Dear Writer

I get that you're afraid.  I am Always. Afraid.

You're scared that if you write people will feel they have the right to form opinions about you.
Well I have news for you: people already feel they have the right to form opinions about you.

What scares you more than their opinions though, is the thought that their opinions might be right.
I can't help you with that.  Maybe they are, maybe they aren't.  And?

Let's say that all of the worst things you think about yourself are true: you're lazy, promiscuous, stupid, selfish, self-absorbed, annoying, needy, fat, ugly.  And?

If they are true, then they were true yesterday when you sat by the ocean.  They were true when you had your last orgasm.  They were true when you drank tea with your mom.  And?

You're still here.  You're still you.  Everything still stands.

What I can offer you is this:

Write.  Write because their discomfort at knowing you honestly will be less than your discomfort at living dishonestly.  Write because you have things to say.  Write because you've stopped sleeping (probably because you've stopped writing).  Write because God told you to do it so blame it on her.  Write because if you don't you may die or, at the very least, stop living.

You have this way about you, this desire to be known and loved but the risk is too great so you settle for seen and liked.  This is you crossing over the threshold, carrying your bride into the new home you're meant to share and seeing how you handle it when one of you breaks something for the first time.  Seeing how you manage when one of you snaps over the remote.  Seeing how you fare when the other stays out late when they were supposed to be home for dinner at 7.

There's going to be ugly and awkward and messes. Do you pack up and find a new home?  Do you sit and cry?  Do you break more shit for better counter space and then use that space to bake a pie together?  You get to decide.  But you'll have to make the decision again and again at the worst possible times.  When you want to curl up and hide or better yet, run, that is when you'll have to decide to stay and stay and stay.  That is when you'll need to reach for the broom or a Kleenex or their hand.  Just.  Don't.  Run.

I'm told you can't be committed to love or art and hope to come out looking good in the end.  Too much transpires in the process.  Too much happens, breaks, gets fucked up.

I know what you are thinking, "I am always fucking up."  So get good at talking about it.  The story will still be yours even if others think it is now theirs to do with as they like: they are mistaken.

You are afraid of people and their hearts.  And I get that because they're fucking scary.  But they are also the only thing that makes any of this worth it.  It's time to draw a line in the sand and stay on your side of it.  Don't run to cross it and don't run away from it.  Plant your Goddamn feet and let the feelings come.  You have tried a million different vices to weigh down this part of yourself that keeps bubbling to the surface, tried a million different ways to fill the spaces; but nothing can outrun silence forever and silence is what you've been avoiding all this time.  There is no need for your lies in silence.  You are forced to just be in silence.

So get cozy, grab a notebook, and dare to write badly.  Dare to live badly.  Because then at least you can be sure that you're doing it.  Write.

Photo by Pam Stewart; note featured in photo by Pam Stewart's Mom ❤