If you stopped writing for a long time

[pegkerr]

If you stopped writing for a long time--and I mean a LONG time, on the order of several years--and then managed to start again successfully, I would like to hear a little about your experience. Why did you stop? What did you need to resume? What prompted your resuming? Did you fret about not-writing when you were not writing? Were you afraid that you had given it up for good? When you resumed, how long did it take you to have faith in yourself?

Comments

Hi...

[charisma.livejournal.com]

Hi.. I've been lurking here and reading your journal a while, figured I'd comment on this because I did, once.

Why did you stop?
I was going to college, and I got very sick and had to stop doing that. So thought I might die for about ten years, so I spent that decade doing nothing creative because I was pretty convinced that I had no life left.

What did you need to resume? What prompted your resuming?
Well, I'm sure that it's different for everyone but for me, music saved me. In particular, a band called The Elected (http://www.myspace.com/theelected). I listened to their music, found it beautiful and felt like maybe life wasn't so bad. I started writing poetry, wrote a book of poetry and gave it to them. After that, I just kept on writing- short stories, poems, articles... still writing, though sometimes slowly. Working on a collection of short stories.

Did you fret about not-writing when you were not writing? Were you afraid that you had given it up for good?

I thought I was done with that part of my life and I didn't have a serious need to write anymore. But I felt like I was dead, so that's pretty much why. And yeah, I thought it was forever. Writing again felt like rebirth.

When you resumed, how long did it take you to have faith in yourself?

Faith is a shaky thing - some days I have faith in it, some days I don't. But I keep writing now, and I think that's what's important.