Today we’d like to introduce you to Ra’Von Simone Crawford.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
I started writing poetry when I was 11, shortly after my maternal grandmother passed away. I spent a lot of valuable time with her when I was a little girl that I will forever cherish. My grandmother was one of my favorite people and the best cook on the planet. When she passed away, it hurt me like no pain I had ever felt until that point, and often I felt like I could never properly say goodbye. She was my guide and protector here on earth and the loss devastated me, especially since a year prior, my parents divorced.
Ever since I’d learned to write as a kid, my mother encouraged me to jot down my thoughts. I learned to date and keep track of the things I was feeling and what I was going through. With that encouragement, I’ve kept journals from the time I was in elementary school all the way to the present day. Those journals and my love for story telling morphed into poetry first, then I began working on my first short story soon after.
It’s funny because, as a kid, I always thought poetry had to rhyme. So in a lot of my earlier work, everything rhymes. Like every single line rhymed. Then I started exploring different poetry and storytelling techniques and realized there are no rules when it’s your imagination at play. Your work can be as long or as short as you want it to be. It can have actual situations or ones that are made up and so on and so forth. There was a comfort in that. Knowing that I could create something without conflict and challenges. Without having to overcome the perils of life. I could create things about love and simplicity and strength and greatness and for a while, that’s what I did. I worked really hard for years, getting everything I had physically written, typed. Putting my ideas on paper and structuring them to write as much as I could. Editing and rereading my work so I could make sure it was just right. In the end, I finished something for myself and I was so happy and excited and super proud of myself.
Then, I shared what I’d been working on. And that love and joy for what I produced came crashing down. The reception from my family was less than stellar to someone who’d recently turned 15. They urged me to change the theme of my work to better match religious ideologies or to create more so they could profit from it. I think in those moments of sharing as a teen; I was looking for someone to love what I’d created as is as much as I loved it. But as you live life, you realize expectations are just methods for you to get your feelings hurt because you slowly learn that you should expect nothing from anyone.
Because of the less than a stellar response from my close family, I realized I didn’t want that kind of reception about anything I created ever again, so I shared nothing with anyone anymore. Shortly before I graduated high school, I made a vow to keep my work and my feelings bottled up. And was determined to never feel like that again on purpose. Even through this adversity, I never stopped writing. I spent almost a decade working on poetry and writing short stories, aware that no one would ever read all of my words.
I didn’t end up getting the courage to self-publish one of the first books I’d written until I was almost 26. At this point in life, I’d graduated college twice, gotten a job, a place to live, and a steady income. But also throughout this time, there was so much pressure, so much pain I endured with tiny little pops of happiness scattered throughout that I felt like I was at the end. I felt ready to explode from not being seen, and I slowly understood that there is something so wildly therapeutic about being able to share your burdens, even if no one is listening or reading. I thought that my story and the feelings I had needed to be shared, so I figured out how to self publish. My book “Through the Gates” was a story I wrote when I was 16 and was my first published work. After that, whenever I had a completed set of work, be it old or new, I published it. To date, I have published a romantic compilation story and over 15 books of poetry featuring various themes and circumstances.
Now, I plan my year with how many books I want to publish. Some are topics I randomly pick and focus on, and others are just the way I’m feeling at the moment. Knowing the opinion of others doesn’t matter has allowed me to really step into my own and overcome the fear I had at the vulnerability of being candid about who I am and how I got here. To not be stagnant in creativity, when I’m experiencing writer’s block, I either paint or go outside and photograph the beautiful world around me.
I’ve already released two poetry books this year and I have two more planned for release in October and December.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
The road has been bumpy, curvy, uphill, and one of the longest distances with no end in sight, but I’m so grateful for it because without the wild road of life, I wouldn’t be here sharing my story today.
The biggest struggle I’ve had to deal with in life is pretending. Unbeknownst to me, I spent a lot of my life hiding behind the facade of how I thought I should act because I did not genuinely know myself. I was living for the approval and love of others, not realizing I was slowly suffocating by not looking for that same approval and love from within.
I didn’t know the depths of the traumas I’d been through and I didn’t know who I could talk to about what was going on because anytime I tried to let others in to better understand myself, I always ended up being berated instead of comforted. So I stuck to pretending.
It may not sound like a big deal, but the sheer exhaustion of putting on a mask day in and day out to appease others while neglecting yourself is one of the hardest things to struggle with mentally. I literally walked around the school campus, my work, and my friends and family, pretending I was happy and that everything in life was swell. I had to pretend I loved my job so I wouldn’t end up slacking off, causing more work for other people. I had to pretend I was straight. I had to pretend that I wasn’t avoiding the things I was scared to face by binge drinking too much and too often. I had to pretend I enjoyed being around people. I had to pretend I enjoyed being thousands of miles away from the one person I truly loved. There was so much outward pretending, when I finally had a moment to myself, all I could do was sleep.
After my first semester in college, I fell into a depression of sorts because for the first time; I realized I was alone with no one around to reach to the depths of me. There were people everywhere on campus. I had roommates, but I was internally battling myself and my mind, trying to make sense of life. I went to church hoping to find answers that never came. I contemplated checking myself into a mental health facility and even considered taking more drastic measures to find some semblance of mental peace.
In the end, it took making myself extremely uncomfortable and changing to understand myself more and what I was going through. The first thing I had to do was stop pretending to be someone I wasn’t and to stop doing things that made me uncomfortable, to make others feel good. I moved back home to California from Hawaii, strengthened my relationship with my now wife, and set boundaries with friends and family. When I was ready for the next step in personal progression, I sought professional help, and six months later, professionals diagnosed me with autism and anxiety.
With my new outlook on life and sense of freedom, all those struggles and battles on the road to me made sense. I could effectively understand myself and communicate what would and would not work for me, and I could understand what I did or didn’t need. I finally had the chance to comprehend and acknowledge the reasons behind my emotions and identify my triggers. A deeper understanding of myself liberated me from the chaos of my mind. I unpacked and processed all of my trauma to become a better me for myself. For the family I created.
Even though the road wasn’t smooth, I wouldn’t trade it for the world. I wouldn’t trade anything I made it through because it was a lesson I needed to learn, or protection from something not meant for me. Either way, I am grateful for the road on this journey.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
Writing poetry is undoubtedly what I love to do if I had just one choice. Since opportunities to be creative are endless, I have dubbed myself “The poet who paints and photographs.” I channel what I call “PPP,” which is my creative unleashing through poetry, painting, and photography. My creative outlets set me apart from others because through these very different things, I have stepped into someone no longer afraid to be genuine with herself and others, and that takes a lot of courage and vulnerability to admit.
Poetry came to me early on as a little girl, but I fell in love with photography after taking a class my sophomore year in college. I never really understood the “picture is worth a thousand words” quote until you really take the time to understand the dynamics and thought processes you have to go through to get an excellent shot. It’s an accurate test of will and patience that a good deal of may not understand if you’re just looking at a random photograph. But truly, all photos are works of art, and I found that so fascinating. When the class concluded and they required me to hand in the camera, I experienced a sense of devastation. I convinced my dad to buy me a Nikon D90, and the rest is history. Since I was in Hawaii, I was outside all the time taking pictures of the beaches and flowers, buildings and bugs. Anything I thought was beautiful.
I painted my very first canvas in the winter of 2018, which also marked a year since I’d moved back home to California from Hawaii. Trying to take pictures in a city in paradise versus a city in an overpopulated area was my worse nightmare. I could only take so many pictures of things around the house, so I had to find another creative outlet while I adapted to being back home in such a fast-paced environment. Painting quickly became my new normal and a way for me to release that was relative to the change I was going through.
With this, I’m able to kind of bounce between whatever outlet I’m feeling. It gives me a sense of calm knowing I don’t have to be confined to one thing, but I have a couple other outlets to get creative with. I feel like I specialize in everything I put my heart into, so I don’t have just one specialty, but if I really had to pick one, I absolutely love writing.
I’m most proud of my book Noiselessly Vocal. It was my very first poetry book, and it was a roller coaster of everything I had kept in throughout my life. The first few poems in the book were the very first ones I wrote as a kid. Noiselessly Vocal is a celebration of finally being heard saying nothing.
I’m also very proud of my painting called “The Autobiography.” It’s one that I put a lot of heart (and layers) into to be sure it captured the true essence of who I am as a creator. I like wild, chaotic things, vibrant colors, and a lot of hidden meanings, and I really captured all of that in this painting about my life.
What makes you happy?
Understanding myself wholly has made me the happiest I’ve ever been because there is no more pretending. Learning my likes and dislikes and living authentically and truly for myself has unleashed more smiles and peace of mind than I ever thought was possible in this current life. Being able to show what I am feeling through my creations has been a close second to making me thrilled. Now, I get to release and share things with others that I hope puts a smile on their faces, without fear of any expectations. I create in hopes I am a contribution that leads to consumers’ happiness as well.
You realize that life is what you make it and if you have the determination to be anything, then that is what you will become. I have started to really embrace love and light and with that comes the truest form of those things, which is happiness.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.ravonsimonecrawford.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ravonsimonecrawford/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ravonsimonecrawford/
- Other: https://ravonsimonecrawford.myportfolio.com/
