I became a writer by accident — or that’s what I’ve been telling myself
I had no plans of getting into writing. But I did. Why?
I was never supposed to be a writer.
I didn’t grow up writing Harry Potter fan fiction or stories about magic kittens. I for sure didn’t write any poetry. I occasionally wrote a diary, but didn’t all kids?
I wasn’t even a particularly avid reader. The only time I read in volumes was when they gave us a reading challenge at school, that is when I was externally rewarded for it. (Towards the end of the challenge, my parents had to take me to the doctor because I was suffering from neck pain. . .)
Anyone who knew mini-me or even medium-sized-me thought I’d go into something that requires dexterity and a sense of aesthetics — like interior architecture or dentistry. When I wasn’t doing homework, I was arranging my bookshelf into the color of a rainbow, folding tiny origami boxes for storing my beads, designing namesake high heels for my friends at school, or taking photos of dinosaur figurines in burst mode and turning them into GIFs in which the dinosaur explores the peculiar human world. I even attended a high school specialized in visual arts and dreamt of being a fashion designer, a photographer, a chocolatier — not a writer.
“Nothing about my childhood and adolescence suggests that one day I’d sit down to type every morning and that I’d have sticky notes with story ideas scattered all over my apartment.”
What I’m trying to say is that nothing about my childhood and adolescence suggests that one day I’d sit down to type every morning and that I’d have sticky notes with story ideas scattered all over my apartment. Nevertheless, I now write for a living (if you consider content design writing) and for a loving (this is me writing for fun, I promise).
So how did I get here?
I used to think that Morning Pages made me a writer by accident. But the more I think about it, the less convinced I am that it’s the full story.
Altogether, I have three theories:
- Morning Pages made me a writer
- Writing comes naturally to me
- I have a strong drive to share my experience
I’ll let you decide which of them is the most convincing.
Theory 1: Morning Pages made me a writer
Four years ago, a friend recommended I try writing Morning Pages, three pages of longhand stream-of-consciousness journaling first thing in the morning.
She promoted them as a kind of solo psychotherapy, a way of getting some distance from your thoughts by dumping them on the page. Her recommendation had nothing to do with trying to help me unleash my creativity, or if it did, she masterfully camouflaged any such intention. We were both in psychotherapy back then and were simply curious about anything that could boost our healing.
Initially, I waved off the idea as I often did with her suggestions, which could feel a bit woo-wooey to me. This one also sounded like a waste of time; writing down random things for 20 minutes was the definition of inefficient to me. But later, for a reason I can’t recall, I gave Morning Pages a try.
It’s already halfway through November. This year is soon ending. I thought my acne was getting better. But no. Why does everyone else have flawless skin? I need to remember to get those batteries for the fire alarm today. Maybe I can go to Clas Ohlson after work. I’m meeting Elena in the center anyway. What’s that sound? Why are they fighting this early in the morning?
After I finished writing one page of this type of nonsense (I rarely did the recommended three pages), I closed my underlined Muji notebook and went on with my life. The next morning, I did it again. And again. And again.
Julia Cameron, the creativity queen behind Morning Pages, suggests that some people struggle with this style of writing. But I had no trouble writing down my unedited thoughts as petty and repetitive as they were. At times, I even enjoyed it — especially when strong emotions or the previous night’s dreams came out on the page.
After a few weeks, I started to feel an urge to write down my thoughts, but not just my morning thoughts. I felt compelled to jot down any observations and insights that felt significant to me. So I did.
I wrote them down on scraps of paper around my home and the notes app on my phone. Then, one day, I opened a Google Doc and started working some of them into a full-length text.
In January 2021, I published my first Medium story Dear 2020, Thank You for Stripping Away My Routines and Good Habits. If it sounds like a diary entry, that’s because it was, albeit one that took multiple hours to write and edit.
And because I continued getting story ideas, I continued writing. I’ve continued writing for almost four years now. (Three years into my writing journey, I also landed a job that has to do with writing. My Medium blog was useful — it worked as a kind of writing portfolio.)
“Timing-wise, Morning Pages are the most convincing theory for why I started to write; I started doing them, and shortly after, I started sharing stories on Medium.”
Timing-wise, Morning Pages are the most convincing theory for why I started to write; I started doing them, and shortly after, I started sharing stories on Medium. But if we are to believe Julia Cameron (and we are), Morning Pages can unblock any type of creativity — not just writing. So why didn’t I begin to make punch needle rugs or design home textile collections, things that would’ve made more sense considering my childhood interests and my studies?
Theory 2: Writing comes naturally to me
When I talk about my bachelor’s studies, I often say I studied textile design, but I never worked in the field. People rarely ask why, so I leave it at that. I don’t tell them that I never even tried to get into the field. I didn’t believe I had it in me — neither did a professional recruiter.
It was the last year of my bachelor’s studies in design. I was taking a print design course which was not only a course but also a competition. Every year, Aalto University’s design department organized this course in collaboration with H&M. At the end of it, three students — the ones with the best work — “won” the course, and were offered an internship at H&M in Stockholm. But even if you weren’t among the winners (which I wasn’t) you got a chance to meet the H&M representatives if you wanted to. Now it was time for my session.
I entered the small room where the dark-haired recruiter was already sitting. I sat down opposite her, placed my portfolio on the table between us, and introduced myself. I started leafing through my portfolio, explaining things here and there, but she barely looked at it. I could tell something was wrong.
“I don’t think this is for you,” the recruiter said abruptly.
I forget the details of the conversation that followed but I think she went on to explain how we both knew this was not what I really wanted or should be doing. What I do remember is being on the brink of crying, not out of disappointment but out of relief. In a twisted way, I felt seen. Finally, someone had said out loud what I’d been thinking: I don’t have what it takes, whether it’s the talent, the drive, or the mental toughness that’s required to succeed in this field.
At the end of our session, the recruiter suggested that I might be a good candidate for fashion buying. Fashion buying? She handed me her business card and told me to get in touch if I was still interested in her suggestion after graduating. The business card lay in my desk drawer for years, but I never contacted her.
What does this story have to do with writing? Bear with me, we’re about to get there.
Throughout my studies, I was convinced that if I hadn’t been one of the valedictorians in my high school, I wouldn’t have gotten into design school at all: The full points I got from my high school diploma (and the entrance exam interview which was the only non-artistic task) allowed me to cross over to the list of accepted students.
When I watched the other students discuss their sketches with the ceramics studio master, strut from one station to the next in the woodworking studio, or mix a steaming pot of dye-filled water and fabric, I saw people in their element. But I didn’t feel I was in my element; I felt clumsy in my vision, my ideas predictable and childish, and stiff in my execution.
But writing is different.
Writing has come easily to me— especially the kind I do on Medium. “Easily” doesn’t mean I can write up a great story in two hours (I’m a very slow writer). It means I have more ideas than I have time, first drafts often emerge on the page in a few furious sittings, individual stories organically grow into series, and even when I get stuck I have this silent knowing that if I just keep working, I’ll eventually surpass it.
And perhaps most importantly: I enjoy the process. I enjoy how stories slowly build up inside me while I experience things in the world and reflect on them. I enjoy the reading I get to do for my more sciencey stories. I enjoy collecting all my notes and transferring them onto a Scrivener document (at least once I get started). I enjoy tying the raw bits and pieces together with words. I enjoy making decisions on what to include and what to omit. In a way, I even enjoy being stuck. In those moments, I get to test myself: What happens if I keep working despite the resistance? I love realizing that I’ve made it over the hump, that a story is close to being finished, which almost always comes as a surprise. I also enjoy the final edit: reading my text out loud and scrutinizing the paragraphs, the sentences, the words.
And because I enjoy the process, I’m willing to spend a lot of time on it. Like the design students who’d sit in the print design studio doing dye test after dye test to arrive at just the right shade of mauve, I can sit with the same text for hours on end — 20 hours on average if we’re talking numbers (I track my writing hours).
“So as much as getting into writing might’ve been an accident, staying in it certainly hasn’t.”
So as much as getting into writing might’ve been an accident, staying in it certainly hasn’t.
But there’s one more thing that might explain why I write and why even the stories in which I’m referencing lots of academic articles are quite personal.
Theory 3: I have a strong drive to share my experience
It’s 9:53 p.m. I’m sitting on my mom’s belly in my parents’ bedroom. She’s tucked under the covers. She’s stuck under the covers. Finally, I have her attention. Or perhaps I should say: I grab her attention.
And I talk and I talk and I talk.
You know what happened in PE class today? We had to run to a beeping sound indoors. It was part of the fitness test. And now that the tests are going on you can often hear the beeps in the classroom as well. Beep, beep. Beep, beep. It makes it a bit hard to concentrate sometimes. Oh, and Herr Ohlhorst keeps repeating how much he loves colors and makes us color-code math equations. And did you know that Mira always says cows are her favorite animal? Most people would say cats or dogs, or even guinea pigs like Emilia, but she says cows, and then she draws cows everywhere. It’s funny. And since they’re renovating the indoor yard, we now need to go to this barn laid out in front of the main entrance of the school during breaks. This older student, Tomi, had taken a picture of it and written a funny caption, and it was published in this morning’s Metro.
Mom often wondered where I got all my evening energy from. But how could I not have all this energy? This was my chance. My chance to share with her what I’d seen, heard, and experienced out in the world. And I saw, heard, and experienced a lot. A lot of small things worth noting, at least to my ten-year-old self.
So I didn’t let her off the hook. The hook of my legs clamped around her small waist. I didn’t let her off the hook until she said it really was time now. Time to go to bed. OK, Mom. Let’s go to bed.
Although I wasn’t a writer growing up, I was definitely a talker. My family used to call me papupata, bean pot, with all those words jumping up and down, bumping into the lid.
And what is a talker? It’s someone who likes attention. Or someone who has learnt that when attention is there, it’s important to grab it and fill it with words — because who knows, there may not be another time soon.
But a talker is also a sharer. It’s someone who yearns to share how she experiences the world — what she sees, hears, feels, and tastes.
I’ve always loved sharing.
I’ve held blogs ever since I was 13. I’ve had a style blog, a photography blog, an exchange year blog, a food blog, a restaurant blog. I even had a food-related YouTube channel for a year.
From that perspective, my Medium blog is not that much of a surprise. It allows me to share what I’ve experienced and learned as a human being, whether it’s related to mental health, productivity, or my job. It’s the adult equivalent of sitting on my mom’s belly and blurting out whatever I find significant and meaningful (you’re lucky I spend a lot of time editing).
Also, if I didn’t write, I’d be a worse sister, daughter, friend, and colleague. Why? Because I’d never shut up. Now I can give people more space to share their thoughts, and then I can go talk with the page.
I may have become a writer by accident. I may have stumbled upon it through the magic of Morning Pages.
But I haven’t stayed in it by accident.
And as long as it’s fun, I think I’ll stick around.
