April 24, 2024
Dear Writing Diary,
My second revision is officially back with my agent! While waiting on her feedback, I was eager to start writing the next few chapters of the sequel, but she has advised me to hold off on doing so for now while she reads. So, as a result, this means I’m currently on a break from novel writing right now…which is OKAY. Better yet, it’s healthy.
The fact that taking a break from doing something I love in order to rest and rejuvenate shouldn’t be a revolutionary idea, but for me it is. For over the last decade that I’ve been writing, I’ve taken few breaks. I prided myself on writing at least something every day, which has resulted in me completing eight books over the last twelve years. Looking back, I don’t regret writing at that pace to get to where I am now, but a few months ago the feeling of burnt out that I’d been fighting against for a while at last crashed into me.
I was stressed and uninspired. I was also simultaneously restless and exhausted. Just like it had been for years, my life was split into two halves of school/work and writing. But unlike before, these two halves alone were no longer enough. I felt caged by the routine I had created. A routine that for years I had found comforting…until it wasn’t. In addition to writing, I craved creativity and adventure through a different outlet. I craved to experience and create more.
So, I started another hobby, which quickly became a second passion in the form of graphic design (see the below screenshot of the inspiring words I had engraved in my graphic design pencil!).
But I didn’t stop there. I started listening to different podcasts I found interesting that were entirely unrelated to writing or publishing. I started going to a local café on the weekends to read and write and people-watch (oh, come on, we all do it). For the first time in my life, I even started reading and enjoying self-help books. I was still writing of course, but gradually, step-by-step, my life was becoming more well-rounded. And still is…
Which is why for the next month that my agent has my book, I refuse to feel guilty for writing less and spending more time on my other interests. I know that this will ultimately decrease the speed at which I write books in the future, but overall, it will make my life more balanced and fulfilled. Don’t get me wrong. I still love writing. It is still my first passion, and one that I will gladly stay up way past my bedtime doing in order to meet deadlines I’ve either set for myself or someone else has set for me. But those hardworking nights will be balanced eventually by days of lazy reading or taking time for morning yoga. My writing will take on a schedule that more closely resembles the ebb and flow of the ocean’s tide or different temperatures of the seasons, sometimes hot and exhilarating while other times cool and slow. The one thing I will consistently do, however, is to nourish my creativity, whatever medium it might take.
So, as always, here’s to seeing what tomorrow holds. Even if it’s not writing, it will definitely contain at least one, if not more, beautiful and inspiring things.
-K
I've been mulling over this post for a while! Thank you so much for sharing your experience, it's so precious. It's extremely inspiring to feel how dedicated you are to writing (freaking 8 books in 12 years?! Tell me more!!); and at the same time I can totally see how difficult it is to strike the balance between dedication and burnout.
Also, reading how you discovered other hobbies (kudos for that too!) made me think of something: being a writer it's a weird thing, because we have to imagine all sorts of fantastical things and experiences that we may never have if we just spend all of our time writing. Maybe trying out different things can make us better writers?