'Stay Brave' with Genevieve Walker
‘Stay Brave’ is an interview series by woman-identifying creatives for woman-identifying creatives to inspire bravery in the creative life. [Created and curated by Leah Umansky]
How do you interpret the phrase, "Stay Brave?"
Directed at me and my creative life, I have a couple reactions (and interpretations). One is to take the phrase “stay brave” at its face, wipe away the nuance (but not the context), and respond: “Yes, to ‘stay brave’ is what it takes to be a writer, so the phrase acknowledges me. It’s encouraging.” Part of the reward of pursuing a creative life is this pride we get to take in doing something hard. A phrase like “stay brave” is a celebratory callout to kindred creatives. It’s beautiful and lonely and sad and inspiring. My second but simultaneous interpretation is: Someone is telling me to keep trying, and without their help. “To stay brave is to believe that what I create is valuable enough to fight for, and fight for it alone.” I take umbrage at the personal responsibility implied, and the abstract authority; there’s a built-in futility to the phrase “stay brave,” as well as condescension. “All you can do is keep trying until you do something someone likes enough to support you.” I could also be wry and say that to “stay brave” is a sentiment I once saw expressed by a certain CrossFit instructor on social media. I think I smirked, but it stuck with me. Ultimately, it does take a lot of bravery—perseverance in the face of discomfort—to learn, change, and achieve. It also takes sustained bravery to navigate a life, any life, because uncertainty is a constant.
As a woman-identifying writer, what are the ways that you “stay brave” in your life?
I choose to make writing—editing, reading, thinking—important. I prioritize being alone with my husband and dog. It looks easy written out, but it’s oddly tough. It requires guarding time, and skipping out on a lot. I love my friends, family, and community. To “stay brave” in this respect is to remind myself that to try very hard at something takes a lot of focus, and to focus on writing means necessarily not focusing on a lot of other things, and that’s just the way it is. On the other hand, to “stay brave” I seek out or naturally gravitate toward people who are living similar lives. And, I keep writing, sharing my work, reading others’ work, telling them how much their work means to me, and riding the highs that come from people doing the same for me.
Who is someone in your life who models “staying brave” for you?
I feel fortunate to know a lot of people who model “staying brave,” mostly friends and family but also coworkers, clients, former teachers, and acquaintances in the field.
What writers, artists, and/or musicians do you look to to foster a sense of “bravery?”
Yes ^ —working writers, artists, and musicians, but, also, in particular, those who keep going after so-called highs and so-called lows in their creative careers. That’s the type of bravery I find most inspiring: when someone continues making work after its reception wasn’t what was expected and they have to “live up to” or “overcome” the idea of their work. I’m also buoyed by the kind of bravery that’s accompanied by a curious, humble, fun, and engaged personality (so, someone I’d also want to have dinner with).
What’s a piece of advice you would pass on to your younger self about “staying brave?” What’s something you know now, that you didn’t know in the past?
It’s trite, but: The process is the process. I did a lot of suffering over “wasted time” in the past. The long walks, the tumultuous romances. Weekend trips I didn’t want to take. The time spent researching and pitching stories that never came to fruition; hours and hours on massive projects eventually put to rest. It might sound like a contradiction to guarding time, but part of my process as I’ve come to understand it is recognizing when I “should” sit in my chair and do the “actual” work, and when I “should” let my mind wander, or just hang out.
Can you remember a time in your life where you realized your own bravery? How did you use it to propel you forward?
I’ve got intense albeit garden-variety anxiety, and every five years or so it becomes an impediment to functioning “normally.” I was a teenager when the cycle began and while I’m (pretty) adept at managing it by now, each cycle’s peak has required a new tool, so to speak. Recently, I had to find another new approach, and so, alongside new therapies, I started running in earnest. I’ve always leaned on the mood-altering qualities of movement, but I’ve never been into pushing myself physically. I’m injury prone. As a kid, I thought of myself as weak or if not weak then definitely lacking in stamina, and I had proof. I walked and rode my bike, and in my twenties I got into rock climbing, but running a mile was never easy (or even really possible). After meeting an 80-year-old woman who runs five miles a day, I decided it was time to try harder. A friend of mine who knows this kind of stuff (and is a great civilian running coach) recommended a weight-training-for-complete-and-embarrassed-beginners program, and allowed me to text her updates about my incremental progress. I learned about dynamic stretching, and how strengthening muscles in the back and butt actually make running feel less like dying and more like working out. As my distances increased, I realized that what I’d thought of as discomfort that would lead to injury was discomfort that led to strength, and endurance. It was a very small but powerful realization. It gave me a tangible reference point for the experience of growth. After I ran a 10k (without any injuries in training), I recognized that I’d set out to do something I hadn’t thought I could do—and had a real chance of failing at—and I’d done it. There’d been no promise of a prize, no higher salary or applause. I’d tested myself for the sake of seeing what I was capable of and it felt great. “Bravery” is a heavy word to apply to the experience, sure, but looking back, learning to run, for me, was a clear instance of having learned to do something new, where learning required humbling myself to my own limits; accommodating rather than denying my limits by way of reframing them as parameters instead of barriers. Learning to run is something I’ve looked to as evidence of my ability to transform in substantive ways I previously thought impossible.
What do you do when you aren’t feeling brave? What inspires you or motivates you?
I think about things other people have done, and how cool it is that they took the risks necessary to do what they did. And, at a certain point, I try to stop thinking and start doing. There’s an aspect of so-called bravery that’s kind of anti-intellectual. (Which is also part of what gives bravery its negative connotation: the rallying, battle-cry element.) Bravery requires shutting out the noise of rational thought—the “You’re facing unknown, and danger! thoughts—in order to experience, and execute. I could easily think myself out of doing pretty much anything. But, I know, too, that languaged thought is limited by so many factors, the first of course being the construct of language itself. There’s plenty of evidence to suggest that one’s ability to think clearly is tied to environmental factors we can’t begin to consciously contend with anyway, from the amount of sleep we’ve gotten to our financial stability and inherited socio-cultural circumstances, not to mention stuff as basic as the weather. Believing we can out-think so many inputs is probably the more anti-intellectual stance, and learning to shut out the noise, the warnings that pop up when we start writing an essay, for example, is the only “smart” approach. Sometimes, this kind of chatty-brain override requires going for a long walk. If nothing else works, I watch a movie.
In what ways would you like to be more brave in your creative life?
More, yeah: more brave, more energy spent on my creative life. More time working but also more time spent resting, restoratively.
What is your proudest moment of bravery?
Every time I show up to something or some place I’ve never been to before, especially if I’d rather be at home, safe and silent with my family (which is most of the time, admittedly). Almost always I experience myself as spiritually expanded by the simple act of showing up and engaging.
What are you currently working on?
I’m editing a magazine and a handful of writers on the culture beat. It’s so cool to be back in an editorial setting, full-time (which is how I started my career; before this current gig I was freelancing, primarily for brands). Personally, I’m working on a collection of linked cross-genre essays loosely tied to memory research. I might also be working on a novel, but without the pressure of “working on a novel.”
Thank you, Genevieve!
Genevieve Walker is a writer, journalist, and editor. Her essays, features, reviews, and poetry (as well as her edits) have appeared in a variety of outlets, from the BBC to HODINKEE, The San Francisco Chronicle to Real Life, GQ to Guernica, and others. Right now she’s the executive editor of Highsnobiety. Her work can be found here: www.genevievewalker.com
Leah Umansky is the author of three books of poems, most recently the forthcoming OF TYRANT, (The Word Works in April, 2024.) She is currently working on a memoir Delicate Machine, an exploration of womanhood, hope, and heart in the face of grief and a global pandemic. She earned her MFA in Poetry at Sarah Lawrence College and has curated and hosted The COUPLET Reading Series in NYC since 2011. Her creative work can be found in such places as The New York Times, POETRY, The Bennington Review, The Academy of American Poets' Poem-A-Day and others. She can be found at www.leahumansky.com or @leah.umansky on IG.