Kern Carter's Blog, page 29
August 29, 2022
Checkerboard Classes
Image by Alesha BurtonSchool, to me, has been an experience of loathing fun. A sulk where I need to dislike it and bottom my expectations to the floor to truly enjoy the experience of an 8-hour day. I used to do it the most in my elementary school band. I’d pretend I disliked playing the clarinet so long that when I do come to play, I enjoy every second like rediscovering a childhood song.
To an extent, university felt somewhat different. Maybe because everything was online and important, so I only had to look up how to get to downtown Yonindale during the spring when I actually needed to haul a giant watercolour pad on a busy train.
My first year majoring in creative writing felt inspiring and driven, yet vastly empty. Like the edge between a rainforest and a desert. The hills are like fluffy white elephants but I cannot tell you where they are going, just that they are.
Socially, it’s been the quietest desert known to Terris. Being online due to the pandemic meant that it was more convenient, but more isolating. It felt like reading alone in a dark library. I did feel outside of the loop at times. I did feel like I didn’t belong here and didn’t deserve to be here. The doubts piled on, stacking atop me. I was the plate and they were the pancakes. Nowhere to run when you’re drowning in sticky regret.
Maybe in times like those I wish I had a shoulder to lean on that wasn’t the chat bar of our Teams’ meetings. I wish the shoulder wasn’t the empty logs or the teacher egging more and more people to share a heart to at least have me recognized by three half-asleep classmates.
I felt like an editor more than a writer sometimes too. As though I was giving and giving and giving, always typing and absorbing and regurgitating for everyone’s sake. I never really felt like anyone tried to be the same way with me. I always made an effort for the sake of engagement, for the sake of the class. Silence in a classroom is quiet. Silence in a Teams’ meeting is deafening.
My first year was a wreck socially. I am hoping that this year, with much of my classes in-person, I can hopefully sit beside an extrovert that loves to talk and make friends so that I might drag a friend through.
This doesn’t mean I didn’t learn, however. I think my learning has grown like a knapweed ripping through tree bark. I feel like I can see the world differently. I feel like I can write both shamelessly and endlessly. The pain in my third finger on my right hand is non-existent when I am writing harder than the last thirty minutes of an exam.
My favourite part of this is the notebook. Notebooks weren’t something I extensively kept before this, preferring to keep my mind in messy sheets of paper either locked away in a binder or burned by a swirly paperclip. My sister suggested that I take up ancient arts of storage and sealing like how vampires used to conceal and move their palaces at a moment’s notice.
Notebooks are the essence of my learning. Watching a poem grown and bloom from draft to draft. Reading through book notes, through class notes, through my own personal blah blah of a chatterbox mind. Writing in the spaces. Writing outside of the margins. The erased bits. The bits of text scrubbed out and smudged and overwritten.
I’ve also learned to take notes from other people’s works. There has to be a reason why we’re reading their work. There has to be a reason why I love their work. I take notes on what I liked. Then I see how it can work with me and my own voice. The inspiration taking from another and writing like another are encouraged in creative writing classes.
I hope that going into the next year, I can make some friends and turn a good experience into a great one. The great demon hanging in the corner of my room will find the light one day and evaporate into the cold dust of a spiderweb. I hope I don’t feel worse than my lowest most pathetic days.
I wish everyone soon going back to school a great experience because I think we all need it after last year.
— Heleza
[image error]Checkerboard Classes was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
August 27, 2022
August 26, 2022
August 25, 2022
Upgrade Your Life by Discovering Your Inspiration Person
Since childhood, I have always drawn inspiration from other people. These people kept changing over time. Sometimes I was inspired by some character in a book or from a Netflix show.
I wanted to be exactly like them (at that point in time). Over time, I realized that it's okay to gain tidbits of wisdom from everybody, but we shouldn’t aspire to be like them. The end goal should always be to become the best version of yourself—living your life to your utmost potential.
So I discovered precisely one person to draw inspiration from—my younger self.
Remembering how crazy her dreams were and how unique her thinking and passion were.
Little Aishi never thought about what was possible or what wasn’t. She just wanted to be. A writer can have such a profound impact that it can change people's lives. Her words provide comfort in times of need. Stacks of paper or fancy stationery fascinated her so much that she would pee in her pants… haha!
Whatever I do now, I do it for her. In the mornings, when I don’t feel like getting up or if something is not going right, I think of her, suck it up and go on. I carry her picture in my wallet, and it's even the wallpaper on my laptop.
It’s my sole job and responsibility to make her happy, to make her proud, and give her everything she deserves.
And I think it’s really crucial to find your own Inspiration Person. It gives direction to your goals and increases your chances of winning in this life game by 90%.
Changing my mindset to this has brought so many opportunities in my life. It has even made me more resilient, stoic, and full of courage, impacting my overall personal development in a huge way.
I’ve seen people spend their whole lives expecting that kind of love, loyalty, and respect from others. But it's us who have to take care of our inner child. No one can do that for you. Even if they want to, they just can’t.
No matter how much money, fame, or possessions you accumulate, in the end, what matters is that your inner child is happy, lively, and lives in joy.
Pura Vida,
Aishi Nirmal
[image error]Upgrade Your Life by Discovering Your Inspiration Person was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
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August 24, 2022
Not Letting Bipolar Define Me
Photo by juan mendez: https://www.pexels.com/photo/smiling-woman-looking-upright-standing-against-yellow-wall-1536619/For the first time in a while, I did myself a huge favor. I listened and danced to some music to get me in the mood. I played Buga by Kizz Daniel and started to sing and dance.
That song is slowly becoming my anthem. My mother also loves the song and often sends me videos from Instagram or Tiktok of people dancing to that song to cheer me up. Thanks, mum. I love you for that. Abeg let me flex joor!! I be Naija babe and I am proud of it jare!!
As I mentioned in a previous post, I was diagnosed with Bipolar; Bipolar II to be precise. My mother feared how people, especially Nigerians, would treat me should they ever find out.
Now let me break something down here. Africans are not the most friendly individuals to discuss mental health issues with. As far as they are concerned, anyone with any form of mental disability is not normal. Once they hear the word “bipolar,” they automatically assume that you are a mad person.
For those that do not know, bipolar disorder is mental health illness that causes unusual shifts in mood, energy, activity, etc. Some often mistake it for depression and ADHD, which are completely different, but symptoms from the latter two disorders can also be found in Bipolar.
I remember being depressed for several years without understanding why and I would often feel like crying, and sometimes, I would cry myself to sleep. I often had suicidal thoughts as well. This is part of the depressive phase, which I still deal with.
Then we have the manic phase. During this phase, I get energetic and excited for no reason and would sometimes be cheerful to a sickening degree and hyper. My poor mother panics whenever I a going through those phases. She is still trying to understand, but she is extremely supportive and also tries to be careful with what she says to me since I am very sensitive.
My sisters are also supportive, and my boyfriend, surprisingly, still does not quite get it yet. Bless his soul, though. A great support system makes me feel better and snaps me out of self-pity mode. It is tempting to wallow in sorrow. That never ends well.
This is why I am trying to meditate and document my feelings in a journal so that I understand myself better. It has been working so far. I am also learning to appreciate people a lot more.
I take medication as the doctors have instructed and try to eat as healthy as possible. I also try to do some exercise even though I am a lazy cat for the most part.
A note of advice to anyone going through mental health disorders: do not let it define you. Rather, use that as a strength. Let people judge. They did not create you or the life you are currently living. Be yourself and love yourself always. I have a dream. I have an ambition and will not let anyone or anything stop me from achieving it. Watch out, world, because here I come!!
[image error]Not Letting Bipolar Define Me was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
Words Are Breadcrumbs that Lead Me Home
Writing validates and soothes the horror and lays down the memory of where I’ve been
The Power of Precise Words
To achieve greatness, we need to ensure our voice is heard loud and clear, particularly by the people who are trying to support us
