I think one of the hardest things for me about getting serious about writing as a craft is the fact that, unlike most anything other thing I can think of that I’ve undertaken, it wasn’t at the entry level. Or at least I have never perceived it as such, and I’ve had a lifetime of assumptions I’ve brought to the enterprise. Another very difficult thing about writing is that you’re baring parts of yourself at a level of detail few people, if any, ever get to see — not only do you expose all the things that make you tick emotionally, but you also open up the nuts and bolts of how you think. This is one of the places where existential angst comes in. For many of us of the writerly persuasion, the idea of getting writing wrong isn’t simply the act of screwing something up — it can feel like our failures are indications that we ourselves are screwed up at the core.
Which is why I want to hug the man who wrote this article. He says all the things I’ve been trying to tell myself over the years and which I keep failing to actually listen to — all in one place. If you suffer from neurosis regarding writing, I recommend printing out this article and taping it up near your usual place of torment in an effort to reduce your temptation to engage in self-torture.
Writer, harpist, genealogist, language geek, Hibernophile, astrologer, recovering court reporter...
K. Murphy Wilbanks 
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