I'm sitting here in the library where I do most of my writing and I can't seem to pull a single thing together on the page. I've been trying to rewrite a story I've been working on for a week now and I just can't seem to make any decisions.
On Saturday, I got a letter from my advisor and it was short and didn't have much positive to say about my story. It's frustrating and now I'm sitting here doubting my ability to create stories at all. I look at the words on the page and I feel like an absolute failure. I'm allowing myself to second guess every single word. I know I want to have a discerning eye when it comes to my own writing but I just want to throw everything out!
So, I tried.
I tried to start over on something new and it's not working either. I don't know if I am cut out for this. There are so many people out there who are better at this than I am but I am compelled time and time again to return to the page. WHY? Why do I do this to myself? I come back to the page each time racked with insecurity and doubt, wondering if I'm just doing this out of some kind of childish fantasy to be something. Something other than what I am and I'm not sure if it is the truth or not. Is that why I come back? Am I trying to figure out what I am or what I am not?
Writing, in the past, has given me the opportunity to be outside myself. To ask myself questions that I dare not open up to personally. I make my characters experience the pain. When I'm creating there is a safety to it. And maybe that is where I go wrong. I'm not feeling the things that I'm asking my characters to fell. This whole process scares the shit out of me. What if I find something that I don't like? What if I find out that everything that I'm working for is smoke and ash and I'm left with a handful of dust.
I sacrifice for this, the writing. I keep myself sequestered away from people, finding time to meditate over the issues I face in writing. Is this just mental masturbation? Am I just getting of on the fact that I'm a deep thinker?
What am I DOING?
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