On achievement over play

How I (almost) killed my love of writing

Oct 15, 2022

Last week’s Glittery Welcome felt easeful to write. Today, as I begin to write this week’s letter (for the fourth time), I notice a tightness in my scalp. A familiar drive to ‘better’ what I have produced to date. A fear that despite the name I’ve given this project, it is only Glitter that will do. You are not here for the Biscuits.

Other creative adventures have stuttered to a premature close for similar reasons, and so this seems as good a place as any to write from.

One morning, soon after the pandemic began, a poem appeared on the pages of my journal. It was a poem in the loosest sense, in that it rhymed in places and was constructed around a metaphor. But I decided it was a poem, nonetheless. I had been bingeing on poetry online, and my husband had gifted me my first anthology: Staying Alive: Real Poems for Unreal Times. I sat in bed each night, whilst he read his Brandon Sanderson novel, sticking tiny Post-its on the pages that most spoke to me. Perhaps we have him to blame for my decision to write my own.

I had no clue where to start, but Google led me to the perfect book:

The author began by reminding her readers that writing poetry requires the belief that you and your experience belong in a poem, and that almost nobody finds that easy. She was right. But it was also deeply fulfilling.

I (re-)discovered the magic of making something for the sake of it. Of writing something that required no explanation. The freedom of no ‘right’ and ‘wrong.’ I accepted her invitation to play with imagery with the enthusiasm of a three-year-old let loose in a Pick and Mix store. To draw on one of the author’s metaphors, I discovered a poem-shaped hole in my life I hadn’t realised was there.

It is no secret that writing poetry can be therapeutic, and it didn’t just help me make peace with my past. On a twice-postponed, long weekend away, I wrote Man Flu; fifteen lines inspired by my inability to show sympathy towards my husband. Within an hour of writing a first draft, I softened, and we began to enjoy ourselves, despite his incessant sniffing.

Writing poetry became my active recovery from an increasingly hectic work schedule. Some evenings I wanted to veg out in front of Game of Thrones, but more often I wanted to write. Though easy on the eye, watching Jon Snow attempt to save Westeros just didn’t compare.

I began sharing my poetry with friends on social media. The first was entitled Things I Didn’t Think I’d Miss; a very basic list poem about commuting to work. I felt as though I had a skipping rope in the playground and had invited people to join in my game. Do you remember the kind? Where you are all singing together and jumping in unison. One friend messaged me a week later. He’d read that poem out at a Zoom team meeting, and his colleagues had all had a good chuckle.

Around that time, I had what seemed like the best idea in the world: I would seek professional feedback on what I was producing. I booked a tutorial with a published UK-based poet, and another with an unpublished, but prolific poet in the U.S.

The poet from Maine had been sharing her poetry for more than a decade with her email subscribers and had self-published a number of books. She gave me useful feedback on the poems I’d sent her and asked me insightful questions about my motivations for writing.

But it was the British poet’s feedback I acted on. She told me my work was promising. That with her editing hat on, she would seriously consider publishing one of the poems I had sent her. The next day I wrote to my ‘work’ email subscribers and celebrated my creative breakthrough. Perhaps you were on the receiving end of that note. I was pretty pumped.

I joined the National Poetry Society and studied the winning entries of their monthly and annual competitions. I upped the ante on learning about what separates great poetry from the rest. I booked another tutorial to get more feedback and gauge my improvement.

But as I endeavoured to avoid cliché in my poetry, I became one myself. Like a contestant on a TV talent show, I submitted my work to competitions and poetry journals, hoping for my big break. My hobby was no longer soul led. It was no longer about having fun. It had become all about performance and being ‘the best I could be.’ The part of me that had led me to write personalised poems for friends at Christmas was nowhere to be seen.

With every rejection I received, my motivation dwindled. I stopped sharing my writing online; the rules of most journals and competitions dictate that once shared in public, poetry is exempt from being considered. I settled for the consumption of other people’s creations. If I couldn’t write to a publishable standard, what was the point? My daughter and I got up to date with Game of Thrones. Then we started on Breaking Bad.

Am I falling into the same trap again? Despite my desire to practice creativity for its own sake, am I secretly hoping that some expert will proclaim (me and) my writing worthy?

This is what has blocked me from finishing this second letter until now. With these words on the page, I can see this inner barrier more clearly, and move past it, for now at least.

And I am glad. Because writing this piece has had me arrive back in the playground. There are no teachers urging me to be sensible or ringing the bell and telling me it’s time to go inside and put my school shoes back on. If there are, I can’t hear them.

I need this playtime. I’ve spent too long in the classroom, putting my hand up, trying my best to give the correct answer. I want to charge towards that skipping rope and jump, even if I get tangled up and fall over. I want to play chase and invent new games with my friends. Games that may make no sense to the bystanders, but that might have them shrug their shoulders and join in anyway.

Isn’t that what we all want more of? We were told that playtime was the padding between lessons. But what if play is a bigger part of life than we have been led to believe, and our willingness to embrace it a gift, rather than a self-indulgence? After all, the marketing men are mostly trying to sell us a feeling. What if what we want to feel is closer than we think?

I’ve just noticed I’m grasping around for a profound final flourish. But something else I learned from my study of poetry, is that overstated endings are best avoided. So, I’ll leave it there for now.

With love and shimmies,

Claire :)

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