Wednesday, June 7, 2023

If I had to give up writing… An IWSG blog post


Welcome to the first Wednesday of the month. You know what that means! It's time to let our insecurities hang out. Yep, it's the Insecure Writer's Support Group blog hop. If you're a writer at any stage of career, I highly recommend this blog hop as a way to connect with other writers for support, sympathy, ideas, and networking. If you're a reader, it's a great way to peek behind the curtain of a writing life.

Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG. This month's co-hosts are: Patricia Josephine, Diedre Knight, Olga Godim, J. Lenni Dorner, and Cathrina Constantine!

June 7 question - If you ever did stop writing, what would you replace it with?

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First, /shudder/!  The thought of giving up writing is horrifying. Though I have sometimes considered giving up publishing, I have NEVER considered giving up writing. That seems like giving up breathing to me--it's so integral to my life and wellbeing. So, this is definitely a very hypothetical question for me. 

When I was younger, I might have pursued another art--focused on music or drawing. Those were also among my early loves, alongside writing, and scratch a similar itch for self-expression and creation. 

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But these days, my fingers don't work so well (they never really worked all that well, to be fair), and I don't have the finger dexterity to get very far with instruments or sketching anymore (at least not by hand--the way I loved them as a child). 

So, if I had to give up writing (and it's hard to imagine what could make me do that), I'd maybe take up film making. 

There's a lot of exciting story telling happening in short film (though maybe that's cheating--I'd still be writing, just in a new-to-me format). 

How about you? For my fellow writers, what would you pursue instead? For readers and other creative folks, what if you had to give up your favorite mode of self-expression? What would you do then? I'd love to hear about it in the comments!

9 comments:

  1. I could see continuing writing but giving up the publishing dream. I'm kind of there now. And film making sounds like a good switch for you if you had to due to the pain in your hands.

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  2. I'd find an outlet somehow. Storytelling is too much fun. :-)

    Anna from elements of emaginette

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  3. Filmmaking is an excellent choice! Publishing has become a paper boat for me. Surprisingly, I'm okay with that ;-) Long as I can write, I will. Maybe I'll see you one day in the woods ;-) Write away!

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  4. I do a few creative things so if I opted to stop writing completely, I'd just knit more.

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  5. LOL! That picture says it all. Oh, the horror of not having the written word to depend upon. I continued to write before I had an audience. I can't imagine that would change if those circumstances returned.

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  6. Story-telling IS passion... It doesn't just stop; though it may change form

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  7. Either way, you'd still be telling stories.

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  8. I second Alex: film making is another way of telling stories. It is almost writing, but using a different media.

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  9. Film making is a wonderful storytelling medium! I've written short scripts before and they're such a different form of telling a story but very, very creative. I think the force to be more concise and allow the cast to communicate more than just your words is a challenge. There are so many ways to tell stories that aren't centered around writing. I've really enjoyed this month's question. It's got me thinking a lot deeper about my other forms of art.

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