It is six days since I last lifted a weight. This has become an exercise holiday as well as a mental break because I am only now beginning to accept just how tired I was leading up to Tuesday’s gig. So much has happened and so much of that has had an intellectual drain on my ability to function correctly. This morning was the first I’ve woken up to where I’ve remembered what I dreamt for a while.
There have been periods in my life like this where I’ve looked back and realised how seismic the change was that occurred within them. This is the first time I can actually remember living through it, and it is the first time that I have kept an accurate record of progression. For that I am hugely grateful, because it allows me an objectivity I don’t ever think has been possible before.
One of the things that has bothered me the most in my poetry writing journey thus far is my inability to make meaningful connections using it with others. Tuesday night showed me that this is changing. In order to continue that evolution successfully there is a project that I’ve not fully committed to because my brain literally cannot yet do the heavy lifting. I feel things far too keenly to do so.
That needs to translate into a practical realignment of my brain: it’s something I realize that I have never learnt successfully. It’s something I watch
and do as easily as breathing, though I suspect the reality is that there’s a lot more work involved. It is time to admit to the room that I live my imagery far too internally and am unable to translate that power into poetry.There, I said it out loud. Now I HAVE to try and fix it.
This comes at a time when I know my exercise journey requires some tweaking. It always seems to be the case that I never just have one thing to work on, it’s always a pile of things that needs poking. Yesterday therefore was essential to allow my brain some space in which to work out what has to happen to make this easier. There were also a couple of poems that got written on Tuesday that I need to revisit. They are the most emotional, personal things I have written for months.
There is one other thing that happened on Tuesday that needs to be shared. It has nothing to do with the gig and was sparked by a particular annotation that my mentor left in my first poetry submission. I was not expecting the response it created, and I was absolutely not ready for the depth of emotion that emerged from seeing it on a page. It’s making me cry now just typing this.
It was a statement of such generosity that I think I’m still in shock.
I knew mentoring was the missing piece in a particular puzzle since last year. What I didn’t realize was just how impactful it would be. I saved reading that document until I was on my own and in a receptive mindset and every word had registered with a determination to listen and improve. There is no point in ever being the person who refuses to accept they can be better. It’s soul destroying.
In fact, having watched someone doing just that in private messaging the night I arrived in Brighton has made me even more determined to never, ever become someone like that. Fear does terrible, awful things to people, and we are living in a period where it pervades so much of normal daily existence. I will not be dictated to by fear, and I will not allow it to consume me any more.
I can be brave and strong. I will endure, and I will remain a storyteller.
I will tell my stories and champion big ideas for as long as I am able to do so.
Love this post xxx
Yes!!