must claim this victory, must declare, “I Am!” and it feels like i’m creating myself from the ground up.
Catherine, I can't thank you enough for what you wrote. I worried about acknowledging the degree to which writing is a saving experience for me, how it feels like an assertion of existence on my own terms, my version of your "I Am!" I worried that it would sound crazy! What a relief to hear that it resonated with you. I don't know how much of my story you've read in an early post, but I used to be undone by the same kind of constant self-criticism. Writing my memoir about the experience of my parents' end-of-life ended it. The whole goal of our substack is to figure out the mechanism of that transformation. I understand now how it worked, and we hope to pass on what we learned to others. Writing can be a pathway out of a negative loop!
I’m so glad that you shared what you shared! It’s very heartening and encourages me to keep going, to keep mustering the courage to come out of hiding. And I’m so, so glad to hear that you’ve freed yourself from that very difficult place. I’m in the thick of it and lately I’ve been joking to my friends that I thought I was going to turn into a butterfly, but I think, instead, that I will be turning into a phoenix and rise from the ashes. That’s what it’s feeling like, anyway!
Elizabeth, I very much relate to all the motivations you described. Years ago, I said to a visiting artist (I’m a ceramic artist), “I feel like an amoeba.” What an odd thing to say to anyone, much less to a stranger whom you admire! I often remember that embarrassing moment of honesty because it so perfectly represents what Barbara described as primitive and at the level of survival—my yearning to be seen and to even exist! It rose up, unbidden (well, not by my head) to express itself with words that were painfully revealing. I do feel driven to write and to create, despite massive inner resistance and constant self-critiquing. There’s something inside me that must claim this victory, must declare, “I Am!” and it feels like i’m creating myself from the ground up.
Catherine, I can't thank you enough for what you wrote. I worried about acknowledging the degree to which writing is a saving experience for me, how it feels like an assertion of existence on my own terms, my version of your "I Am!" I worried that it would sound crazy! What a relief to hear that it resonated with you. I don't know how much of my story you've read in an early post, but I used to be undone by the same kind of constant self-criticism. Writing my memoir about the experience of my parents' end-of-life ended it. The whole goal of our substack is to figure out the mechanism of that transformation. I understand now how it worked, and we hope to pass on what we learned to others. Writing can be a pathway out of a negative loop!