Mom Writes First
Mom Writes First inspires busy moms to make their writing dreams a reality.
Write the book, book, poem, blog, or journal! Whatever you're writing, this podcast is here to help you reach your writing goals.
Get ready to be inspired, empowered, and supported on your writing journey.
@momwritesfirst on Instagram & TikTok
Mom Writes First
13. When Writing is Hard (a tool to help you write, even when you feel like you can't)
As I sat scribbling notes on the bleachers during my child's sports event, the reality of balancing motherhood and writing struck me harder than ever. It's a struggle that's all too familiar, and today, I'm getting personal with you about how to keep your writing dreams afloat in the storm of family life. We're diving into the CPR method - Compassion, Perspective, Release - a lifeline I've clung to when the tides of life and creativity clash. By starting with a healthy dose of self-compassion, we can better understand the weight of our challenges. Shifting our perspective, we'll examine whether writing is genuinely impossible or simply uncomfortable in the moment. And finally, we'll chat about the art of release, learning to let go of the barriers that hold us back from the page.
Wrapping up this heart-to-heart, I'm reaching out to all the fellow writer-parents to join the ongoing conversation where encouragement flows like ink at momwritesfirst on Instagram. Remember, your stories are not only valuable but necessary, and there's a world eagerly anticipating your words. So, cheer up and tune in for this session of unwavering support, as we pledge to keep our pens moving and our narratives unfolding. Let's promise to touch base again soon, continuing this shared journey of storytelling, motherhood, and the magic that happens when we merge the two.
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What do you do when it's hard to write?
Speaker 1:That's what today's episode is all about. Hi, I'm Jen. I'm the host of Mom Writes First, the podcast that helps moms write every single day. Today, I'm here to share with you something that I recently wrote to myself while I was at one of my kiddos competitions. I'm a Mama 5 and I'm also aspiring to be a published writer. I work full time and so, with five kids, I try to squeeze in my writing wherever I can. Over this past weekend, I was at a day-long competition for one of my kids, but the nature of the sport that he participates in meant that there was a lot of downtime in between his events. When he was resting, I wrote a little bit of a note to myself in my journal, and when I got done, I looked back at it and I thought, oh my gosh, this would be perfect for the podcast. And so I'm here now to share that with you.
Speaker 1:What do you do when it's hard to write? There are going to be times when you sit down to write and the words just won't flow. There are going to be times where you feel stuck. There are going to be times where you don't like your writing, editing can be hard. Getting feedback is hard, especially when we are not used to actually receiving meaningful feedback and especially if we have not prepared our ego for that feedback. There are going to be times where we prepare to write, where we set aside time, we find someone to watch the kids, we get everything ready and then something comes up A kid gets sick, the dog throws up, the stove breaks, or an emergency at work desperately needs our attention. All of that happened, by the way, in the last month. For me, there are going to be times when it feels like nothing is going to plan, where it feels like life is just too messy, too chaotic and too hard to make time to write. This is normal. This is typical for moms. This is not unusual, especially for moms. What do you think, dear listener, can you relate? Maybe you have other challenges that have made it even harder to write, and I find myself in this space where it feels just too hard to write, or when I'm working with a client who is showing up and telling me it's too hard for them to do something to reach their goal. It's too hard for them to write every day. It's too hard for them to make space to write at all.
Speaker 1:I use a coaching tool called CPR to move through and beyond those hard places CPR stands for Compassion, Perspective Release and we work through them in that order. Let's take them one at a time here today and talk about how we might use them to work through those moments when writing feels very hard, beginning with C, compassion. When we're first starting out to move away from those places that we're struggling in. For those times where we're finding our writing to be hard, it's really critical to approach ourselves in that space with Compassion, to acknowledge with both love and compassion, that where we are and what we're feeling at the moment is real for us. When I coach someone on this, I begin by holding them truly in my heart from a place of compassion and acknowledgement, to acknowledge and validate their feelings that, yes, this is really frustrating and yes, it is really hard and for sure, all those little things, those little annoyances, those little things that go wrong, they add up and they do make it hard to write. I approach it in this perspective from a place of unconditional love and acceptance and compassion. When I'm coaching somebody, I feel like it's such a special honor to be able to sit with them in that moment and hold that space for them. And the reason that I can coach from that particular place is because I not only hold you in that place of love and acceptance, I also, at the same time, want the very best for you, and in doing so I acknowledge that I don't, as your coach, know what is best for you, but your wisest self does. It's from that place of compassion and love, where we acknowledge where we are in the moment, when things feel hard, that we can actually move on to looking beyond that situation. And that's where the P in CPR comes in. That's where we begin to look at other perspectives that might exist.
Speaker 1:I know for me personally, when I'm in the throes of the struggle to write, when my laptop and I are sitting at the back of the struggle bus and the words just won't come out. After I have compassion for myself, after I acknowledge that it is frustrating, that it does feel lonely, I can then begin to work on perspective taking. In my experience personally and as a coach to others, perspective taking is a really important part of shifting out of that space of frustration and feeling like everything is very hard my favorite question to ask myself when I tell myself that everything is so hard is is this actually hard? And of course, if I'm being completely honest, the answer is no. This is not actually hard. It isn't actually hard to have writer's block. It isn't actually hard to find time to write. It isn't actually hard to say no to things that are getting in the way of my writing. It makes me uncomfortable to do so, but that's not the same as being very hard. It's not actually hard to get critiqued on my writing, to have an editor red line my writing every which way. That might not always feel good, but it's not actually hard. And it's the same thing when I talk to clients, after we acknowledge that they are feeling very frustrated and lonely and that it is feeling very hard to them and that they're struggling, after we acknowledge that and hold them in the place if I ask them the question so is this actually hard? Almost every time they look at me kind of from like the corner of their eye and they're like no, this isn't actually hard. Sure, it feels hard in the moment, but it is not actually hard.
Speaker 1:There are a lot of things in this life that are hard. There are some things that I think are actually quite hard. Cancer, cancer is hard. Health scares Also really hard. Kids starving Hard, people getting hurt that is hard, literally. Not having a way to pay your rent Hard. In our modern lives most of us don't actually have many struggles that are actually and legitimately hard. It seems hard, but it's not actually hard. We've just become very comfortable. We've just become used to instant gratification, discomfort. Sitting by itself is not hard. Not being able to write because we have writer's block, while it's frustrating, is not hard.
Speaker 1:Getting critiqued on my writing makes me uncomfortable, but it's not actually hard. Sure, it seems hard in the moment. This is a very unpopular opinion, but my view is that the things that we're talking about as struggling with with our writing, those are not actually hard, and labeling them as hard as holding us back it's stopping us from reaching our goals, it's stopping us from writing. Remember that while you're taking perspective, you're already holding yourself in a place of love and acceptance and non-judgment, and so it is totally safe for you to take that perspective and realize that, while it is frustrating, while it might feel uncomfortable, that does not make it hard For most of us. We are privileged and blessed and our basic needs are more than met. We may have health issues and challenges, and I totally agree that those are hard. But writing is not hard. My stove breaking, the kids getting the flu, even the emergency at work those things aren't hard. Does that mean that we don't love ourselves anyway? No, because our number one step here is C, to start with compassion. But it does mean that we can open the door to a perspective shift so that we can hopefully get off of the struggle bus once and for all. And that brings us to R in CPR.
Speaker 1:This is where we release the resistance to things being hard. We accept that it isn't always easy to write. We stop labeling it as hard as if that's a bad thing. It doesn't feel easy. We release the expectation that it should feel easy. When I find myself on the struggle bus, I find it very helpful to remind myself that nothing has gone wrong. It's supposed to feel like this. I'm meant to be here sometimes. It's part of the process. It's part of sitting with my writing. The critical feedback is part of growing. The daily hassles are life's way of making sure I show up as the kind of mom and kind of writer I really want to be. It's part of the whole package of being a writer. At this stage in my life, when I'm trying to release that resistance to things being hard, here's one way that I think about it that really helps me to move through it.
Speaker 1:Did you ever have to tune a radio dial by turning a dial? When I was a kid my dad had this all-beat-up brown truck. He used it to drive around on the farm and, honestly, the floorboards were like partially gone. The radio barely worked and to get it to work you had to tune the dial just so you had to get it just right to listen to the station that you wanted to listen to. And sometimes you'd be driving along and on the back roads and you'd hit a bump and the radio would slip out of tune. So you'd have to correct it. You'd have to re-tune it and dial that dial in.
Speaker 1:For me, being a writer feels kind of like that at this stage in my life, like I'm trying to tune in to being the writer that I want to be and when something comes up like a kick at sick or the stove breaks, that's just a bump on the road and, yeah, I have to recalibrate, retune, retune that radio dial, but it's just part of it. It's the same thing when someone gives me a feedback and it might make me feel like I'm a little derailed from it, or the same thing when I get hit with some writer's block. I just have to take a breath, acknowledge where I am, have compassion for myself, do a perspective shift so that I don't get caught in that feeling of hardness, and then release the resistance by tuning back in to that writer that I really am, just as if I were tuning a radio dial. Each time I do that, it gets a little bit easier to tune back in and eventually I know that I won't even have to re-tune after every bump. I'll just be all digital and type the number of the radio station right in. I'll just go right to being the writer that I want to be.
Speaker 1:Look, I know that this requires a little bit of a leap of faith, that you have to believe that you could be the kind of writer that you want to be, even in the face of the things that come up every day, the daily struggles, the things that throw you off, even in the face of challenges, even in the face of daily struggles. Once you release some of this resistance, it's so great because it frees up your mind and it frees up your creative juices to start working and moving forward, and that's what's so awesome about this CPR method. This method, the CPR method and this idea of tuning in to be the writer that I really want to be truly works for me right now and it's something that I've shared with clients. But what I really love to do is work with clients to find their own way to release the resistance, because every one of you, every client I work with, every one of you listening out there, you each are so unique and you're going to come up with your own way that really works for you. Try this out.
Speaker 1:Let me know what you come up with over on Instagram at momwritesfirst. I can't wait to hear from you there. All right, my friends, that's all I have for you today. In case no one has told you today, you are a resourceful, creative, whole human being. You are an incredible writer and you need to keep writing. The world deserves to hear your stories. Please join me again. I will see you next time.
