When I decided that I wanted to try to be a writer and find my voice, I knew that it would take a lot of practice. So starting a blog that I’d write weekly on Saturday mornings became a constant for me. No matter what kind of book I was writing the other days of the week, I knew that on Saturday mornings I’d be writing about my life experiences and the lessons that I learned the week before.
The purpose of this blog isn’t just to practice writing, but also to keep me accountable to paying closer attention to my life so I can find the lessons I’m supposed to learn and share with you here.
So around seven in the morning, whenever I hit publish and head upstairs to get ready for the day, Missy will often stop me to ask how my writing went. Usually I shrug my shoulders and say fine.
But often I’ll tell her that it sucked.
I know we’re often our own worst critics, but I hate publishing something that I feel isn’t perfect or the message isn’t clear or I didn’t take the right angle to capture the real story that I’m writing. Being on a self-imposed deadline of finishing by seven o’clock keeps me moving forward. If I feel like I’ve taken the wrong path that day or the wrong angle on the story, it’s too late to turn around.
But I show up anyway. I sit down in faith and I write whatever’s on my heart, whatever it is that I feel called to share with you. And whether I think it’s good or bad, I hit publish and I walk away.
I’ve noticed a funny thing happen whenever I tell Missy that my writing sucked that day. A few hours later, I’ll get an email from a reader who tells me how much they connected with the message… they felt like I wrote it just for them… and it helped with a trial they’re going through.
That’s when I scratch my head and try to figure out why what I consider to be my best writing isn’t always what resonates with readers… and what I’m embarrassed to have written impacts lives.
They say that if you want to find your voice in writing, you need to show up every day and write something. And you need to read. A lot. Because when you read and you find something that you wish you would have written yourself, you know you’re on the path to finding the writers that will influence your body of work and help shape you into the writer that you’re supposed to become.
My favorite book about writing is Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. I love the way that Lamott explained how to find the real story, the one you’re supposed to write. She says that good writing is looking for the kid standing up against the wall. The kid nobody notices. And that kid is who the real story is about. It’s waiting for the Polaroid to develop to see what shows up out of the dark, green murk.
For the longest time I thought that was advice on how to find your voice as a writer.
But now I realize that it’s about so much more than that. I think the real story is that finding your voice is really just the beginning. Because after you start to find your voice, you need to learn to trust your voice, too. That’s the real story here. That’s my kid standing up against the wall.
I’m finding that best way to learn how to trust your voice is to start by trusting yourself.
So write.
Trust your gut.
Say a little prayer, decide what you think the real story is, then start your work.
The only way to build self-trust is by being brave, so once you start, don’t turn back.
Don’t hold anything back, either. Because the words that you’re brave enough to share with the world just may be the very words that someone needs to read. Even if you thought they sucked.