Enough

The following post is an entry into a contest hosted by Positive Writer called “You Are Enough.” For more information on the contest or to read entries from other writers, click THIS LINK. For my submission, keep reading.

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It is the first blank page in an empty composition notebook, the blinking cursor at the top of the white screen in a new word processing document. Before ink meets paper or fingers push a single keystroke, you hear every imaginable whispering doubt sowing seeds of discontent. This is where you decide if you are capable of transcribing thoughts to prose and if your story is worth telling.

After publication, critique is readily available and often unavoidable. Grammatical mistakes are publicly visible, errors in logic are up for debate. You hope for praising reviews and positive feedback while bracing yourself for disparaging comments. Third party evaluation comes after the work is complete. All those external voices are heard after the most difficult labor has passed. The hardest part of writing transpires before you begin. To overcome the intimidating unstarted project, you must silence your loudest critic: you.

Those negative objections, the inner monologues you have with yourself, staring into space, filled with trepidation. The first word seems lost, a complete sentence is a daunting challenge, and a full page improbable. Instead of seeing outlines you see deadlines. The voice which should be saying "let's go," grumbles "not you, not now."

So you stare at the empty screen, the blank piece of paper in front of you, the notes application on your phone. Your thoughts diverge from your work in progress.

What if this idea isn't any good?
What if my publisher rejects it?
What if it never sells?
What if audiences mock it?
What if no one ever reads it?

What if ...

The hypothetical questions could be paralyzing. Individual doubts feed into bigger doubts, stressing over being stressed. If you are anything like me, you reach a point while gazing into the abyss where you want to expel the internal grump.

If you have had enough then you need to believe you are enough. Waking up this morning was the first word on an empty page for the story you are writing today. A hot shower and fresh cup of coffee were your opening statements. Every heartbeat is an additional keystroke contributing to your headcount goals. Your deadline is bedtime, and tomorrow is a new day with another blank page and blinking cursor waiting to begin a brand new story. You are the only capable scribe because you are enough. Your stories deserve to be told because you exist.

Your ideas are good enough to be shared, to be accepted, to be sold, to be complimented, to be read again and again and again. The world needs your voice, it needs your perspective, it needs your prose, it needs your tomorrow. So write. One word at a time. Even if it needs editing. Even if it needs revision. Even if it needs to be completely re-written. Write. Do it, because only you can compose the stories placed inside you. Do it, because you are enough.