Friday, January 20, 2012

Convincing Myself.

I need to stop writing about writing.  But I do hope you'll indulge me in one more.

Ahem.  {Clears throat}

I am a writer.  I am resisting all urges to delete that sentence.  I am going to leave it there and I am going to back it up.

I write, therefore, I am a writer.  I write all the time.  I journal and note-take, often in my own head and on whatever scrap of paper I can find.  I write story ideas.  I write emails which, depending on the rant I'm on, are really just a blog post intended for a much smaller audience.  I chronicle my day, one way or another, all day every day.  I narrate my own life in my head as I'm living it.  I wonder how I would describe each moment to someone if I were to retell the day's story.

I edit those stories far more often than I edit what's on the page.

Later, I am taking the thing that happened or that someone said or did and I'm putting it on paper.  I'm trying to make it cute or witty or otherwise.  I'm trying to emphasize the details.  

And at the end of the day, I'm a writer.  

I need work, of course, because I'm not perfect.  I need to practice, keep up with it, refine my process.  I need to focus and hone skills and be clear about goals.  I need to move in the right direction and accept (and learn from) set backs.

But that doesn't make me "not a writer."  Because I do, after all, still write.

Saying I want to be a writer doesn't make it so.  It lets me off the hook if I don't write.  It makes it easy to back out.  It's a crutch.  If I simply want to be a writer and the words don't come, rather, if I don't seek the words and guide them to the page, then I have my excuse already lined up.  "I tried to write, but it didn't work out."

Saying I am one means I have work to do.  It means I have some soul-searching to do.  It means I have decisions to make about what is next and where I want to take me and how I will get there.  Saying I am one means taking that leap of faith and putting myself out there for failure and for success and all that is between.  It's being open to something new and different and, yes, scary.  Saying I am a writer is the first step towards fulfilling a dream.

I am a writer.  I am a writer.  I AM a writer.
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1 comment:

  1. Love this line:
    "I write emails which, depending on the rant I'm on, are really just a blog post intended for a much smaller audience. "

    ReplyDelete