My writing journey

Since the beginning of the year, I have been trying to find a place to write so that I can hone my writing skill. I have found that finding a place to write is not as easy as it sounds!

I have also come to understand the life and struggles of being a writer and of finding their own places to write. I’ve come to realize the reasons why some writers retreat to cabins in the mountains: it isn't just the peace and quiet they need, it's also the atmosphere. A writer needs to be in a place that inspires ideas and creativity; a place that gets the writer's blood flowing. Such a place might be different from writer to writer: it might be an individual thing. It might depend on the genre and subject matter that the writer broaches. Would it be best to retreat to an environment similar to the locale of the story or the book? If one is writing about the sea, one wouldn't want to be in the mountains but on a beach. The waves and the sand would inspire the creative flow. If a story or book's locale
was set in a forest or a jungle, one wouldn't want to be writing in a tent in the middle of the Sahara Desert. Yes, I can see there might be benefit to retreating to a homogenous locale.

Yet I have familial responsibilities and I am not financially well-off enough to escape to my own cabin (particularly since I don't own a cabin and I don't have money to rent one). Such is life, cay sara sara, as Doris Day might sing - what will be will be. Which basically means that I have to settle for what is available.


I am a daily wage earner trying to find a writing job to augment my income. What is available? Newspapers. Job forums. Word of mouth. I used all three and with persistence, and probably a little luck, I finally found the place I was looking for.

Several weeks after submitting my essay test at EPH, I became a member of the gray team. Writing blogs is something I’ve never done before.
Thus, being new to the blogging industry, I have found myself committing "lessons to be learned." Errors in other words. (From errors we learn lessons.) Some of these lessons to be learned were my incorrect uploading and naming of files, and uploading the Winzip, *smile*. Oh how grateful I was that there were kind hearted people around me (the staff and my fellow writers)! At the initial stage of my being a writer, they were there to answer all the questions of a newbie writer.


Aside from not having my own internet connection at home, I am also a slow writer. These limitations of mine had caused me to be reluctant in getting an assignment. My doubt was transformed into self confidence when I found a friend from the red team who shared with me her writing experience with EPH and gave me tips on how to make my job easier. My newfound friend would often gave me an advice that “If others can make it, why shouldn’t I? Besides, how can you increase your pace if you won’t try?" “Lakas ng loob lang yan,” she would often insist.


With this new friend's support, I finally gained the courage to get an assignment.
Nonetheless, there was still a yellow streak down my back and I felt the need to back myself up a little. I requested a grace period, just in case the assignment proved more difficult than anticipated.


Armed with this new confidence, I proceeded doing my first assignment. Upon completing it, I was amazed at how drained I felt! Hemingway said that writing 300 words a day is hard work. I of course am no Hemingway, but I did gain a little insight into what he meant. The focus, planning and revision of intense writing was indeed hard work!


As they say, all work and no play makes a person dull ... No. That does not apply here. I love to write! Yes, it was hard! But it was never dull or uninteresting. It was invigorating. Stimulating. Totally worthwhile. It's what I want to do! Yet the heaviness of mind and even fatigue of body, nonetheless, helped me to remember. I immediately bought myself an ice cream. The cold milky chocolate on my tongue rewarded me nicely for my accomplishment.

I found my second assignment easier than the first. It wasn't as mentally fatiguing. The third was easier yet, and by my fourth submission, I must have been doing something right because they promoted me to the red team.

In retrospect, I have to say that an on-the-job friend is indeed a comrade. A comrade, a mentor, is what every new recruit needs.
She helped me as I struggled along the way, and prodded me when I was about to give up because of lack of time and self confidence. With the experience and training I acquired at EPH, what seemed to be a grueling writing activity, now has become a totally enjoyable experience that fulfills me.