Inspiration

As a writer, I have come to find that I cannot wait for inspiration. It does help when it shows up but you cannot wait for it. I write everyday or try to at least. Sometimes me staring at my wall of Ghost fanart is part of the writing process. My inspiration for writing is that I want to see myself in literature. I am a person of color, a latina, or latinx. I am not fiery, sexy, or came from hardships to go to an Ivy league school to get out of my home life and be the first in my family to go to college.

I come from a middle-class family. Going to college was/is a no-brainer. My mother had several degrees. I come from hardworking people but I was not like the stereotypes the media likes to portray. So when I wanted to really become a writer it was because I wanted to see myself in the pages of my books. I wanted to see myself on the bookshelf representing my truth, my personality, and my style.

From my About Me post, you saw I am passionate about what I do even when I don’t make a living from my works. I love writing. I love opening a blank word document and with a few words I can introduce to the world a new character who seems as real as you or me. I love that no matter what I can have the story go however I want. I can sit there and put in ALL the tropes or just a few. It is all up to me and how I want to share my voice with you.

My other inspiration is from music. I can’t just sit and wait for inspiration to come and tickle my brain to work. Music has always been my escape and because of that I know if I put on my headphones right now, and fire up a random playlist I will be instantly transported into a place where my ideas are not just ideas anymore, they are living breathing scenes I can witness and choose to write about or not.

Personal story!

Last year, I was in a bad place. I came off the hardest year of a career I thought I wanted. But after suffering through, I decided it wasn’t for me. I was going to take a year off and take care of my children and try and get my mental health up from the ground where it was stomped nearly to death. I was watching YouTube late at night and found a reaction series. The YouTuber was reacting to Korn and I have loved them since I was in junior high/high school. I got a kick watching someone react to a 20 year old song that I enjoyed so long ago. I scrolled and saw a band I had never really heard of. I mean, I knew OF them but never cared to listen to them. If I had only known though.

I found Ghost. If you are poised over your keyboards about to tell me they aren’t metal or Tobias Forge is evil because of what happened with his prior set of Ghouls, you are free to leave my site. That band saved me. I love their music. I love the whole concept. I love everything. Watching the reaction video, I was swept away in the imagery and the music. It was catchy and the video was awesome. Where the hell had I been all this time? I googled them immediately and found all their albums on Spotify. I watched their concerts and interviews on YouTube. I absorbed everything.

Tobias Forge, the masked singer, mastermind, goofy goober, is the reason I am working so hard right now. The fandom especially is the most welcoming one I have ever been apart of. I joined Facebook groups and met my now best friends who live in other states, even other countries. My book cover artist does fanart of Ghost and that’s how I met her. Her work is amazing and so realistic, every piece she does looks like a photo.

You are probably still wondering how this guy inspired me. When I joined the FB groups I came across fanfiction. I know many people believe fanfiction is the bottom of the barrel in terms of literary accolades but you can leave my site with that attitude. I’m preparing a post on Fanfiction at a later date. Anyways, I read so much that I wanted to write my own. After two years of being unable to pick up a pen and hating myself for that, I started a fanfic. And now just six months later, I have eight fanfic works and TWO BOOKS finished. I went from a drought of misery and self-hate to me not being able to stop writing. All from listening to a band and learning everything I can about them.

One day, I’ll make an embarrassingly long post about Ghost and it will be cringey but full of love for the band. I owe my current success at writing so much at Tobias Forge. That adorable Swedish man, who doesn’t take crap from anyone, who took a chance and while he had newborn twins went (with huge support from his wife, My QUEEN) and started a band he had always dreamt about.

So if anyone asks me what my inspiration is, I will always just say, “Everything.”

It’s true. I take in everything and through my experiences, it filters out into my stories. If you are a struggling to find something to write, I hope you can find something to take from this post. Maybe you just haven’t discovered your muse yet. Keep going. Listen to music, watch movies, READ, and you will find your voice.

xoxo

Erin Elyse