Let’s talk about Fear baby.
Sometimes I’d weep on the drive home thinking about how terrible I felt after sharing my stories aloud. Nothing could have prepared me for the harsh criticism that ensued between those walls each week during our 2-hour evening classes.
I missed when the words would effortlessly slip out of my fingertips, and my ritual was simple as: hear words, find paper, write. I never worried about whether what I had to say was right or wrong, good or bad. I shared my words because putting something out into the world that other people could connect with made me feel alive, and I always understood this work would be my ultimate purpose in life.
I had chosen a memoir class, because myself seemed like the best topic to be an expert at as a starting point. In my first class, I eagerly volunteered to start the live readings with a childhood story, confident of the praise to ensue at the finish line. But the room was silent. Everyone, including my teacher um’d and uh’d under their breaths, as they attempted to convey a tactful way of saying “are you sure you’re in the right place”?
After my last class, my teacher sent me a carefully crafted email, telling me it wasn’t too late to choose a different career path.
I felt incredibly beaten down. I had quit my job after feeling spiritless in my work to take some much needed time to focus on myself. After spending half a year exploring India solo, I returned home certain that whatever it was going to take – more education, writing for pennies, being poor – I was ready to pursue my writing as more than just a hobby.
And for a long time I did. I met with publishers of big magazines, interviewed, cold called, applied to go back to school, enrolled in every night class I could find remotely related to writing, accepted ghost writing gigs on topics I knew nothing about. Begged, pleaded, cried.
There were little wins, but for every one, there were huge losses to counter it. After 2 years all in, and what felt like little to no progress, I finally decided to accept that perhaps all the doors closing on me were clear signs indicating this was not the right path for me.
I never considered myself to be a fearful person. I was the first in my family to go away for school, the first of my friends who dared to quit their job and travel, and despite all the warnings globe trot through India solo. But these acts of “bravery”, didn’t change that in facing my biggest fear – being vulnerable – I gave up when it got too hard.
I am not changing careers, leaving the country, or even professing a specific direction for writing. Writing is still a scary place for me to return to, and I struggle with whether I will ever belong here. But what I did manage take away from all the criticism, rejection and tears: not all stories have to have a romantic ending, sometimes the story ends, because it’s where it was meant to end.
Sonal Batavia 