From Private Pages to Public Stage: Embracing My Voice as a Writer


 I have always been someone who loves writing. But I’ve never considered myself a writer. I have always done it naturally as a way to express myself but kept it private.

Any stories, poems, or just long-form thoughts and the countless notebooks I’ve accumulated over the years have just been a place to hold the abundance of overwhelming ideas and emotions daily life brings. Something I’ve never even given a second thought, or aspirations of being anything other than a form of personal expression and reflection. Something for me. Nothing more.

However, over the years, more than once I’ve had teachers or friends ask why I don’t do it in a more serious way. Perhaps I was so obsessed with music that I never even considered giving my attention to a different form of art seriously.

Recently, I have been doing a lot of inner work through a mastermind program for women. There, I had an encounter with someone that brought this topic back to the front of my mind. She asked: “Do you write?” and after a lengthy conversation, she said: “You need to start sharing this with the world.”

This happened at the beginning of the summer and the conversation was so moving that it made me stop and really consider this more seriously. I started to look back through some of my notebooks. I have to admit... sometimes I’m shocked to read back what I have written mainly because after doing so, I completely forget about it for years.

I’ve re-discovered many long-forgotten poems. A lot of them are heartbreaking, or working through heavy emotions like depression. So I never thought this would be something worth sharing, other than with myself... I’m still reluctant.

It also happens that sometimes I need to write in that moment, when inspiration strikes, and there may not be a notebook nearby, so I end up writing anywhere: napkins, little sticky notes, tiny notebooks, or scratch paper that may still have space left from other notes I’ve made... or even non-recycled envelopes...

When I like something, I keep it. So when going through this process, I found this tiny paper where I wrote a lullaby for my daughter Cora. She was only 3 months old. I remember writing the lyrics, and then making up a melody in my mind. I promised myself I was going to make it a composition. I may have had the intention, but the mommy brains took over and I never finished it. That tiny little paper disappeared for the longest time... survived (like many other scrap paper poems) several moves.

Two months ago, (and 15 years later), I found it. Because of that conversation, I decided right there to simply sit down and finally start writing that composition. It became my summer project and now it’s practically done. It has become a little choir and string orchestra piece that I’m really enjoying writing and I now want to start sharing and publish more formally.

Yesterday, as I was looking through some business materials and platforms, I accidentally rediscovered a private blog I created when my daughter was born. Again... I was shocked at how many years I kept it going... but more so, that I didn’t even remember it... there are 4 years of posts there, and I was more shocked to find out I had started 2 more personal blogs (this being one of them) that I have no memory of... One post in particular speaking about my love for composition and a commitment I wanted to make when I turn 33 to re-take composition again.

Well... life certainly took over and I never posted again on that blog. I focused on my kids, and the work outside of music that life presented at the time. I cannot say that any of the things I have done between then and now (and they have been plenty) are a waste of time. Of course, it all has been worth it, and it all has made me grow in many different ways. They were just not the things that I wanted to be doing, or that made my heart sing.

Seeing that old post, I could’ve been heartbroken. But those are the things that got me to start my business, (Violin Bootcamp) and now that the kids are bigger and I’m reconnecting with myself, finding these paused projects has given me a new desire to finish them. Maybe, now I can actually re-take that blog, and do what I said I was going to do in that post.

This little lullaby is the first project I’ve decided to tackle. I just wanted to take the time to share this journey, and acknowledge how important it is to make space for the things we truly want to do. Give them priority. Bring them to life. Or even better: Live them. It’s worth it.

See the score here.



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