Detox Tea Talk: August 2018

Originally published on August 26th, 2018

Last month, I took a much needed break from writing. I only posted four times in July, and instead of forcing myself to complete four more pieces, I focused on theatre and traveling instead. I never thought I'd want to take a break from this website, but I guess after over a year and a half things can change. I've never been very good at knowing when I need a break, but after starting a bunch of new pieces and not being able to finish them, I knew that I needed to take a step back. 

When I say I took a break from writing, I mean I took a complete break from writing. I didn't write poetry, I didn't write in my journals, and, as you know by now, I didn't write for this blog. I've always been a writer, and finding myself struggling to put words to paper (or screen) was really strange. It can be weird to take a break from the thing that defined you for so long. But I think that's one of the reasons the break was so good for me. 

For the last two years, writing became the thing that I was known for. I was known for being the poet, the one with the blog, and the one who read a lot. There was nothing wrong with this. Actually, I loved being known for these things, because I'm proud of it. I like that I write poetry and read a lot and have a website that I built myself. But my love of traveling and especially my love of theatre were kind of pushed to the back burner. When I took that break, I got to travel (obviously. France was great, and so was Luxembourg), and I got to focus on my internship with the theatre instead of writing a bunch of posts in advance for the rest of the summer. 

Writing is hard. It requires you to be vulnerable and open to criticism. Writing can help you deal with emotions, but sometimes it requires you to talk about past emotions with causes you to experience those feelings all over again. Writing can be emotionally draining. But writing is also what I love to do. It gives my mind space to wander and my soul space to breathe. Even so, writing isn't the only thing that does those things. Traveling let's my imagination run in a thousand different directions. Being involved in theatre makes me alive in a way nothing else does. So yeah, I took a break. 

But now I'm back, and have been for a while. I have posts ready for the rest of the year so I can still keep up with everything when I start college and start filling my time with more things that I love. Taking that break reminded me why I love writing, but it also reminded me that in order to write you have to take time to live. Until next time, 

~ Claira 

Iced tea this time, with a murder mystery as a bonus.