Going Public
"You have to let people see what you wrote"
This first post feels like a throat clearing. Who am I? I’m a person who’s written a lot and shared little. I’d like to change that and that’s why I’m here.
In a New Year’s Day online writing workshop, I discovered, through a series of prompts, my word for the year: public. It didn’t surprise me and it solidified my plans to start sharing my work.
I’ve got a lot of stories I’m burning to tell. True stories that shine a spotlight on moments in my life when I felt foolish, elated, jealous, brazen, embarrassed, alive, manic, depressed. I can’t blame it all on the Moon, but could I blame it on anyone, anything, any time in my life when something so consequential happened that it changed me forever? Definitely.
I’m not shy anymore and I’m ready to share my stories. They say life is fleeting and the older I get, the faster each year seems to pass. At the end of my life, would I be happy to look back and see that I’d squirreled away my writing and kept it from view? I know the answer.
Perfectionism has stifled me. It’s impinged upon my ability to get to the finish line with my work, call it good, and let it go. A few years ago, however, I stumbled upon a Tina Fey quote, from her memoir Bossypants, that’s stayed with me. She said,
“You have to let people see what you wrote. It will never be perfect, but perfect is overrated.”
Her words, lodged in the back of my mind for some time now, rise on occasion, reminding me of what I need to do.
We live. We accrue experiences, which become memories, which when crafted and shaped, become stories to share, or not share. Shared stories have the potential to help people feel less alone, which is why I write in the first place. I’m hoping that by letting you see what I wrote, you’ll feel a little less alone, too.
Thanks for being here, E