I open a blank word document. I just finished the rest of my homework and I have a 3-page essay due tomorrow. I change the document settings to my professor's requirements. Now it is time to start writing.
Except I don’t start it. I write the beginning of the introduction, but I get stuck and I don't know how to proceed. Instead, I check a few websites, hoping for some writing inspiration. I get restless and go get a snack. I finish my first sentence. But then, my will power fails and I check my phone. I sit on my phone for an hour. I get nothing done as I endlessly scroll and refresh. The whole time I am yelling at myself to work on my essay - that I need just write it - but I scroll on.
I turn back to my essay. I write another sentence. I delete it. I rewrite half of it. Once again I get restless, impatient with my writing. I recheck the same three sites. I come back to my essay. I finish the sentence.
It has been two and half hours since I started writing. I’ve written a single paragraph and I hate myself for it. Writing is a chore. I dread having to write an essay for class. This scene is repeated week after week as I struggle through my writing assignments.
Losing the Joy
I didn't always hate writing. I enjoyed writing poetry in class and by myself. I used to write little books when I was really young. I filled up multiple journals in elementary and middle school and even into high school.
This is one of my homemade "books," which I probably made around kindergarten. Also pictured are three of my journals. The dates on the cover are the range of dates of my writing until they were full. What really impresses me is my journal in the middle of the stack, which I filled in a year and half. This contrasts with my most recent journal, which I started over three years ago, but is only about a fourth filled.
As I got older, I wrote for myself less and less. There's no one cause to blame, but a multitude of factors of why writing became harder and harder.
First, I have experienced an increase of writing assignments. In middle school, essays were few and far between. Writing assignments increased in high school, but the volume is insane in college. This semester I have had at least one 3-4 page essay due every week, sometimes two. Once I finish my assigned writing, I have little desire to write anything else.
Writing has also become higher stakes for me. High school essays wouldn't make or break my grade, but in many college classes, essays are significant chunks of my final grade. Scholarship essays and job applications have money riding on them. These high stakes add extra stress to writing, which adds to my resentment of writing.
Finding the Joy Again
When one of my friends approached me about joining her creative writing club last year, I turned her down. I made some excuse for why I couldn't join, but I knew I didn't write for fun and I definitely couldn't write creatively.
A couple months later I was observing a high school English classroom for my Intro to Teaching Language Arts class. The teacher invited me to shadow her creative writing club she hosted during a free period. I was expecting to just watch and take notes, but she handed me a bag of alphabet cookies and included me in the meeting. Our task was to write something with the letters we received on our cookies.
With my letters I was able to come up with the words find, run, crazy, and busy. And then I wrote a poem - no procrastinating, no annoyance with the writing or myself, and minimal erasing. This was the first poem I had written in two years, and I had scrawled it on the left side of a notebook page in ten minutes.
And then I rewrote the poem (on the right)! I wanted to make a few tweaks to improve it. I chose to edit my writing, when most of the time I can't bring myself to reread it.
The teacher I was observing asked me to share my writing with the club and then complemented me on it. It was the first time in a long time I had a positive and fun experience with writing.
A semester after this experience, I joined my friend's creative writing club. Once a week, I sit down and write for thirty minutes. I share my writing with my friends and listen to their writing. I do not worry about perfection or grades. I just try to have fun while I try out different writing techniques and styles. If I don't like my writing, that is okay, I can try again next week. But when I am proud of what I wrote, I post it on my blog - this blog.
I created my blog to enter a for a scholarship, but it became a place to share my creative writing from club meetings. Eventually, I started writing poems and short stories on my own, outside of any class or club requirement. Ideas would bloom in my head and I had to free them - I had to write them down. This evolved into other types of writing, like recipes. Only a few friends look at my blog, but I enjoy writing for it. I knew an essay about my writing experiences would belong on the blog that helped me learn to write again.
Expanding the Joy
Writing still can be painful - literary analysis essays and reflections are still frustrating, slow processes for me. But I am proud of my ability to say I can enjoy some writing, even a year ago I would not have believed I could say that truthfully.
Moving forward, I plan to continue to write for fun. I also hope to choose to write more. This blog, my creative writing club, and journaling provide opportunities for writing on interesting topics with low stakes that make writing enjoyable.
My experiences with writing also make me think about my career. As a future high school English teacher, I can help students learn to enjoy writing, but I could also be part of the cause for a student's hatred of writing. I don't quite have the answers yet on how to teach writing so my future students enjoy it, but I think my journey with writing will enable me to better teach my students. I hope my students never have to dread writing like I have.