For many years, I believed songwriting was a dream forever out of reach. A few years ago, I knew maybe three chords on the guitar and could barely form a melody. However, when I leaned into my love for poetry, I realized that a poem, a few chords, and a simple melody were all I needed to write a song.
Throughout most of high school, I found joy in writing simple songs that only the walls of my bedroom would hear. I loved creating imaginary worlds and stories, most of which I couldn’t relate to at all. But after filling a journal with random verses, choruses, and bridges, I realized that songwriting had become a way to escape my emotions rather than process them.
Although I had always listened to my favorite artists talk about the importance of vulnerability and personal reflection in their music, the idea of being truly honest—even with myself—felt uncomfortable. But as I began to explore my emotions more deeply, I noticed a shift in my writing. While it was difficult to be so vulnerable about my anger, sadness, and fear, the outcome was worth the discomfort of the moment.
When I started the college application process in my junior year of high school, I didn’t expect to reflect so deeply on how songwriting had shaped my life. I thought I would spend weeks debating essay topics, but I couldn’t think of a story more meaningful than what I had learned through songwriting.
My thoughts kept drifting back to a small record store I had recently visited. Inside, about twenty cardboard boxes held old records, packed edge to edge with artists I had never heard of, each selling for just twenty-five cents. I picked out a few records without thinking much of it. When I arrived home, I noticed a half-written song sitting next to my record player—right beside a quarter. Twenty-five cents.
I began constructing my essay, but I couldn’t shake the thought that nothing I write will ever make a difference; that even if I did manage to create art I was proud of, it would most likely end up in a cardboard box fifty years from now, mindlessly scrolled past by a seventeen-year-old girl. Although, slowly, it dawned on me:
A manager in a used vinyl shop can stick a price tag on every record they have, assigning value based on age, rarity, and so-called “importance,” but each of those albums holds a story and a feeling someone once wanted to express. And that’s what truly matters.
Once upon a time, at least one person walked into a record store filled with fresh vinyl and decided that that story, that feeling, and that record was what they wanted to experience. Now, those songs reside in a used record store, worn with love, waiting to be discovered and felt once again. So even if my greatest work—something I pour my heart and soul into—ends up in a used record store with a twenty-five cent price tag, at least it was experienced.
Now that I’m in college, I can’t imagine my life without a guitar in my lap and a pen in my hand. There may be moments of discomfort, doubt, and frustration, but songwriting has become a part of who I am. By stepping back and recognizing how much my “little hobby” has shaped me, I’ve discovered a truth that will carry me through the rest of my life: the value of art isn’t in its price, but in its ability to inspire.