Kelsea Ballerini stepped far outside of her comfort zone in order to create her newest project, a book of poetry called Feel Your Way Through. The volume addresses the singer’s coming-of-age story and explores family dynamics, sexuality, body image concerns, relationships and more.

“Poetry, to me, can seem really kind of heady,” Kelsea explains. “It’s really just an autobiography that rhymes. So I’m nervous and I’m terrified, and it’s certainly the deepest I’ve gone and also the most artful I’ve gone.”

The book might never have been written without the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent shutdowns, which took Kelsea — and the rest of the touring industry — off the road for over a year. During that time, she says, she wasn’t able to process her emotions through songwriting the same way she always had in the past.

“I couldn’t write music about it, because music made me sad,” she admits. “Because that’s such a place of connection and community, and it wasn’t in 2020.”

But the time off the road sparked another source of inspiration for Kelsea. While she was writing, she says, she began to slow down and reflect on a way she never could have during a normal year.

“We’ve all had this excess time to think and to process and to be — you know, I really like being busy,” she goes on to say. “I like running at a high speed all the time. And so I hadn’t really thought about my life since I was 19. I’ve just been sprinting. And I had a lot to process.”

Feel Your Way Through arrived last week.

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