We all have our ways of coping with the pandemic, and mine is writing.
I wonder whether I can keep up this torrid pace of writing after the pandemic is over and I'm not staying at home and actually going to work. The answer is probably not, because I won't have my computer everywhere I go, not will I have all this time at home to keep myself busy by writing.
Writer's block seems not to exist anymore. I can just go on and on with my rambling that makes sense and, for some reason, people like to read. I don't always write about Coronavirus-related things, like social distancing, numbers, data, and how our lives have changed. I did a lot at the beginning of the pandemic, but I guess I just got used to it.
I, too, want life to go back to normal, but I kind of don't mind being able to have all this time to write and feeling like I'm a servicable member of society by staying at home, helping flatten the curve, and not being a burden on our health care system. I don't know how I've been writing so much but I remember what my friends always told me when I signed up for a college publication where I put in one article a week.
You can't keep this up. Life is going to catch up to you.
Well, I did keep it up. It ended up being a huge constant in my life to write every week and put in at least a 500 word article. It took a couple years before writing multiple articles a week once I took on a leadership position within my organization, and then once I left, I started writing even every day. Let it be clear that I don't advocate advice like writing every day, but it kind of just happened and I never complained about it.
But during the pandemic, I haven't been writing articles every day. Some time in March I wanted to take off constraints of writing one article a day because I was sick of the structure, and I thought I was going to go easy on myself and give myself a pace where I wasn't trying to force out writing. Well, I stopped forcing out writing, and I ended up not writing an article a day.
I ended up, now, writing three articles a day.
It's not like I keep track, but I have prioritized writing above all else, and that especially includes the distribution of my content. I can write in the morning, afternoon, or night, and it's just something I've been able to do any time, any where. On an average day, I've simply just spent a lot of time writing and felt a lot better for it.
If I'm trying to do an analysis of a really thoughtful and insightful piece, I write about it. If it's a book that had a significant impact on me, I write about it. If it's a movie that really struck out to me, like Parasite, I write about it. These days I write about everything, expanding my range and including a lot of satire too.
Even if I can't keep it up, my perception of writing has evolved over the course of the pandemic. Instead of seeing it as this monumental effort every time I write of crafting something special out of nothing, I see writing now as a form of communication. coping, and processing.
If I spend too much time on social media agonizing and comparing myself to others, I write. If I find myself reading the news too much and being overwhelmed by politics or Coronavirus news, I write. If I'm bored and just need something to do with my time, I write.
Most people will only see my output and see that I'm a prolific writer who's able to put out a ton of content, hopefully quality content, a lot. But they don't see the process. Writing has never been more fulfilling, more meaningful, and more fun. I'm glad it's my hobby and not my day job, because I would hate any person who micromanages and forces me to write.
I write at the beat of my own drum, when I want, when I feel like it, and if it's not fun, to me, it won't be worth doing. That's why I will never be a full-time writer, because I wouldn't want to be forced to write. It's not about the outputs, it's been about the process. It always has been, and I see that now more than any other time.
Writing is an escape, not a job. There were times during the school year when I wrote in my classroom during my planning period to keep myself sane -- it helped me calm down and process what was going on.
Recently, although it seems like writing is the only thing I do, I have been finding a new school placement for the next year as well as teaching every day and upholding my compliance responsibilities as a special educator.
It's not a light workload, and yet it's been a lot easier than it is during the school year. This might just be because behavior management isn't a big part of my day-to-day routine anymore, when it used to be my biggest problem every single day, but it might also be because I've been writing a lot more.
Writing just gives me a sense of control that is absent in a lot of other aspects of the freelancing business. You can influence, but not control whether or not people read your writing. But you can control whether you write, and what you write. Maybe writing is just an attempt to play God, but I'm personally much more at peace writing more these days, maintaining my own sanity while doing better about myself.
Write. That's a solution and something I tell myself. You can think, sometimes, that to do well writing online, it's sometimes all about promotion and marketing.
But no -- it's about the purity and the sanctity of the writing itself. It's taken a pandemic for me to see that, that no amount of marketing can replace actually writing. Write -- it's the only way to get better at writing. Sure, you need to revise, edit, and use a lot of editorial assistance, but nothing can replace the act of actually writing.
People tell you all the time that you have to read to become a better writer. And that's true -- write about what you read and it'll also give you your own interpretation of your readings.
But writing? Well writing is the holy grail, the act by which you're playing with fire and getting better at it every single time, whether you realize it or not.
What better time to write than a pandemic?
