It’s been a while since I’ve sat down to write. Sometimes I go through phases when I barely write at all, which is hard when so much of my identity is in being a writer. I envy the kinds of writers who go up to their lovely writing lofts every day and write for hours and hours. I’m just not that kind of writer, I guess. I thrive on creative bursts, so when creativity is lacking, I have a hard time forcing it. I’m not very disciplined. But today I’m finally sitting down to get words on the page.
So what have I been up to?
I’m not working right now. For a while, this was a struggle for me. I felt a sense of purposeless, of failure. Jobs I applied for didn’t work out, which was impactful on my self-esteem. I struggled with questions like: Am I not good enough? Why doesn’t anyone want me? What am I even good at? And then I got pregnant. Since I’m planning to stay home with the baby, I didn’t want to start a job that I’d be leaving in a few months. So I decided to stop the job search and to just wait for the baby. But here’s the thing: waiting turned out to be very hard. I felt the purposelessness very keenly, very acutely. I began to wonder: What is my purpose? How do I bring meaning into my life? Continue reading “Searching for Purpose”