Lil’ G looking deep in thought today.

Just a few weeks ago, I had an idea for a blog post that writing is so much like life. It’s got many ups and downs and many twists and turns. I jotted the idea down to write about this, but then never did get around to it. Until today, when I read author, Dani Shapiro’s blog post, “On the Long Haul.”

She wrote, “A book is a lot like life.  You never know what’s around the corner.  You never know when it’s going to up and change on you.  You can’t predict the outcome.”

Yesterday, I was having a day where I just didn’t want to  work on the book I’m currently writing,  Joie’s Gift. Back and forth I went in my head saying that I should write. Write anything. Write something. Then I’d find myself being defiant and silently saying, But I don’t want to. I don’t have to if I don’t want to.

I also knew that at the end of the day I wouldn’t like myself much for not writing. But I didn’t care. But you know what else I knew? That I’d come back to my writing again. I know this about myself now. I will come back when it feels right. I also know that I have to live with the consequences of how I feel when I don’t write. I also know that when I do write, I feel better. I. always. do.

Yesterday I was willing to accept that I wouldn’t feel totally like me because I didn’t write. But that was okay.

Dani goes on to to say in her post, “My inner life is an inaccessible landscape when I’m not writing, a foreign and unfamiliar place.  It doesn’t feel dangerous so much as remote.  I don’t know any other way to get there.  The pen lights the way for me – it has always been my only source of illumination.  But the further away I drift from the page, the harder it is to get back.”

Today I wrote more for my book. I feel good. Actually, I feel great! But I also know another day will come when I don’t want to write. Another moment will come where I say what I am writing won’t matter in the world. I’ll wonder why I’m writing this book. I’ll think about how dumb it is. Will anyone care?

As much as I sometimes wish I didn’t have those feelings run through me, I own that they do. They aren’t always pretty. Writing and life isn’t always pretty or perfect. But when those moments of happiness come because I wrote, I soak it in. I give thanks for it.

It’s also reassuring to me that someone who is a best seller, having written eight books, goes through so many of the same things. This. is. normal.

Dani has been traveling quite a bit the last few months, teaching writing workshops, and now ready to get back to her writing life and wrote, “It’s time.  Time to close the door.  To begin to cultivate the patience and blind faith once more.  Time to be fearless and reckless, to pick up that pen and watch the light stream out of it.  Here, it will point the way.  Here, remember?  This is who you are.”

“This is who you are” brings a wave of emotions for me. It is in the creating that I feel alive. I know this to be true of most who create and the tug and pull we feel when we aren’t in that place. Just as in life, when it is chaotic and stressful, we yearn to find our way back to our center.

And if we stay the course, accepting the ebb and flow, this is what makes it all worth while.