It’s been a long time since I’ve felt inspired to write. Some time last year I made a decision to step away from blogging to focus on my MSc, but mostly it was because I’d lost the passion and fire that I once had for pouring my words onto a page.
As is often the case when you turn your hobby into a business, what was once created from inspiration was now created from obligation. In some ways I fail to see it as “creation” at all.
The blogging landscape has changed so much over the past 10 years (I started this blog in 2017 if you can believe it). When I first started writing, I wrote what I wanted to write about – that was kind of the whole point. But slowly as blogging became a legitimate career and this became my income, what I wrote about and the way I wrote about it shifted. It had to.
After a few years of this, I couldn’t ignore the reality that writing in this way had stifled my creativity and turned what was once a passion into a chore. So I stepped away, hardly by choice, convinced that I’d lost my joy of writing altogether.
I wanted to feel inspired again, called to write about something because I just couldn’t keep the words contained. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d written a post without a plan, a search engine strategy, or a schedule to hit publish. I missed the spontaneity of creation, but weeks became months, and still no inspiration struck.
Fast forward to a few days ago, when the sun made a welcome appearance in the UK for what felt like the first time in forever (perhaps figuratively as well as literally), when I felt that flicker of inspiration reawakening.
I always feel like spring hits me out of nowhere. Like yesterday I was living in the dark depths of winter, and today I’m awakened by the fact that the sun is shining at 5pm, the tulips in my garden have broken through the soil, and the jingle of the ice cream van is echoing through the house.
I can never quite put my finger on the feeling that this gives me – it’s like a cross between nostalgia and hope, I think. It feels like a sudden lift of the heaviness of life, when work feels a little less like work, and the realm of possibilities has opened up to me. It feels like what a new year should feel like.
As I allow myself to live and work more in alignment with my energy levels, it makes less and less sense to me that most of us in the northern hemisphere start our new year in January, when it’s darkest and coldest, when the natural inclination is to hunker down and hibernate. A few years ago I stopped setting new year’s resolutions for this reason, opting instead to set a word for the year to help gently guide me in a way that respects my fluctuating energy levels.
And now as we approach the spring equinox on the 20th of March, I’m finding myself naturally called to consider some more concrete goals and start dreaming again. Words are flowing to me and I feel excited to write! What felt forced and unattainable just a couple months ago feels like it’s opening up to me now, and I feel like I have the magic of spring to thank for that.
I think we could all benefit from living with the seasons a little more, honouring our energy levels, and taking a break when things feel forced. It’s not always possible in the society that we live in, but I believe there are always little shifts we can make, and maybe one of those is taking some time to dream and set new goals in the spring time.
Whether this is a new beginning for me or just a flicker of inspiration breaking through after a period of darkness, I’ll take it! I hope that this spring brings some lightness to you too.
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Esther is the founder of Through the Phases, an online space dedicated to balancing personal development and self-care. From her experience living with chronic symptoms, she believes that rest is essential for a sustainable and fulfilling life. She has a degree in Psychology, is yoga teacher trained (200hr), and is currently pursuing a Neuroscience MSc to further study the mind-body connection. Read more about her story here.