Your Turn Challenge Day 1: Why are you doing the Your Turn Challenge?
I need help. I’m scared. What if I’m not good enough? The backstory and the context is so involved and lengthy. Whose got enough time to even read this? What will this say about me as a person? What will my community think of me? My family? My parents? Will they be proud or will they cringe? I’m tired of hiding. Enough already, I want to be naked in front of the world. I don’
I’ve battled with developing a writing practice over the previous 7ish years. In the last few months, I’ve hit a new stride. I’ve got a goal of writing 1,000 words on a computer and 3 pages in a journal each day. I don’t hit the goal every single day, but something has changed.
I am a writer. I’m not scared to let myself bleed on the page anymore. Its my own sacred space, free of judgement.
Most days I’ll begin with no idea of where to start. I know its in there, no need to force it. I watch the steam come off a hot cup of coffee and I’ll inevitably be reminded of something that I haven’t written about yet. I’ll start writing, releasing everything. More often than I had expected, I end up passing my self-imposed goal writing a few thousand words in a sitting. I enter into a trance mode. No one disturbs me, even in the most bustling coffee shops and hostels. When the words are flowing, its a waterfall that fingers struggle to keep up with. Most of it isn’t so eloquent, some of my sentences aren’t even real sentences. I forgive myself. It’s a numbers game, the more I write, the more chances I have of writing something worth sharing.
This is why I’m doing the Your Turn Challenge. I’m scared to share. I’ve written so much, yet I remain stuck in this pattern of not publishing posts regularly to my blog. I feel like I’ve got to chisel away so much lead in order to get down to the gold. I’m a nomad on an uncertain travel road. I don’t even know if I’ll have access to internet every day for the next week to submit a post. If I don’t try, I’ll never know. So, here goes.
I hope that the Your Turn Challenge will help me get over myself. I hope it will help me get into a habit of publishing regularly. I see this challenge as incremental step in proving to myself that I can do it, if I so choose. I hope I can mold my misplaced shame and irrational fears into a humble confidence.
It’s Your Turn.