Category Archives: On Being Latina

Sometimes the present is so changed that the past is linked to the present only by a fragile word. To build something new, you must be prepared to destroy the past. – Yvonne Vera.

The first time I read that quote in Butterfly Burning I was in an immense amount of pain. I wasn’t in physical, but the internal pain was nearly unbearable. I was being pulled into several directions professionally. First it was my love, my work, journalism and being a reporter at a mid-sized daily. Then it was my first love, my future, writing and the MFA.

For a time there, it seemed that journalism demanded more of me than it had in the past, ironically during my graduate program. However, I wanted to give the program and this direction a fair shot.  I always wanted to write books and that they’d be fiction and that the road to finding my voice would go through this program.

What to do? Not sleep? Quit one or the other?

Then I read this quote. The word that linked my past and present at the time was safety.

Becoming a storyteller? Yes, that was in my DNA from the minute I could breathe. My brain doesn’t and can’t function any other way. But what made me (frankly) miserable during this time? Safety.

On one hand, I wanted to stay where I was as a writer and journalist because it was familiar. I found a sense of comfort in knowing things others didn’t, not because I gained that experience through learning but because I had some sort of seniority. I had become one of the “old timers” (mostly through attrition). Life had become predictable in a way and that make me feel so safe even though I knew that I was stagnating in my craft.

On the other hand, this new thing, this MFA and this journey toward finding my voice? This was what I yearned for. New air. New thoughts. New muscles being flexed. I took to this life as if this was where I was meant to be. But this also scared me. There were so many unknowns. Would I…could I…actually become the writer I’ve always wanted? This was not the inverted pyramid of journalism but the truth of fiction where I could wound or heal myself with a phrase — there was no detachment.

Scared. I was scared either way.  Then I read this quote and it made all the sense in the world.

In order for me to stop being scared, I needed to be ready to destroy the past.

That didn’t mean to quit one or both — newspapering or MFA. That meant that I needed to rethink what it meant to be a writer and a storyteller. That meant I needed to define what that was for myself and how I could carve my own reality.

Once you understand the meaning of your writing, you can carve out your own destiny. (Click to tweet this)

That’s when I began to own who I really was — a storyteller who can tell a story in many different ways.  I chased stories with a new zeal and read everything I could get my hands on, including creative nonfiction. I wanted to learned how different stories and writers worked.

I became an apprentice to words. 

So now, among the sea of tweets and statuses and the speed of changing technology, I know that the world still needs storytellers. That talent is one of the building blocks of humanity. People will always want a story.

And that, readers, is the most freeing thing in this world.

Editor’s Note: This post is part of a 28 day blogging challenge from Imperfectblogging.com. The goal is to develop your blogging voice. To learn more, click here. 

Have you ever seen the movies where people confess to a crime right before something big happens? It’s one of those trademark things that always happens in big blockbuster movies with explosions and such.

Well, there’s a reason those confessions happen before the big BOOM. Confessions are BIG and SCARY and well, draped in all kinds of truth.

Yesterday, I wrote about truth in S.E.L.F as part of the 28 days of imperfect blogging. Today, I write about confessions and I tell you one of my secrets. Here goes…

I am afraid of success.

Shocked? When I came to that conclusion, I was as well. But it seems that I’ve always been afraid of success. Here’s a video of me talking about being accepted and about to start one of the best chapters of my life — grad school.

Yup. Fear. It was written all over my face at the time.

While some folks fear and run from failure, I embrace it. I love failing. That means there’s more work to do. But success? At one time, it meant suffocating. As a result, I’d sabotage myself in so many different little ways. I didn’t want that bomb to explode, I guess.

About three years ago, I got the best advice, however, from a business woman at a convention I was at. My fear of success wasn’t about the success part, she said. It is a deeper issue, something you need to meditate on.

She was right. I wasn’t afraid of success. I was afraid of being done. If I was wildly successful, then what? What do I do with myself? If I write a book that everyone LOVED, how can I write the next book?

As a writer, something like that can block your creative juices for a while. But I realized that success wasn’t about other people, it was about me. I determine what is successful and what it looks like. I determine what the next step to my path is.

The secret to confessions is that you have to be true to yourself. Only by being truthful can you do the work worth doing.

Click to tweet

For writers, that’s a lot of heavy lifting. But it’s also great material for the page.

Now, it’s your turn. What’s your confession?

Editor’s Note: This post is part of a 28 day blogging challenge from Imperfectblogging.com. The goal is to develop your blogging voice. To learn more, click here. 

When you think about Shakespeare’s famous quote (the one in the picture above) what comes to mind. For me it means finding a place of authenticity within yourself and being okay with it.

As writers, journalists, or storytellers, this is crucial because that’s where stories come from, a place of untouchable authenticity. That’s step one to the story, to find its truth. Step two is to tell it.

For Dr. Maya Angelou, that place of authenticity within one’s self is the thing one must keep pristine, clear from anyone and everyone, including yourself. That’s that one place where no one can tell you about yourself, the core of the truest true and the purist pure. Your most authentic self.

So, what’s my truth?  Now, that is a GOOD question.

Many times in my life, when people wanted to define who I was (and there have been many) I asked myself that question. Who am I? What’s my truth?

I started that journey so long ago and from that moment, and all the moments since, I remember (as if I could forget) who I am.

I am a writer. A sister. A daughter. I believe in the truth in all its forms. I believe words are a form of truth and that using them for anything else is blasphemy. I believe in empowering not only myself but others in any way I can, most especially when it comes to writing or storytelling. I am my father’s daughter, my grandmothers’ grandchild.

And I am complete.

My theme is called S.E.L.F

S: Self-acceptance, even when it’s hard.

E: Endless searching for the truth

L: Love in all its forms

F: Finding my path (no matter where it takes me).

What about you? What does Shakespeare’s quote mean to you?