Why investing in your self-care and wellness is essential to sustainable creation
Listen folks and listen good:
You cannot build a writing practice without thinking about and planning for your own wellness. You will burnout, stay frustrated, remain exhausted and guess what? You will quit.
I hear it all the time: “I have no time to write” and “I’m too tired” or “I have had it with this industry!’ The last point is one I hear most often. And yes, as a marginalized writer I will be the first one to admit that the overwhelming whiteness of the Canadian publishing industry creates more problems than it solves. The historical and systemic barriers that we’ve faced and continue to attempt to climb over only add to this exhaustion. But I have made it a personal goal to focus on what I truly have control over: myself.
I want the writers that I work with to take back their agency. I want the writers I work with to invest in themselves first, even if no one else will.
In 2006, I started to take my writing seriously. I decided that (even though I literally had no publishing credits), that I wanted to build a career with creation at the core of everything I did. Enter the naysayers! Family, friends, colleagues—many of them scoffed at the idea of building a career in publishing. This was my first taste of the necessity for community. I needed to find the people who wanted to see me succeed. For me, that was step one.
In 2016, I became the managing editor of a local literary magazine. There, I learned about the terrifying “go, go, go” culture, and I was contributing to it. Everyone seemed to move so fast, we all prided ourselves on how many hours we worked while sitting hunched over at our desks, our faces bent into our Door Dash linguine and grande Americanos. I was on the brink of burnout and I could feel my body breaking down. This was terrifying. My first book had just come out and I was deep into the outline of my second. My body was screaming for help. Step two for me was to begin listening to my body and take action.
In 2018, my memoir was released and I was thrilled and eagerly looking forward to the book tour! My book took me across Canada, and even into Singapore! I had no idea the toll touring would have on my mind and body and not because it was super strenuous, but because I didn’t know what to expect and therefore I was underprepared. I didn’t know that I’d have to do back-to-back panels discussing the intimate layers of trauma I touched on in my book, even when I repeatedly tried to shift the conversation to craft. I didn’t realize that I’d have to then socialize in rooms full of people who then wanted me to further serve up my trauma. Where were my boundaries? How could I have protected my time? Was I allowed to ask to step away? Who was in control? Industry transparency would have been a stellar step three!
Now, I’m not saying there wasn’t a TON of fabulous stuff in between, because there was, but as embarrassing and saddening as this is to admit, I was too burnt out and depressed to enjoy any of it. That realization shredded me.
In 2020, I sat down with my good friend Jade and I told her my idea for Breathing Space Creative. “I want writers to take care of themselves and love what they do so they can do it forever.”
“That’s a cool idea!” she said. “How can I help you build it?”
The rest is history! The Forever Writers Club is honestly my tried and true solution to bringing the care, joy, transparency, and sustainability back. We owe it to ourselves to at least try, right? So what do you say? How will you invest in yourself?
Chelene Knight is the founder of Breathing Space Creative and a writer living and working in Vancouver BC
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