Why I shouldn’t write
The worst introduction you’ve ever heard
The last time I wrote was in May 2016, for my class called “Writing for Publication.” I sashayed after class into the warm sunset of my approaching DTS graduation and surely thought, “I’ll write tomorrow.” I was twenty-four years old. What a sweet idiot. (Thank you for everything, Dr. Glahn.)
So over eight years later, here we are.
I have a lot of reasons to not write.
It feels vulnerable. It is. And this is what I tell my clients to press into when they get scared of going after good things. Being known is vulnerable. Doing new things is vulnerable. The good things come from being vulnerable.
I haven’t written in eight years. You haven’t. And it’s vulnerable. Re: see note on vulnerability above. Being vulnerable will give us the good things.
It will take time. Yes. Good things do.
It is hard. Yes. Good things are.
People will think I’m weird. Yes. You are.
This is actually the worst time to pick this back up. You have a human child. And a human husband. And a human job helping humans. Yes. This is true. This will also help you help the humans as you help yourself. And you want your baby human to see you lead and it will help your baby human see how you lead.
What do I have to say? You have a brain and many years of therapeutic help. Surely you have some material.
What if I make a fool of myself? You will. And we are all going to die anyways so what does it matter?
There’s a lot that’s happened to me and in me and through me in the eight-year pause I’ve taken from writing. I’ve grown up. I’ve gotten married. I’ve started my own business. I’ve had a baby. Somehow my cat is still alive and well despite her own attempts to not be. I’ve traveled. I’ve been tired. Sick. etc. I don’t know if I have anything nuanced or wise to say, but I humbly hope that what I can offer is a small kernel of insight as I sift through my own experiences, of past, present, and future nature. I have many reasons to not write, but none of them are good enough to keep me from doing it.
Writing is how I process the world. It’s how I make sense of it. And if it helps me, I hope it helps you.
