It is hard to disentangle yourself from your work when your identity is so tied up with it. I am a writer. I don’t know what I would do or who I would be if I wasn’t a writer of some sort. I always wanted to be Jo March (I know; everyone wants to be Jo March).
Writing gives me a sense of purpose, but it also gives me a lot of joy - I’m lucky to get this from my job, many people don’t. But it does often feel like I’m walking a tightrope (this is also a good metaphor for general freelance life); trying desperately to keep steady, while wobbling a lot, and feeling like I may suddenly lose my footing and fall. This tightrope is suspended over a deep ravine with hungry crocodiles at the bottom, AKA Twitter.
‘You are only as good as your last story’ is an old adage in journalism. Some journalists might dismiss this as being silly, but I do feel this hanging over me. Perhaps this is a good thing: it motivates me to be better. But if I don’t feel like my last story was good enough or if I’m struggling to get commissions or if I’m finding writing difficult, then it does feel like a punch to the gut. I think freelance journalists feel this more acutely because our whole livelihood is based on our ability to not only deliver stories, but also to hustle and sell ourselves as writers (it’s not just our words that we’re trying to sell, but ourselves - why am I the best person to write this piece? Why should you commission me?), which demands a certain level of self-belief. We are our words. On a good writing day, that makes me feel great. I have honestly never felt as euphoric as when I’ve written a sentence/paragraph that just flows out of me and works - as sad as that may sound.
But on the bad days, when I can’t even spell, when a piece doesn’t go to plan, when the rejections keep coming, when my mind is a barren wasteland and finding the right words feels like drawing blood from a stone, and the curser blinks at me - mockingly - from a blank page on Word, it does make you question yourself. What if my words aren’t good enough? What if I’m not good enough?
It’s easy to feel like an imposter. The insecurities quickly creep in; you wonder whether you will ever be able to write again (why does this always happen when you’re on deadline?), you start comparing yourself to *insert successful journalist around the same age as you, here* and you wonder whether you should just pack it in and get a job in marketing. At least the money will be good.
Of course, self-doubt plagues everyone. Some more than others.
As much as I hate to admit it, it all comes down to self-confidence, something that is very hard to learn - you are either blessed with an abundance of it or it just seems to steadily accumulate with age and experience, like white hairs. Once that happens, I hope it will be easy to see the off days as a small blip that you will recover from, not a cataclysmic problem that will trigger an existential crisis.
During these moments, I have to force myself to remember why I fell in love with writing in the first place. And it was love. A coup de foudre (love at first sight… or love at first write). It felt like freedom.
I have to force myself to believe that the words will come, and they do - eventually.
But, we are more than the words we put down on paper, more than the job we have, or the money we earn. It’s worth remembering that; I’m trying to.
Reading
We’re Not Going Back to the Time Before Roe. We’re Going Somewhere Worse - This New Yorker piece by Jia Tolentino was shared widely following the overturning of Roe v. Wade - if you haven’t read it yet, you should.
Her husband was abusive. He was also a cop. Is there a link? - In last weekend’s FT Magazine, Sarah Haque focuses on one case of police-perpetrated domestic abuse in the UK and investigates how he turned his police training on his wife ‘Cora’ who described it as like living in custody in your own home. It is beautifully written, but it will make your blood boil.
Egypt Destroys Nile Houseboats, Washing Away a Living Lore - Houseboats along the Nile are being towed away or destroyed by the Egyptian authorities in a move to commercialise the riverbanks. This piece shines a light on the history of the boats - the last remnants of the city’s glittering past.
The Paper Palace - A book with a narrative as chilling and enveloping as the pond the protagonist dives into every summer in Cape Cod. If you are looking for a summer read, give this a go.
The last of the Bougainvillea years - Lebanese poet Zeina Hashem Beck writes vividly on displacement, home, and nostalgia:
“I’m mourning Beirut, which rose and danced in October and exploded in August. I’m mourning the ever-reduced possibility of going back. I’m mourning Arabic, which my children will no longer learn in school. And I’m mourning the bougainvillea in my garden — my companions, my beauties, my trees with infinite iridescent flowers like thousands of windows.”
Tokyo’s Manuscript Writing Café - A café where you can’t leave unless you’ve hit your writing deadline. I can’t decide whether this would be my nightmare or something that would be really useful.
Watching
Last Night in Soho - Late to this, but I loved everything about this film - the innocent Cornish girl going off to London to follow her dreams, the flashbacks to Soho in the sixties, Anya Taylor Joy, and the unexpected, violent ending.
The Real Mo Farah - The four-time Olympic gold medalist for Great Britain reveals a secret he’s been keeping for most of his life; he was trafficked to the UK from Somaliland as a young boy (under the name Mohamed Farah - which is not his real name), where he then worked as a domestic servant for a family. This documentary unravels his story and highlights the horrors of child trafficking.
Writing
The show must go on: Ukrainian ballet dancers, now refugees in Paris, vow to keep dancing for their country - For The Globe and Mail, I was very lucky to be able to meet (and watch) ballet dancers from Kyiv City Ballet during their rehearsals at the famous Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris one hot afternoon in May. The ballet troupe arrived there on the 23rd February for a short tour. The next day Putin invaded their country. Théâtre du Châtelet, one of the most iconic stages in the city, offered them a residency, enabling them to keep performing.
For Kyiv City Ballet, dance is a form of resistance; a way to share the Ukrainian culture and renowned fighting spirit with the world, as well as helping to raise money for charities back home. Ivan Kozlov, the company’s founder and director, calls them “troops for the stage”.