Checking myself

I really need to work on myself and be a hell of a lot more proactive about things. I’ve started wondering if my writing is suffering because I’m not giving it the time it deserves. Lately, I’ve been postponing writing my articles until later in the day when I used to do them either right after an event, or right after all my interviews were done. Like right away. Part of me wonders if it’s because I just don’t have as tight of a schedule without 1) an office and 2) school during the summer. Like at my one internship (with an office), I get stuff done super fast. But there I definitely don’t care about my writing as much because I don’t really care about the organization. I just need to fucking make rent so that’s why I’m there. I still write about shit that matters though, because fuck not doing that. Seriously.

But with my first internship, I can’t EXPRESS how much it means for me to work at South Seattle Emerald, have the wonderful editor I have, experience the wisdom and knowledge and creativity and honesty of my beautiful, wonderful coworkers. A publication that was birthed out of community struggle and inequality, a start-up that seriously runs on the fuel of morality. I need to do better. If not for myself, definitely for them and also the community I’m serving. I love all of them. I do. And I’ve seen my pieces make a difference in real time, which I can’t even put into words how wonderful that is. But. I need to do better.

I need to sit down and make some serious goals and actively work toward them, starting either tonight or tomorrow morning. This needs to happen. My writing deserves it, those my writing involves and affects deserves it, and I owe it to myself, too.

For f***'s sake.

Last week was a real wake-up call.

Post-script:
I also had a moment of existential crisis about doing journalism for the rest of my life because I realized that if I’m not taking the time to dedicate to it like I used to, am I losing my passion for it?

The answer is I’m not. 
​
I know SURE AS HELL my passion for what I do is whole-heartedly still there. I just. I think I got too cocky and too confident or something and just lost my dedication to making it the best it can be. Being the best I can be. Doing the best I can do. And that’s BS. I should not be doing that at all. Not at all.