WP4: Writing is My Biggest Nightmare
I have always had this one recurring nightmare. I would be randomly dropped into the middle of nowhere. A desolate place where no human life is around me. I have to find a way to get out of there in order to survive. My mind is completely taken over by the fear of having to make it on my own, the fear of the unfamiliar and unknown, the fear that I would have to make my own path, not knowing where to start, not being given any directions or ways to judge if I am making the correct decisions. I get stuck, I freak out, I shut down. I am in my most vulnerable state and I have to rely on my instincts and trust that I will know how to make it out alive. I always wake up from the nightmare before I am able to see how it would end and if there is the possibility that I could figure it out and everything ends up being okay.
When I write, I feel like I am thrown into this same nightmare, reminded of my fear of the unknown. Ever since I was a child, I always excelled at math and science. There was something about the process of doing a bunch of work, solving a problem, and finding out that I got the right answer that was so rewarding for me. I would know I was good at math if I could get to the correct answer. This was how I judged my knowledge, my abilities, and my level of smartness. It was easy. All you had to do was follow the rules and equations and you would end up just fine. It was immediate gratification. There was never any question as to whether it was a job well done. If you solved the problem you were on your way to greatness.
The satisfaction I got from math never translated to writing. In fact, I hated writing. What I really hated though was the uncertainty, the feeling of not knowing if I was doing good enough. I hated that writing was made out to be something you could explore and be creative with when you were still expected to conform to a baseline of what “good writing” should be. The way my schooling experience taught me to write a certain way and to sound “academic” and “professional” deterred me from even trying to think outside the box. I always wondered why I should even try to write when the way that feels right to me is not seen as good enough, that it doesn’t meet the standards, that it isn’t high caliber. You might as well just give me a bunch of math problems to solve at that point. But writing is a path itself within the greater journey of life. A path full of decisions and possibilities, but a path that we all try to control and create rules for.
The sun is setting as I am walking across McCarthy Quad to get to the library. I think it’s so interesting how everyone is going out of their way, deciding to take a route that is much longer just so they can cross along the brick pathway. I hate that pathway. It is always filled with bicyclists, skateboarders, and pedestrians who refuse to make room for you to get by because that would mean straying from the pathway and onto the grass. But I love the grass. I love staring at its vibrant green color(when it’s not all dead of course) as I cut across it so that I don’t have to use the path. I wonder why more people don’t do it and why they avoid the grass like it’s some scary thing.
The thing is, the path was put there to be walked on, so I guess it makes sense that people choose to follow it. That’s what it’s there for, and we all tend to stick to what we’re used to and what we know works. But I ask myself, is the grass not there for the same reason? The earth did not always have these pre-designated paths to follow. Animals relied on their instincts and senses to interact with their environment and move around. However, hundreds and thousands of years later, man-made trails and pathways are the norm, the way to get from point A to point B, and we tend not to deviate from them.
My recurring nightmare is really just a reiteration of our fears to create our own paths, to possess the power of deciding where to end up and how to get there.
I must admit then that my tendency to be critical of those who use the path is quite hypocritical. The same reason I hate writing is the reason they hate walking on the grass and why everyone hates the unknown. But I have learned that just like my decision to walk on the grass, I can also decide to take the path less traveled in writing. I can dictate where I want my writing to take me.
This freedom I have given myself with writing has allowed me to be brought to the depths of my mind that have been unexplored thus far. I have taken myself into the darkness where mysterious creatures lurk and where the wind harshly howls. I have used writing to explore the different possibilities for how my nightmare could end, with some being more bleak and frightening than others. But, all of the possibilities have taught me something new about myself and the different ways I can push the boundaries of what I feel like I am allowed to do.
At times, writing has left me vulnerable and scared. It has humiliated me, stripped me of my clothes, and my protection from the environment, leaving my flesh exposed to the elements and my mind exposed to my greatest fears. My limitations. My imperfections. All of the things I hate most about myself. But most importantly, writing has unlocked my ability to explore, to create, to mold, to reconfigure. It has shown me how I can use my words to make an impact if not on others, then on myself, discovering my potential.
In the past, I have allowed writing to determine the path I am supposed to follow, the same way the brick walkway in the McCarthy Quad does for everyone else. What I have come to learn though is that I can create new ways for writing to play a role in my life in the same way that I have learned to create my own path across the grass to get to the library. I hope the more I am able to experiment with writing and allow it to take me on unexpected adventures, the less scary my nightmare will be and the more I will see all the possibilities of what I can achieve.