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The blank page is here again. I’m sober. Anxiety strikes and I doubt me. But there is no quitting because I refuse to give in. I must keep at it until I win. Whether intoxicated or not, I have to believe I’ve got what it takes to make something great.

Writing is about determination and want. Skill gets developed over time and understanding only arrive hands on. To be a writer one must write. One must fight with their best foot forward and hop the rest of the way if need be. But write. And write. And write.

There’s no right way to do it. There’s no right place to start. The formula is simple. Start at whatever garbage is easy to access and work, and work, and work until it starts to shine. Through word play and multiple drafts, one sentence turns into many. They become paragraphs with meaning. Purpose. A message.

Before long garbage turns to gold. Words exposing the soul. About who I am. About what I do. Even if its fiction, that fiction came straight from inner truth. And I’ll hate it more than anyone around. They’ll love it because it was not made by them. But they got to see the things about me that I can’t express any other way. And they’ll like it even more if they relate. Because like me they struggle to say what they’d like to say.

The doubt in my ability to make things that’ll last and people want to have.

The impostor syndrome I was born with.

The fear of abandonment I choke with.

The itchy thought in the back of my mind that everyone is putting up with me because of some inclination they can’t control to be kind.

And though I might struggle to say them out loud, even write them, the point is I try when I can. My hands are shaking as I type that I am sad, lost my best friend, the first pet I had, but I share it because I can.

Writing is about exposing something through the words. For things to come out that need to be heard. Like therapy, it needs to mean something, even if that something is nothing. It’s that nothing that means something to someone who was looking for a nothing to believe.

The want to back down is quite loud. And I have to forcefully remind myself what writing is about to pull myself off the edge and get with the program instead. There is someone somewhere who needs to read the words that I write to ease their days and their nights. Whether one person or millions, even if no one is reading this, I got it off my chest and maybe that was the purpose.

And yeah, maybe I’ll struggle sober, but as I get older and reteach myself the tricks I’ve learned I’ll improve. It’ll take time, but if I strive I’ll survive and my life will continue fine. I doubt my ability, not my will. I know that with time I’ll be ill and the skill will show and everyone will know I’m for real.

I just need to remember that writing is about work. About trying to be heard. About mastering the words. About exposing all my hurts.

And I’ll sit and I’ll write. Even when nothing is on my mind. Because when that blank page visits it’ll be time to prove that I am a writer with a lighter in my heart. I’ll fight right here with the keys before my eyes and hands. I’ll be making a stand against the blank page trying erase it.

Because I’m a writer.