Why I love writing

I am drawn to beautiful things. I suppose everyone is, to some extent, but I am just about obsessed with it. Beautiful rooms. Beautiful shoes. Just the right lipstick with just the right smile. The perfect flower arrangement. Pretty much every picture in Martha Stewart Living or House Beautiful magazines.

I am not, however, able to create beautiful things for myself. I am not able to be creative visually or, at the very least, not at the level I would expect of something beautiful for myself. I can knit but not well. I can take pictures but not of the breathtaking sort that I love. My biological father is an artist and creates beautiful pieces that I - and many others - covet wildly. I have always been mildly (tremendously) envious of his talent because you'd think that if I were going to be saddled with his looks - we are nearly identical - I could have gotten the artistic ability, too. But I didn't.

And so I'm left with a yearning to create beauty that I can't seem to fulfill in a visual way. But I can write. And I love to write. And writing makes me feel like an artist because I can make beautiful things with my words. When I'm inspired and ready, the words just flow from my fingers and into the universe just like a cascade of water.

But it's not just the creativity factor that makes writing so special to me. Putting my thoughts into words and words onto paper (or the computer) helps me "get out of my head". I suffer from depression and that disease is always trying to make me retreat into myself. The isolation and shame associated with depression can leave me feeling totally unmotivated to write but when I am able to push through that feeling and start to put down in words what I'm thinking and feeling, it nearly always marks the start of feeling better.

So for me, writing is both a creative outlet and an escape from the isolation of depression. In the eight years since I started this blog, I've used it for both purposes and also as a way to find connections in a disconnected world. Writing is my window to the world.


Comments

Anonymous said…
Denise,
You do write well! I've read your blog for years because it is so honest and forthright and gives such insight into who you are and, besides that, reads so well.

I finally commented on your blog a week or so ago when I was able to bring myself (technologically challenged and definitely "older") to believe I really could be anonymous. I want to urge you to continue to find ways to deal with your depression and diabetes. Don't find yourself in 30 years or so with heart disease, chronic kidney disease and more. I lived in denial, shame and neglect for too many years, and now wish I had paid better attention and loved myself enough to really take care. Please don't make the same mistake. You still have the opportunity for a healthy life with diabetes.

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