By Carley Sullivan, Photography Editor
I think being an artist, I have an innate desire to express emotions, whether that be through a visual art form or through language. I have tended to take more of a visual approach to expressing emotion in the past, but recently I have taken to writing a blog and many letters– despite my previous near hatred of writing.
Writing has always been something I found myself dreading, thanks to being forced to write so much through school. Although I have always been fascinated with the idea of arranging words in a way that actually expresses my emotions and thoughts, while also getting them outside of my head, I still struggle with this. But I have started to put my writing out there more.
When I was younger I was one of those kids who loved school and put myself in all the honors classes and enjoyed doing all of my school assignments.
As time went on, I became less excited about writing about all of the things I was forced to. Writing was no longer a fun thing that I could express myself through, but it had become a chore to write about the assigned topics that I couldn’t care less about.
Now that I am older and have more control over how I spend my time, I have been able to write about things that I enjoy, I began writing letters to multiple pen pals and sharing my thoughts on my blog that was previously just for sharing my artwork.
While doing these things, I have found my love again for writing. I have been able to express feelings and share those thoughts and ideas, no matter how messy the words and sentence structure have been. I think that there is a beauty to the process of getting emotions out on to the page, even if it’s ugly at first. Sometimes I think you need to allow yourself the freedom to send that really messy rough draft of a letter to someone or to post that blog post that is a very authentic representation of how you feel, even though it may be a sloppy compilation of word vomit.
Allowing myself to express my emotions through writing, as well as though my visual art has been a really exciting thing for me. I had forgotten how much fun it can be to write and share my own thoughts on the things that I love and care about. I hope you will all take some time to let yourself write for yourself again, because I don’t think you will regret it. Also, if you are interested in seeing the thoughts that run through my mind, check out my blog at gnarlycarley.weebly.com, and maybe start your own while you’re at it!
