I write because I have to in order to live. Some days I control my writing, and other days my writing controls me. It is an unfortunate relationship, an addiction even. If I don’t write, I go through withdrawal. Like a binge drinker, the only way I can get my buzz is through writing. The click of the keys is electricity. The creative flow goes through me in one jolt, taking control of my fingers as they dance across the keyboard. 

The disappointment and failure I feel when the inspiration leaves me as suddenly as it came is overwhelming. My consciousness is torn from my world and jarred back to reality. One way remains for me to jumpstart that buzz, to recreate that exhilaration. I just have to keep writing until my mind is struck and I am transported back into the world of my story. The creative lightning lives again. 

My sophomore year in high school, I tried to stop writing for two reasons. I felt discouraged by this constant whiplash that would happen between reality and my world. Writing became a chore, and, for some reason I didn’t understand yet that writing is a job. 

I showed someone my writing, and they told me that they could not see me being a writer. This is possibly the hardest thing to be told when you are passionate about something. These are two things that shattered me. 

I wanted a purpose in life, and I wanted to be able to do something I was good at. Being told that something you are passionate about is not what you are meant to do is one of the most demoralizing experiences a human can ever go through. 

Fast forward three years. I’m in my gap year, trying to find something to do and that creative lightning hit me. It was the first time I was so inspired to write that I hadn’t even had to type a word for that jolt to hit me. 

In that moment, I knew, beyond a doubt, that I had to write. My story transported itself from my brain to paper one way or another. For days, my fingers danced across the keyboard, letting out all of the creative lightning that had been pent up for three years. 

Now, I thank the person who told me they could not see me being a writer. I no longer care about what they said. Constructive criticism is one thing, but I am determined now. A determination I did not have in high school. Whoever said that they could not see me being a writer is absolutely right, they can’t see it. 

Challenging me with that statement has taught me now not to internalize my writing, but to internalize my identity as a writer. Internalizing it to the point that no one can steal it from me. Nothing anyone can say about my writing can take that from me. Creative lightning and identity are the two reasons I write.