Tag Archives: Weekly Content

The Ghost of You Haunts This Empty House

This house is slowly collapsing on itself ever since you’ve been gone; life has been a whirlwind of lost time. The departure of you has created a void within me. I have realized that I’m more fragile than I once thought I was after you left me impairable by your destruction. I could never understand how such deep penetrating sorrow can drill into my brittle bones without puncturing the walls of my lungs, how my chest can be full of love and sorrow all at the same time to bear it all. 

Time slowly escapes me; the only evidence of lost time is tainted behind my sullen eyes and the dark shadows beneath them where the ghost of you haunts me. I can feel misery slowly spreading itself inside of me, the heaviness of sadness weighing on my chest, remorse tugging on my shoulder blades, a seething longing building up in my throat of things left unsaid. A darkness has loomed over me, gradually spreading into my chest like a fatal poison bringing me closer to death second by second. A self-inflicted death, I don’t think I could ever stop loving you as your presence wraps around me like a second skin. Maybe love has always been a fleeting nature of a tender dying matter that could never be kept for too long.

The day you left, something shifted inside of me. I started tearing down the wallpaper in our bedroom and repainted it as if it could undo all the memories that were held within the walls. Sweet nothings scattered across the floorboards, I tore them apart one by one, hoping that your voice inside my head would ease away. I took down photographs of us, but your image lives permanently on the walls of my mind. I changed the sheets, but your scent has engulfed the entire house. I took the batteries out of the clocks because time has ceased to exist ever since you chose to abandon me. All that remains is the emptiness that has settled inside of me of all the things I’ve lost and loved.

The Importance of Having a Routine

Being a writer or anyone pursuing a creative field is difficult because you have no one to push you to do the craft except for yourself. As a result, it is easy to get burnt out or fall behind on creative work. Therefore, creating consistency through implementing a routine that will help you produce good work is essential.

#1: Eliminate All Distractions
Eliminate all distractions by putting your phone away or putting it on do not disturb. If you’re working on a device, clear all the tabs you do not need and close all the programs you don’t need. A further tip is to delete the messing app from the dock to prevent you from being distracted by incoming messages.

#2 Empty Your Mind
Before you sit down and start your creative process, you must clear away any distractions. As an overthinker, I find it important to empty my mind by journaling or meditating to clear any lingering thoughts and worries. It is also a great time to set your intentions and be relaxed before you start working.

#3 Set the Mood
Whether it’s lighting a candle/incense or playing music in the background, it is important to stay zen and relaxed to help you focus on the task at hand.

#4 Come Prepared with All Your Materials 
For me, I know when it is time to write when I have all my material laid out for me and a freshly brewed hot cup of coffee. Further, having all your supplies will help you enter a flow state as you do not have to keep moving around and encountering distractions.

#5 Get Working
Some days are better than others, but as long as you dedicate even 5 minutes to the craft, you are one step closer to getting better each day. I work organically, and sometimes hours go by, and sometimes I spend more time staring at a blank page but learn what works best for you. You may want to do the pomodoro method or see where the day takes you.

The Art of Cultivating Taste

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

– Ira Glass, This American life about Storytelling

I can’t remember when I stumbled upon Ira Glass’ concept of cultivating taste, but it has stuck with me ever since. I was going through writer’s block and felt so seen and heard reading his words. As a perfectionist, it is very defeating to sit down and produce “shitty” and unsatisfactory work where the feelings you want to explain are not piecing together the way you want them to. Some days are better than others, where the words can flow out of me naturally, and some days I am left staring at a blank page until I feel defeated enough that I no longer want to write anymore. But, on the days when everything works in your favour and you feel proud of what you have written is the best feeling in the world to me. Whenever I feel down and doubt my writing abilities or feel like I have created the best work and peaked as a writer, I return to this video and feel reassured. Whenever I feel a sense of imposter syndrome or a writing slump, his words comfort me like a blanket in the death of winter.

Check out the full video series of Ira Glass talking about storytellng here