Lost in the Story

I used to think I’d write everyday after work, that no matter where my day took me there would always be time to create. In reality though, I’m lucky if I can get a half decent dinner down before crawling into bed. 

By the time I finish work my brain feels like it has 50 open tabs. I can shut my laptop, leave my desk and use the drive home to decompress, but coming home mentally exhausted is a common occurrence and there’s no sign of that improving. 

When I was at the end of writing my book I was working a minimum wage job right out of uni. It was a glorified retail job in an opticians that had me on my feet all day and talking to customers all day long. I found time to write then. I found time to finish my book. 

Corporate work however, took a mental toll I never expected. 

Working a desk job appealed to me as someone with some pretty complex health conditions. I’m good with spreadsheets and I can juggle multiple things at once. After spending years working with customers during holidays as a student and getting shouted at, how hard could sitting at a desk really be. 

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Creativity needs space to grow. It needs mental room to breathe, mature and come into fruition. After a day at work, mental headspace is not something I have. I know I’m preaching to the converted here as many of you will work full time and know exactly what I’m on about. 

I don’t have answers yet on how to overcome this. I haven’t found a method that helps me find the mental energy to be creative after work. I have so many creative projects I’d like to sink my teeth into. I want to spend the time to really market my book and see it in book shops. I want to go to open mic nights and poetry readings and share my work. I’d like to write a second book. 

I don’t think my creativity has disappeared, but I think it’s hiding. 

I’m at the start of my career and chasing promotions and that’s okay. There will be times when things slow down, times where I can rest. I may not know when that will happen but I have to have hope that there will be. 

My poetry tutor at university told us for every poem we wrote we should be reading at least three to compensate. Her idea was that you need to consume more creative work than you write and now I get where she was coming from. It’s hard to pick up a pen and start writing when I’m tired, but it’s a lot easier when I’ve already been reading other people’s poems. The creative juices just start flowing. 

That will be where I start. I’m going to take away the pressure to write every day and let myself just enjoy consuming creative work for the time being. I have a poetry collection by Savannah Brown on my bed side table, it’s been sitting there untouched for 4 months. I think I will pick it up tonight.