For Those Lost In Their Own Doubts

Not many of you know how I started my writing journey. I realize I started this blog with some of the fruits of my emotional introspection over the years instead of starting you off with how I began to put thoughts to pen and paper.

Here goes.

None of this was linear. I'd love to say this went from point A to point B and it just took off right away.

In my case, all it took was a spark. What does that look like in my world? Well, it was an assignment my third-grade teacher gave to us, which was to write a poem. Of course, being the Aquarius that I am, I had to be different than everyone else and decided to write the poem in Spanish. I was eight at the time. And had asked my mother, whose native language was Spanish, to help me convey the words I was trying to say. Once I was finished, I absolutely fell in love with what Poetry could do. My teacher was impressed when I turned in my assignment. But most importantly, I impressed myself. At eight years old I had managed to find my calling, without even noticing at the time.

Fast forward to Junior High. You know what I'm talking about. The awkward pre-teen stage where you have absolutely no idea who you are and what the hell you're supposed to be and everyone has a million opinions about it. Even through that transition, I could still feel myself itching to express myself again. This is where Pop Culture plays a part in my journey. You see, I'm a horror movie buff. And as analytical as I am about them at times, I'm not ashamed of it! There's nothing I love more than to have Horror movie marathons throughout the year, not just during the Fall season. With that said, one of my favorite horror flicks is Halloween (1978). I remember being fascinated with this movie and wanting to write about an iconic character just like Michael Myers who has inspired many of its preceding slasher movies.

However, writing horror novels, just wasn't my thing. And that's okay. You should never force yourself to write something that isn't genuine or isn't coming from a meaningful place. I realized that my words seem to stem from more of a romantic standpoint. There was a poet inside me, a modern Shakespeare, an edgy Emily Dickinson bursting at the seams. When did this epiphany take place you ask? Pop Culture strikes again. Do yourself a favor and watch the movie; Tuck Everlasting. Or at least read the book! I didn't realize it at the time but it has so much more depth to it than people understand.

The ending of this movie infuriated me during my pre-teen years. So much so, that I decided to create fanfiction. This was the crack in my glasshouse. This was what I needed in order for me to push myself into writing more and creating characters that I absolutely loved. Granted, this allowed me to branch into writing fanfiction for other shows and movies, like Smallville and One Tree Hill and even the infamous Twilight!

Enter Highschool. I was fourteen. And I still felt like I wasn't really capturing my own voice yet. Here I was tweaking what other authors have written until I fell in love with a boy for the first time. This was a completely different ball game. Now, if you're a writer, you know that writing based on your own life is bittersweet. You're basically giving yourself therapy through your writing by taking a look at what went wrong in your relationships and what could've gone right as your pen continues to bleed through your notebook paper.

It wasn't until 2019 that a magazine called Z Publishing contacted me through Twitter expressing interest in publishing one of my poems! I couldn't believe it at first. I didn't count how many books were sold after it was published. It didn't matter to me. To have my poem in a book, alongside other beautiful poets who have also bared their soul for the world to read was a transcendent experience all on its own.

Fast forward to today, 2022, a world where we are still living in a pandemic, where this virus keeps mutating and finding a million ways to force us into introspection, I am happy to say I'm a self-published author. No agents. No fancy marketing team. I am the team. Now I'm not knocking anyone who has all that. Some of us are too frugal to cough up the cash for it. All I'm saying is...I'm free. Free to do with my work whatever I want. Change it whenever I want. Market it whenever I want. I can write whatever my truth is and can appreciate anyone who takes a liking to it and can resonate with the words that have touched them in the same ways my favorite books have touched me.

I hope after reading this you understand it's okay if your own writing journey has its own highs and lows, curves, and forks on the road. It's all for a good reason.

Trust your inner voice. It will guide you to where you're meant to be.

- Shar

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