To the Lighthouse and Down the Rabbit Hole

   "Women can't write, women can't paint."

    This is what Charles Tansley says in Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse, and it is a phrase that  haunts Lily Briscoe as she attempts to paint the landscape she sees in her mind. At times she doubts her abilities and despairs of creating anything worthwhile. Her vision contradicts the popular ideas about what paintings should be, just as her actions contradict the popular ideas about what a woman's life should be. In the end, it is her decision to finish the painting that matters, not the painting itself, because in that moment she decides who she is.

    I have been away from blogging for some time. In fact, I have been away from any serious writing in general. The last semester has been a struggle for me, and this present one even worse. I posted some time ago that I was experiencing anxiety about not being smart or creative enough. Since then, I've been up and down. I've been taking incredibly exciting classes and getting to know incredibly exciting people-- but I have also found myself severely limited by my own absurd expectations. I put a great deal of weight on my ability to read and write, and couldn't bring myself to do either except under the "right" conditions. If I was going to read something, my head had to be clear and I had to remember everything and interact with the content on a deep level. If I was going to write, it would have to be as genius and revolutionary as Joyce.

    It didn't help that someone whose judgement I respect told me that my poetry was a bit unoriginal. At the time, it felt like a challenge to do better. As I went along, however, the words began to weigh on me, the way Lily Briscoe felt the weight of "women can't write, women can't paint."

    Things have gotten better. I've begun to realize my errors, and slowly I think I may begin to be able to crawl out of the rabbit hole I seem to have fallen into. For now, I'm going to try to read and write more liberally, and see where that takes me. After all, my obligation is not to the task to perform it perfectly, but to myself to shape myself through these tasks.