I started writing this blog a year ago today. I guess it’s fitting that I started my blog on national mental health awareness day.
Writing for me has been something that has become healing for me over the years. I didn’t make a career out of writing. In fact I didn’t write for a long time. I listened to a couple of outside people, who I didn’t really know well and I stopped writing. They said I was untalented, and a crappy writer.
It was odd, because when I started college, my advisor asked me as I was trying to make decision on a major what I loved to do. I loved to read and I had all these ideas in my head for short stories, but I had not followed that side of myself, because I was a musician and frankly the people that I went to high school with were way more talented and creative writers than I thought I could ever be.
I went to college and learned that my love of writing, wasn’t just about the stories in my head. I started sharing my short stories and sometimes it was sharing of random thoughts. Professors encouraged and I learned that I didn’t have to choose music or writing. I could still play in the band and write and I have been known to write lyrics on a couple of occasions.
I graduated from college and graduate school at the beginning of the web year’s. People were being brave. They I longer had to tell you to your face what they thought about you, or something about you. And someone I still don’t know who. Said in a chat room that I had no talent and should stop trying to write. Best part is I took some strangers words to heart.
Fast forward to 2018 and I am laying on my couch one Friday afternoon and I could hear the thunderstorms rolling in and all of sudden I was writing this story that I knew nothing about how it was going to play out.
That story never did get written,in its entirety, and that’s okay because I have another one that is, and a third started.
The blog started because a friend of mine thought it would be important to share, the mental health writing I was doing during COVID and furlough and processing all that was happening. So after working out my fears of sharing my writing and my feelings with people, I decided to take the risk.
I have talked a lot about how we treat each other. Taking a step back and listen. Stop judging, start loving each other. Stop the hate. These are the things that weigh on my heart.
I celebrated my “herd” expanding on here, and mourned loosing a member of my “herd.” You, read about my love of running and trying to out talk the fat girl in my head to go run a race. Yep, broke my ankle and leg, but I met an amazing friend that day and I will not change that for anything .
Experience shapes us, good, bad and sometimes just plain ugly we are shaped by how we experience things. I can change the color of my hair, I can add a tattoo, I can do a lot of things to my appearance but it doesn’t change my heart.
So my friends as I start into year two with this blog, know that I will continue to ask you to treat each other with love and respect and be mindful of what what is happening around you. We are all in is together and as a mentor once told me. We are all that we have in this world, please take care of one another.
Until next time,
Juli
Juli's Blog 