In the workshop with @thetribecoworks on Monday, 3rd July 2023, I got inspired to restart my blog. And on Tuesday, @bethkempton announced a writing challenge... what a timing! So I'm joining the challenge and here's my first contribution #meetthewriter
Day 1/15: ✨DESK✨
What is on your desk? ...
The desk in my room was supposed to be a desk. Small, but it would have done the job well. But someone tasked it with the additional job of also being a shelf and now my laptop barely fits onto the remaining surface, and I would stare into a box while writing. My inner world stretches far beyond what any box could contain, so I grab my stuff, wander across the kitchen, and set up on the dining table. On the dining table lives a lonely coaster, white marbled (ugh), but it has ha cork bottom, so when I’m around it’s upside down. It has my thermos on it, there’s a small green teacup and a glass teapot, I started drinking tea while writing my bachelor thesis. This little ritual helped me to take little breaks without losing focus. I like the little things in life, the little pleasures.
My painting material is also scattered across the table, I wanted to paint yesterday and then forgot about it. And sometimes there are other people at the table, with their stuff everywhere… Then I’m cut loose, floating around, without a place to write.
So, I dream about MY table. I dream of a big table, maybe several put together. One corner for my writing, one for painting and opposite the place for my (still imaginary) sewing machine. The light is amazing in there and you should see the view! Breath-taking...
I write on my knees in bed, on the train, on the picnic tables at Wembury Beach. I write despite the chaos around me, writing my dream into reality…
Day 2: 🕰️Time🕰️
When do you write?
Mostly in the morning. I wake up with no alarm after I got all the sleep I need. I have cacao and sit in bed for a while, letting my senses awake. Then I transition to the living room. I make tea, bring all the things I need and set up my writing space. Then I write, whatever presents itself that day. This is not tied to any specific time, only to the rhythm of my being. Sometimes I start writing before 8 am, today it was 10:17. And I never made it to the table.
Following my own rhythm is the only way that works for me. Trying to stick to a schedule kills my energy. I’ve learned to work with the energy I have that day. There are periods where I write a lot, every day. And periods where I don’t write for a few weeks. My consistency is not writing every day, but coming back to it, over and over again. 27 years and counting.
I write when it’s time for reflection, time to write a letter to a loved one, time to learn. I write when it’s time to let go of something and when it’s time for heartbreak. And, very rarely, when it’s time for happiness.
Day 3/15 ✨Motivation✨
Why do you write?
I write to stay sane. If I wouldn’t have emptied my thoughts out of my mind and poured them onto the paper for the last 27 years, I would have gone crazy. I write to understand what’s going on inside me. Writing down realisations helps me to embody them and often gets me on an even deeper level of meaning. I write to let go, after the tears I write the reminders of pain and grief onto the paper. I write to liberate myself. I write the unconscious beliefs that hold me back into consciousness. I write to heal.
Day 4/15 ✨Champion ✨
Who are you grateful to for championing your creative work?
I’m grateful to a few people who cheer me on. Two of them are most important at the moment in the creative work of building my life in a peaceful and stable way I never knew before. One is Jo @jo_yeates_essentiallyme For almost a year now she is my mentor for all things that come along in my life. Each week we have a chat, and I can discuss whatever bugs me at that moment. With her support, I was able to take the final steps of leaving more than 20 years of depression behind. To go through heartbreak, the unlearning of deeply ingrained beliefs and the pressure of finishing my bachelor degree. I broke a few generational cycles in the process, and Jo was there, listening, showing me my blind spots and guiding me out of the fear and despair. For the first time in my life I have someone standing next to me who fervently believes in what I’m doing.
The other one is my best friend M. Although she lives in a different country and it’s often months between a visit or a phone call, she is home for me. Where I am accepted exactly as I am. With her, I can be me, unashamedly and she’s the one I tell all my secrets to. For a while we grew together and now, while we each grow in our own gardens we still find back to each other every time we talk. We are not afraid to touch the uneasy things that stand between us. We go to the places that hurt our egos, so we can emerge on the other side with a friendship that’s stronger than ever. She is my Soulmate. And while I often miss her, I also know that our connection is beyond time and space.
Day 6/15 🎶Music🎶
What’s on your writing playlist? Or do you prefer silence?
I am generally quite sensitive to the soundscape around me. If I listen to music with a song text, my brain automatically tries to understand the words, and then they mix up with the words I want to write. My preferred soundscape would be the sound of nature, the birds, the wind in the trees, a brook murmuring or the waves rolling onto a beach. Living in the middle of town, it’s either rain pounding on the roof or seagulls crying (having grown up in a landlocked country, hearing seagulls means at least I’m by the sea…). If the noise of the town gets too disturbing, I retreat to either instrumental music or nature sound recordings. My favourite playlists (either “Concentration” or “Daydreaming”) contain mostly score pieces from Yann Tiersen, Alexandre Desplat, Max Richter, Ludovico Einaudi and the cello versions of soundtracks by 2Cellos. But these days I often put nature sounds on. I find the recordings by Franz Bruckhoff @nzbruckhoff0121 the most authentic. My favourite apps are Flowing (rivers & brooks) and Sunny (sea & beach sounds). Putting my noise-cancelling headphones on, filling my ears with these natural sounds relaxes me deeply, helps me concentrate and focus and lets the words just flow…
Day 7/15 🌺Life🌺 ….it’s one of those days where life just got upside down….
Day 8/15 ✒️Words🖋️
What do you write?
I have quite a collection of poems, mostly written in my teenage years and early twenties. When my melancholy turne
d into a full-grown depression, my mind got numb and the words and rhythms I used to express myself evaporated. Ruminations and worries took over my mind. Writing it all down into a journal was one of the things that helped create the distinction between who I am and what my mind is just babbling about. Now I’m starting to write about my insights and how they came to be in a way I can share with you. I’ve already shared some in earlier Instagram posts and I will continue to do so, here and on the blog on my new website (coming soon!). And now, after a year of writing journal that was truly liberating, the words and rhythms for poems come back. I love poetry, where a few words on a page can evoke a universe.
My mind was adrift during the last few days (normal for Inner Winter) so I have some catching up to do...
9/15 ✒️Tools🖋️
I love paper. I have an A4 Portfolio for work/blog/ calendar and an XL Grand Voyageur for notes and journal on the go from @paper_republic. I write with a @waterman_pen fountain pen or my adored triangle pens from @fabercastellglobal. And when it needs to become digital, my Macbook Pro takes it all.
10/15 👑Talisman👑
In the morning, with my cacao, I pick a card from @daniellebarlowart s Witches Wisdom Tarot. Sometimes the card stays for a few days, allowing me to work deeply with the energy. I take it with me when I set up my workplace at the dining table and create a little travel altar. This morning, very befitting for the New Moon, the Messenger of Air emerged from the cards.
11/15🧜🏻♀️Movement🧜🏻♀️
I can get very still and not move my body much. Up to three days without the need to walk further than the kitchen or the bathroom is not uncommon. I can feel the energy getting stagnant and yet, I still rather stay put. Moving my body consciously and in tune with the energy of the day is one of my biggest challenges. I've taken it on...
12/15 💫Firsts 💫
When I was 16, during my confirmation service, I recited one of my poems, "erfroren" (frozen). It was about loneliness. I silenced the whole congregation.
Day 13/15 ✨Dream✨
If you could write at any desk anywhere in the world, what would your view be like?
A big window, floor to ceiling. Looking over my garden to the sea. A light studio room, with space for my painting and sewing material. Shelves with books, tea and travel/life mementoes. Maps and charts and art on the wall. It could be somewhere near here. Or maybe New Zealand... Or maybe...
Day 14/15 ✨Advice✨
Is there a piece of advice- about writing, about creativity, about life- you wish you’d been given earlier in your career?
I wish I hadn’t taken on a lot of the advice given to me… The German word for Advice is “Ratschlag”, the second part of the word meaning “hit” meaning however well-meant it’s a hit in the face. I have drifted away from the concept of advice, giving, and taking. I often had to learn the hard way that it wasn’t good advice for me. Just because it (seemingly) works for everyone else doesn’t mean it works for me. We are all unique beings in unique situations. We all know what we need in order to grow, it’s just buried underneath what we were told was right.
This is the core of my coaching: I don’t offer strategies, frameworks or advice on how to live a better or happier life. I ask a question: What is going on in your world right now? I hold the space and listen. Often people figure out the next steps themselves when given the space to articulate what’s bothering them. And if needed, I offer my observations and/or opinion (labelled as so) on what tweaks could be made to make life a bit easier. Because they know. They just don’t know how to get to the place where that knowledge lives. I can be the guide who leads you there.
15/15 🪞Mirror🪞
How would you like your writing to be described, and why does that matter to you?
I don’t care too much about how people describe my writing. I write for myself, if someone can relate or take something out of it, that’s great. But whatever my writing does to someone else, is more about them than about me.
As a reflection of me, if people would say that it is honest writing, authentic writing, that would be awesome. Honesty is my core value and if I get to the point where I can transport that in my writing and get that feedback, that would be a confirmation that I walk my talk. I will take any honest feedback, and I’ll try to take it as gracefully as I can….
Comments