I write this during the final two weeks of the year where it feels like it should be over but apparently it isn’t? So I’ve held most plans for the shiny new-ness (and greater possibility of people reading their emails) of the new year.
I started this post during a different time of rest: Thanksgiving weekend. November is known to us writes as NaNoWriMo, aka National Novel Writing Month, where writers all over the world attempt to hammer out 50,000 words. I’ve used their online platform before to keep track of words, but I’ve never seriously participated. It was always a busy time for school, and quick drafting is just isn’t how I write. Plus, this year I’ve been working on short pieces.
My partner, however, has participated for eleven years, almost every year for the past 13 or so. Some of their work I’ve loved was written during Novembers. But this year, they just couldn’t do it—and neither could I do some sort of “writing every day” thing I’d hoped. It’s been a rough year.
So, we came up with “NoWriMo”—no writing month. No pressure to create or all the public accountability that comes with it. We were burnt out.
And…it worked?? When I gave myself the space to not be creative every day or at all, I realized that I still wanted to write, but in a healthier capacity: instead of focusing on the end result—a finished draft, publication, payment—I wanted to write because it was therapeutic. I’ve reached a stage where instead of obsessively chronicling everything, I am starting a new draft that is more distilled. Instead of just thinking about having written something during the day, I crafted paragraphs and put them in my notes. Okay, I still feel pressure because what I’m working on will probably be a part of my MFA application, but I actually find that application less stressful than submitting something for publication.
This year, my health and circumstances forced me to rest more often, and I found so much value in resting instead of overworking myself. So, I’m giving you permission to rest. It isn’t laziness, it is rest.
New Year’s is often full of productivity-related resolutions and goals. It doesn’t have to be, though. I got a new planner, but I’m going to use it more like a diary, rather than set goals I don’t complete and then burn out. I want to see what I actually get done.
Make it your goal to find your limits and rest accordingly. Take some time off so your creativity can come back. Use your vacation time and sick time if you need to. Go to bed early. Sleep in on weekends. I know we’re not all able to have these luxuries, unfortunately. But we should.
Further Reading
Elsewhere…
Dickinson (Apple TV+) has ended, and buried among its many literary treasures might be how Emily’s older brother Austin definitely has a quarter life crisis with his source for meaning in season 2 and his subsequent fallout. Also, a great show, especially if you’re a literature nerd like me (the portrayals of Walt Whitman and—believe it or not—Sylvia Plath had me laughing).
On some recent interviews like his appearance on Fresh Air, Kieran Culkin (aka Roman Roy in Succession, aka the real-life brother but on-screen cousin of the Home Alone kid) says he fully decided he wanted to be an actor—something he’d been doing his whole life—in his mid-thirties. Maybe (Also, Roman did his own sort of “growing up” in the recent (third) season and I still keep thinking about that final scene…)
The newest episode of Depresh Mode was a gentle reminder of the collective trauma of the pandemic and what that might look like moving forward.