Kern Carter's Blog, page 112
August 21, 2021
August 20, 2021
My Poetry
Photo by Дмитрий Хрусталев-Григорьев on UnsplashMy poetry is NOT a “philosophy”.
As others say, it is NOT even my own “psychology”.
It is neither “capitalism” nor “socialism”.
It is neither a “confusion” nor a mere “coincidence”.
My poetry is like “the crests and troughs of the waves
on the surface of an ocean”.
It is “as hot as the summer day”
and “as cold as the winter night”.
My poetry is like “the blood vessels of the virtuous”,
so pure yet so rare.
It is “those roses in the garden”,
so bright yet filled with thorns.
The characters in my poem are like “Bali and Vamana”,
and also like “Rama and Ravana”.
They are like “David and Goliath”.
They are also “ the two wolves, one black and one white”.
My poetry is both “the Yin and the Yang”.
My Poetry was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
August 19, 2021
Call for Poetry Submissions—If the Universe Is Listening …
People say that your outer reality matches your inner reality. While there’s always room for debate—what would you change if the Universe really was listening to your whispers?
Photo by Casey Horner on UnsplashWould it be the way you talk to yourself?
Would it be what you wish for?
Maybe you wouldn’t change anything. If that’s the case, seeing the Universe as a mirror to your inner reality—what are you creating by the way you’re currently cultivating your inner world? What realities do you expect to be coming your way?
Take us into your process of manifestation. The up’s, the down’s, the doubt, the courage.
Show us how you use affirmations & emotional intelligence to create peace of mind and favorable outcomes.
This prompt was inspired by a few lines I created myself;
“If the Universe is listening to my whispers,
I’ll be making sure I speak with confidence,
And keep my wishes simple.
’Cause what I’m putting out,A few new rules:Keep your submission to ~ 350 words max.Format the poem as it is meant to be readMake sure to put the “poetry” tag on your storyFocus on clarity — make sure your piece has a clear premise and takeawayThe same rules still apply:You can submit to this or ANY of our past writing prompts. Just scroll through our previous newsletters. They’ll be marked “Call for Submissions.”If you’re already a writer for CRY, go ahead and submit.If you’re not a writer for CRY but would like to submit to this or any other prompt, let us know and we’ll add you ASAP. Include your profile handle in your message or comment.Be as creative as you want in your submissions. As long as you stick to the topic, we’ll consider it.Just because you submit doesn’t mean we’ll post. If you haven’t heard back from us in three days, consider that a pass.
Will be multiplied in return,
So I can’t keep the focus,
On all the times,
That I’ve been burned.”
Please reach out if you have any questions at all. If you are new to Medium, here’s how you submit a draft to a publication.
Call for Poetry Submissions—If the Universe Is Listening … was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
August 18, 2021
Normalizing Trauma as a Writer Almost Made Me Want to Quit Writing
Is it the new normal, or has it become overly toxic?
Diane Nguyen from the Netflix series Bojack HorsemanIn my last article on CRY, I expressed not conforming to straight-up positivity while sharing my adoption story. I shared a little bit about feeling happy that I could share a story that wasn’t so great.
While it’s okay to share a story to give others hope on how things will get better, it’s not okay to become so negative about other experiences. I’m known to write about how I feel, but it became clear that my mental health was taking a toll when sharing my trauma. I’ve felt heightened anxiety, depression, lack of sleep, irritability, restlessness, overthinking, neglecting self-care, isolating myself from my loved ones, impatience, burnout, disinterest in activities I once enjoyed, and low self-esteem. I wondered then if writing about my traumas would even be worth it in the end.
I recently rewatched some episodes of Bojack Horseman on Netflix, and there are several great themes and emotions that I can relate to. While I’d love to dive in about everything I adore about this show, I want to stay on one key element that happens with the writer, Diane Nguyen.
In the final season, in an episode called Good Damage, she writes an autobiography about her life and the traumas she’s gone through. She goes through several attempts to write her story but is stopped by writer’s block and multiple daydreams. First, she talks to another main character, Princess Carolyn, about her book about “Good Trauma.” She later talks to her boyfriend, Guy, about how being on medication prevents her from writing her book. She then realizes that she’s enjoying more about writing a young adult book rather than her trauma.
One of the quotes that have stuck out to me was this: “If I don’t write my book of essays now, that means all the damage I got, isn’t good damage. It’s just damage. I have gotten nothing out of it, and all of those years, I was miserable for nothing.”
Life is way too short to remain miserable and to keep dwelling on your past. While writing about your story can be part of the healing process as a writer, it shouldn’t consume you as a person. I almost wanted to stop writing for the public overall because I was becoming more consumed by trauma. It was like writing stopped becoming my saving grace and more like drowning in my sorrows. I was dreading the writing process and becoming less of an efficient writer. It felt as if nothing I was writing was any good because I wanted to give up so easily and didn’t want everyone to see how shaken up I was. The pressure from my day job carried onto my writing, and I felt even more anxious and depressed, and that wasn’t the person I wanted to be every day.
Even horrible memories of my past took effect and were showing in my writing, and I knew I was normalizing trauma. Like Diane, I wanted to write about the bad things that happened in my life to show others they weren’t alone. But as I tried to write about my traumas, it did more harm than good on my end. Trauma became something I tried so hard to write about and to make something great from damage.
Sadly, normalizing trauma was becoming more common for me, and I was letting that show to the public. Not saying that I should stay positive all of the time; that isn’t realistic. Maybe I should focus much more on what I enjoy writing about and focus even less on my traumas. I enjoy writing about poetry, short, sweet stories, and articles that make you feel good. Today's world has enough going on, and this writer chooses to focus more on what makes her happy.
Normalizing Trauma as a Writer Almost Made Me Want to Quit Writing was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
August 17, 2021
Masterpiece
Photo by Mike Von artwork by Tristan EatonShe is painted in the most fluorescent colors.
The pallet God used to create her literally made Picasso shed a tear. When she smiles, rays of colors from every end of the spectrum go running in all directions, looking for an untouched canvas on which to leave a mark.
With a simple brush of the arm, one could be left with an unmistakable smear of chartreuse. Instead of being the subject of art, she became the art itself.
She doesn’t need a paintbrush, for she uses her own fingertips to draw the colors of life. It is as if when dawn was on the horizon, she sits on a stool and awaits the sunrise to radiate off of her and project to the world.
Masterpiece was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
August 16, 2021
Call For Submissions — Are We Normalizing Trauma?
This is a deep one. We’ve all been through stuff and if we’re lucky enough to have the gift of self-expression, we share those obstacles through our writing or art.
Sharing our most vulnerable moments has helped countless people not feel alone. It’s helped people cope with dark feelings and make connections that wouldn’t have been possible without the sharing.
But has it become too much? Is the normalizing of trauma impacting us in ways that are imperceptible now but unpredictable in its impact on our mental health? If so much of what we read and write about is trauma, is that numbing us to the grief of our own lives or possibly overflowing our emotions to the point we can’t even care?
We expect some different opinions on this one, so go deep and let loose. There’s no right or wrong perspective, only your personal truth. And CRY is a space for truth and diversity of opinions.
Same rules still apply:You can submit to this or ANY of our past writing prompts. Just scroll through our previous newsletters. They’ll be marked “Call for Submissions.”If you’re already a writer for CRY, go ahead and submit.If you’re not a writer for CRY but would like to submit to this or any other prompt, let us know and we’ll add you ASAP. Include your profile handle in your message or comment.Be as creative as you want in your submissions. As long as you stick to the topic, we’ll consider it.Just because you submit doesn’t mean we’ll post. If you haven’t heard back from us in three days, consider that a pass.Please reach out if you have any questions at all. If you are new to Medium, here’s how you submit a draft to a publication.
Call For Submissions — Are We Normalizing Trauma? was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
August 13, 2021
What scares me about writing?
Photo by Melanie Wasser on UnsplashLast week I completed a milestone in my life. A milestone about which I only dreamt of in my wildest dreams. A milestone that I thought would be impossible to achieve. I published my FIRST EVER ARTICLE on Medium. I still get goosebumps reading that sentence!! I never thought I would be saying those words. Seeing the world on the other side of the ‘publish’ button was surreal. After all that I went through mentally, this achievement right here means the world to me.
Though I wrote my article last week, the idea of writing one was in a simmer state for about 5–6 years. It all started when I was in the first year of my undergraduate degree(back in 2014) at the Institute of Aeronautical Engineering, shortly referred to as IARE, a local college in Telangana, India, where I was pursuing my Bachelors of Technology in Aeronautical Engineering.
I was an introvert (still am to some extent). I was never good at expressing myself to others. I get all worked up and anxious talking to people (even my friends). Naturally, I took to reading, which until then was mostly limited to my textbooks and notebooks. One of the very first books that I read was Man’s Search for Meaning by Victor Frankl. For whatever reason, I had this strong urge to document my perspective on it. After finishing reading the book, when it was time to write about it, the inner demons kicked in.
Questions like — Why are you even reading this? Why are you wasting your time writing and thinking about it? Don’t you have other work/homework to do? so on and so forth, started to torment me. Why, you ask? It was the way I was brought up, I guess. From where I come from, reading and writing (other than your textbooks/notebooks) were considered a waste of time. It was solely dedicated to people in leisure or people who are wealthy and successful, and I am definitely not both of them. Succumbing to this pressure, I dropped it immediately.
Fast forward to 2019, I was staying with my family in Telangana, India, during lockdown 1.0, as my university ordered me to go home due to the outbreak of the Covid-19 Pandemic. To keep active during the lockdown, I started reading mainly non-fiction and biographies, listening to podcasts, and so on, just so that I can be motivated and inspired during the pandemic. It was from these I took the idea to write online.
The idea of writing online unleashed a new set of fears in me like — What the hell am I going to write about? Why would anybody read what I have to say? Surely when my friends and family come to know that I write online, they’ll definitely make fun of me and think that I am a terrible person. I was not scared of writing or anything, but it was more profound questions like — How would a writer writes his/her/their article? or even How would an artist create his/her/their art? baffled me to the core.
Beyond these, there are the ‘what if’ questions like — What if my article/essay sucks? What if my grammar and punctuation were terrible? What if nobody reads my article? What if I get rejected by the publication? Moreover, I was stuck on producing original and perfect content, leading me to questions like — What if my article was not original and not perfect? Because in this day and age, anything you wanted to write about is already written in one or the other form, be it blog posts, YouTube videos, podcasts, etc., with great images/visuals and excellently written essays/scripts. Who am I to write about any of this? I am not an expert, Am I?
These fears and questions had stopped me from writing altogether. Personally, as a beginner, I feel all these questions are valid, and people who write should have definitely ask themselves these questions at some point in their writing life. It shows to some extent that one actually cares for writing. The two questions that I was worried about the most and how I mitigated those issues are given in the following two paragraphs:
The first question was, Should you be an expert in any particular field before writing in that field? My answer is more of a NO than a YES. For sure, as a beginner, writing in any field is a daunting and intimidating task. And, in my opinion, it is the most fun part too. You see, writing is about sharing your process. It is about documenting how you learn stuff. And when you write and hit that publish button, the robots on the internet would do their thing, and just like that, your work is shared with people all over the world.
Somebody may be read it and learn new things from it. That somebody might also comment on your post about their journey. Soon, you may collaborate with that somebody someday. It’s like when a teacher gives you homework to do, you may struggle initially and find it to be really hard, but when you collaborate with your friends and colleagues, the same assignment seems easy and fun.
Another question in the same lines would be, Should you be worried about your friends and family who might judge you for writing online? My answer is a big NO. Let me explain to you with an example, say, a friend of yours for their birthday was gifted a new guitar and is now learning how to play it. During this process, he documents the way he learns it and once a week makes a small video and uploads it on YouTube. Do you think you will judge your friend for doing this? No right!! Then why do you think others will judge you and make fun of you when you write online? THINK, THINK, THINK!!!
So please mitigate your fears and start publishing. And do let me know if this feels relatable to you.
Happy Writing!!!
What scares me about writing? was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
