A writer is one who writes

What does it mean to write? Are you a writer?

A writer is one who writes.

This you have been told by many, many people. “Stop thinking so much and actually put words to paper!”

But what if you have a lot of emotional baggage associated with writing? What if you are unsure of how to write, what to write, the grammar and punctuation, the organization and all of the other goodies that “good writing” entails.

A writer is one who writes.

What if you want to write well? What if you want to express your thoughts and feelings on paper, but you want it to sound like it sounds in your own head . . . but better? Writing is a lot of hard, hard work . . . work that you do not know if you can do.

A writer is one who writes.

You do want to do the work, though. You have things you want to get down on paper, to share with the rest of the world. You want someone to understand, to empathize, to nod in agreement. You want someone to disagree with you, to offer reasons why your logic is faulty. You want to begin a conversation.

A writer is one who writes.

But what if you do that and people are turned off by your writing . . . the thoughts aren’t developed enough, the grammar deplorable, the vocabulary childish . . .

A writer is one who writes.

What if you are constantly nagged by your own internalized perfectionism, the voice that tells you that what you are doing is not right, not enough? How do you get rid of that horrible, nagging, pervasive voice?

A writer is one who writes.

When you were small, you loved to write. You loved to make up stories. You wanted to be the next Laura Ingalls Wilder, or Charles Dickens, or Louisa May Alcott. You wanted to move others with your plots and prose as much as you were moved. You filled small notebooks with many of your stories, of damsels being left at home by sailing suitors, of orphans looking for a place in life, of girls who had big dreams.

A writer is one who writes.

But as you grew older, and as it seemed that you were getting more serious about your writing, your parents tried to dissuade you from going further. “Most writers don’t make any money! You don’t want to do that. Why don’t you go into something more stable, like business or computer programming?”

A writer is one who writes.

Since your parents made the rules and held the purse strings, you had to listen to them . . . you had to, there was no choice. You were an obedient daughter who wanted to make your parents happy, whether it made you happy or not. So you gave up the writing and focused on other things, other things that you didn’t care as much about, but you tried to care . . .

A writer is one who writes.

You tossed out all of the little notebooks, since they seemed to be useless. You were hurt and angry, but that is just the way things were. You did not know where to put your creativity, so you tried all sorts of different things, just so you could get the feeling of creation out of your system.

A writer is one who writes.

But now, many years later, you have come to know that you can’t do things to make other people happy, even though that is all you have learned and all you have experienced. You try to make baby steps in finding out who you really are. You realize that you need to go back to the beginning and sort out where you got off track.

A writer is one who writes.

To discover who you are, you need to work through your experiences, make sense of them. You need to get the words out and look at them - in cold black and white – and see where they lead. You need to learn to write again. You need to be a writer again.

A writer is one who writes.

So you are back at square one, trying to rediscover what you knew so organically when you were younger, trying not to be scared, trying not to have fear. You want to just let the words flow and enjoy them, the sound of them, how they fit together.

A writer is one who writes.

Here you sit, letting the words pour out of you. The words may not fit. The words may not make sense. But at least the words are there, and you are trying to be heard. You are writing. Not well, but you are writing because . . .

A writer is one who writes.