The writers I admire most seem to be able to set aside their fear of judgement. Their writing is passionate and scary and bizarre and unsafe. They write as though they have abandoned the rest of the world--that in those hours and days of creation they are utterly one with all that challenges them as people.
To create like this is to ride a searing edge of all that is considered sane and rational. It is throwing yourself off a cliff; into icy, churning waters when you can't swim. It is to enter the purportedly haunted house armed with only a candle and two matches.
I ache to write at this level. I'm not sure how to cast aside all the fear that holds me back. I wear my excuses like armor.
Write like Emily Dickinson. She had in her will that all her writing should be destroyed. Or write like Mark Twain, who had some of his writings sealed to opened only after he was dead fifty years. Then, after you've done that, get good and drunk and then send it all off to your agent. (Or post it to your blog, or whatever your medium is.)
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