Eleven years ago, I found myself in the back of a cop car, my teaching clothes still on, arrested for a DUI.
Most of life’s unshakable suffering, the tracked mud of regret, comes from denying who you really want to be.
It manifests when we reach for a craving instead of a question, when we stay too long with the wrong person, when we are stuck inside a life, so far from what we wanted, we reach for whatever is loud enough—booze, social media, shopping—to cover up the plain fact that we have let ourselves down.
Prior to the night of my arrest, I’d spent thirty-one years outrunning the only thing I wanted: to write. When I told others I was a writer, my fear said Liar. Said Fraud. How can you call yourself a writer? You never write.
These days, I know better. Creativity is the reward. Not a book deal or an Instagram following. It's the process that makes you.
But back then, I practiced and predicted shame. What if I wasn’t any good? What if I wrote for years, and it never amounted to anything? It already hurt too much.
What if I spent my entire life chasing something that never loves me back?
Whenever I felt the ache to create, when my hands were hungry to write, I rehearsed my fear instead. I reached for something else: I ate, drank, smoked, shopped, fooled around with the wrong men. I spent calories, closet space, and many good cells trying to smother the shame. Avoiding a dream is safer than failing at it, right?
Most of my twenties and thirties were spent in writing-adjacent jobs. Even though I wanted to, I never wrote for myself. As a journalist, I had achieved a sparkly byline but quickly became discouraged when articles were killed for ad space.
Next, I became a high school English teacher. If I had summers to write, to lie on the beach and swim in my thoughts, the great American novel would pour like champagne from my fingers. If I could persuade moody, brilliant teenagers to wade into words, surely I could take the plunge, too.
I was convinced that teaching would be so inspiring I wouldn’t be able to put down the pen. Instead, the school I worked at was drunk on data. Removed every ounce of humanity from the curriculum. Bonused teachers if their students tested well. Color-coded students by level of proficiency. It wasn’t a job, it was a dystopian novel. Most nights, to deal with the stress, I’d have a bottle of wine and a few cigarettes for dinner.
The only reason I stayed was because I’d gotten a grant to teach spoken word poetry from a local nonprofit, Get Lit-Words Ignite. I watched, wide-eyed, as one by one, each student bloomed like a California poppy, spreading their petals to the sun. The ones who never spoke in class started were now talking. There were fewer red, glassy eyes. Attendance improved. I witnessed the transformation—what writing did for them—I was so jealous.
The night of my arrest, I was out with some other teachers, cheers-ing to the end of testing season. Summer was so close we could smell it. It was May, the promise of maybe—of what if—waiting for me. Driving home, at midnight, I was lost in thought about a new book idea when my rearview lit up with red and blue.
The morning after my night in jail, my studio apartment stank of empty and all her echos. The sink of crusty, unwashed dishes. The overflowing ashtray. The to-do lists crumbled next to the trash can. It felt like the scene in a movie where the main character falls into a three-month, sweatpants-wearing, self-medicated spiral.
Was this my life? Single, childless, drowning in debt, barely keeping an eating disorder at bay, suffering through a job I hated. Continually reaching for something stronger to hide the hurt. Stuck in my small room of silence. Handing the keys over to whatever could help me forget.
It was 8 a.m. My eyes darted around my sad 400 square feet. My glaze tiptoeing from my credit card, to my phone, to the open bottle of wine. It’s hard to say if I had a serious drinking problem, but I was definitely flirting with one. My social life centered around booze. Happy hours. Sunday football. Bottles of wine over dinner. Growing up in a “it’s five o’clock somewhere” family, I spent my life watching others use booze as their band-aid, drinking when uncomfortable, drinking to quiet what needed confronting. So, drinking when I felt anything—joy, shame, dark, the anger of not being who I promised myself I would be—felt like the natural response.
As I removed the cork, a Moleskine notebook, spine unbroken, caught my eye. Next to it, a bouquet of pens resting in a Write like a Motherfucker mug.
One poem, I bargained with myself. Just try. Dare to be wrong about it all. Then you can cry into your cabernet. One poem, and then, if you still want to, you can ruin your life later.
Being wrong felt right. The poem wasn’t great, but wasn’t as bad as I had spent decades fearing. After writing it, I no longer wanted a drink. I didn’t crave pizza, or a new dress from J. Crew I couldn’t afford.
I wondered what would happen if every time I wanted to self-destruct, I created something instead. What would my life look like? Who would I be, then?
The answer: a writer. I’d finally be a writer.
I decided to write a poem a day for the next year. For 365 days, I wrote. This led to a book, a career change, and a life centered around creativity.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying creativity is a cure-all. It’s not. Nothing is. But creativity is a chance to sit quietly with yourself, ask the hard questions — who you are and what are you avoiding. To ask yourself: am I happy with who I have become?
I wrote my last book, Boat Burned (YesYes Books), to stop apologizing for who I was, especially as a woman. My prompt: by the end of the writing process, I want to finally love myself. For real. In that book, I sat for one long year and asked myself the most brutal questions: Why the wine? Why do you give it all to men who give you nothing? Why are you so convinced love belongs to everyone but you? Seventy-ish poems later, I didn’t have all the answers, but I certainly had some.
Writing changed my relationship with myself: I became an ally instead of an enemy.
All my life, I have seen creativity change the people around me. Have watched my tough-talking father with pirate tendencies silently weep at the feet of music. My sister pull applause from an audience with the shimmy of her curves. My mother turn twenty again every time she ran her fingers over department store fabric.
Creativity tutors you in the ethics of who you want to be. Creativity ushers in a higher version of the self. It offers a chance for us to sit quietly with our souls and ask them what they need.
You see, everyone deserves a gate, a gravel-laid road to lead you to your highest potential. To dare you to be the person you promised yourself you would be. Creativity is the quickest route I know. It brings something mysterious and magical out of your body to prove how alive and hurt and in love and on fire you feel. It gives you the music to match this spinning, wild, world.
Since the night I spent in jail, over the past eleven years, I have written two novels, three poetry craft books, one screenplay, and a poetry collection. I recently quit my job so I could write more.
The more I write, the less I drink. The less I need. The more I write, the happier I am. I’m the most me I’ve ever been. No longer trying to outrun myself, I face my fear every damn day, fingers knocking at the keys, wading through each ache, to honor the parts still standing.
Most people spend their lives trying to summon the courage to create. Those who do create often limit themselves to the conventions of one genre and their own judgments. We tell ourselves such sad stories about what we are capable of. But what if we said something new?
I want to build a house we can fearlessly live in. Where we can answer yes over and over again. Dare ourselves to pick up the pen, or brush, and prove we’re alive. I don’t want anyone to feel as far away from themselves as I once did.
This year, I have crossed over and committed to a fully creative life. To write in different genres and expand my definition of myself. I want you to do the same.
The Creative Crossover invites people of all different levels, genres, and experiences to engage in art, to be their whole creative selves. Learn to lead a more creative life—using tools and techniques from writing—to feel endlessly inspired and soulfully fed.
For 2024, every month, I will offer one craft-intensive workshop where you can explore your creativity through writing and another offering where you can get feedback on your work, join a generative writing session or book club. (All events listed in the Welcome Post.) I also offer a 30-day challenge to help you do deep feeling, thinking, and writing.
Keep reading for life and writing prompts below.
Life Prompt: What is the one thing you want but have been too scared to reach for? What actions act as avoidance? What is one small step you can take to get closer to who you want to be? To bring creativity into your life?
Writing Prompt:
Warm Up:
A. Write a list of all the big, scary, exciting, and complicated questions you ask yourself. Am I good enough? Is this where I should be? Am I lying to myself?
B. Write a list of things you don’t know. For example: I don’t know how to stop the tides. I don’t know if I’ll see my mother again. I don’t know how to make love stay.
C. Make a list of things in their natural state. For example: a turtle burying her eggs, a pelican surfing the wind, a child leaning down to kiss a flower. Include yourself on the list. What do you do when you are most yourself?
Read the poem by Mary Oliver below.
The Summer Day
Mary Oliver
Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean—
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down—
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
Prompt: Write a poem that confronts the one thing you want to do but haven’t. The thing that will bring you closer to yourself. What questions are you asking? What is shifting? What actions have you taken to avoid or prepare? What is the thing you need to do to be the most honest version of yourself?
How are you embracing creativity, especially during these difficult times? How is creativity helping to challenge? To comfort?
The bit about teaching resonated so much for me. How many schools become factories for killing joy. I was an English teacher too. While I miss connecting with students, I don’t miss the weight of everything else. Thank you for your vulnerability.
Kelly, I am Nicole from sustenance. And joy just shared this piece and I think you’ve just changed my life forever. I am emerging from a chrysalis of a lifetime of others expectations of me. The universe sent me this piece and I am SO grateful for it. Thank you for writing it. Wow, I am.in.tears. Endless gratitude.