It happens once a month or so.
A writer I meet pours her heart out to me. She retells the story how, as a child, she first realized she would one day be “a writer.”
She describes her academic successes in school — her papers, her fellowships, her publications. She tells me how easy it was to write on deadline for work.
She tells me about her partner, who’s always believed in her writing, and very much wants to see her succeed.
She tells me it’s not fame or money she’s after, but the deep calm and fulfillment she gets by consistently spending time doing something she loves and doing that thing well.
Our attention turns to the present day, and this writer’s voice gets quieter as she tells me about the (two, three, five or more) unfinished essays/stories/book manuscripts/half-researched pitches/book proposals she’s let sit on her hard drive for years.
When I ask her how long it’s been since she wrote productively and happily, she tells me in a near-whisper: “Ten years…”
She doesn’t just tell me about these projects. She nearly cries over them.
You see, her creative work – all those stories and books and essays and words-on-the-page, they represent something authentic and passionate and REAL about her life.
Our conversation highlights in stark relief a pain she’d rather avoid: that some of her most-real work in this life still remains undone.
If she’s a writer who’s let this problem fester for years, chances are good that her not-writing situation has rotted her confidence, her creativity and her clarity.
This writer is a writer who’s secretly entertaining a terrible secret:
“Maybe, if writing is so difficult, I’m supposed to just stop trying to write altogether. Maybe my life will feel simpler if I just quit.”
After all, who wants to experience constant failure?
Who wants to have to talk about the status of the still-unfinished book? Who wants to answer the painful questions from cousins or partners or kids, “Is the book done yet?”
The most terrible of writer-secrets isn’t just a threat to creative expression.
It’s a threat to the soul of the writer.
Because we all know that “born writers” have to write to be happy.
The impulse to write, or create, or paint or sing can’t be bludgeoned with distraction. The creative drive must be respected and heeded, if you want to be truly, deeply, authentically happy.
For the past 12 years, I’ve honed a strategy and a step-by-step system to help you transmute your past writing failures into a rich and rewarding, consistent writing practice. I’ve saved more than a few writers from quitting.
And if you’re coachable and truly ready to change… I can help you, too.
Now that I’m back in town, this week I’m opening up a few more slots for complimentary, 40-minute Breakthrough Sessions. Let’s hop on the phone to discuss your writing. Let’s map out a path to get you relief, if you’re suffering.
You don’t have to quit. You just have to be willing to invest in yourself, listen to something else besides your fear and learn a new way to write.
Contact me here to get started: https://coachmarla.com//contact/
