Six am, morning of the Florence Book Festival. There I was with an unpacked crate and outside, my car empty of gas. I was a festival author, but I just wanted to stay home. I curled up with a blanket, a cup of Earl Grey, and my uni-ball vision elite pen. “It’s a total waste,” I wrote.

 

When I need help with resistance, I write. When my feelings don’t make sense, I write. There are more than a hundred studies highlighting the power of journaling to transform negative emotions and lead a person to greater self-awareness.  

 

What I found on the page was a long-ago version of myself: someone young and desperate to stand out. My disabled mom was on the phone all day calling doctors, her attention elsewhere.

 

“What do you need?” I asked that young girl who was me.

 

“Your attention,” she said.

 

I saw how this young self pursued writing as the way to get noticed. Yet now whenever I was a featured author, a podcast guest, or in other author-y situations, I felt wrong, inauthentic, horrible.

 

Since the present-day me knew that attention-seeking was misplaced, I was trying to cancel myself out, at a stalemate, unable to resolve the issue. I was rushing ahead, not meeting the needs of that child—needs beyond my ability to squelch.

 

I sat with that young self, giving her all my attention. In five minutes, I was refreshed, excited, warmed—ready to load up my books. Nothing was truly at stake, and there was fun to be had.

 

Since that moment four months ago, seven writers whom I coach have hit similar roadblocks. Anxiety, ambivalence, the desire to hide, and the need to be seen have all been rolled up into the thought, “It’s a total waste, anyway.”

 

If you’re feeling resistance to writing and publishing, you are not alone. First give yourself the attention you need. Find a way to be with the writing without an agenda. Experience the most creative part of yourself—and let go the idea that your writing has to accomplish anything.

 

I’m reinforcing this liberation as a 30-30 poet for Tupelo Press. This means writing a poem a day for thirty days, and asking for support in order to benefit this worthwhile literary nonprofit.

 

The first year I ran this 30-30 poet marathon, I was terrified, intimidated, sometimes paralyzed. But I kept going, knowing that our teamwork would benefit the press, myself, and hundreds to thousands of future readers. Now I have returned for the experience, finding once again that blocks and discouragements are inevitable. My writing feels like a sing-song kid’s story some days. (“Progress,” Day 13).  Other days, I’ve had to write during a family event (“At the Meet,” Day Ten). My poems can delight or dismay me, but despite what my brain tells me, I can write one every day. The saving grace is that these are merely drafts. And every day I rise up, remembering what’s important, and honoring my creativity.

 

Let us write with a fervor and consistency beyond what is reasonable. And when it’s our feelings that are unreasonable, let’s hear them out, enlisting a trusty pen: be it uni-ball, fountain, or lime green marker. Without conscious demanding, creativity can arise, and eventually, so shall our joy.

 

 So You Think You Can't Write workshop, Clark College, main campus, Saturday and Sunday March 2 & 3.