I was talking to a friend the other day, and she asked me how I was doing. I said, “I’m in a good mood. I wrote something today.” As I said it, I realized the truth of this statement.

When I am writing or reading, times passes quickly. For a period, I am that character, wandering through the pages of my book or bursting into being on the screen. I love to lose myself in a story.

Not all books offer me this kind of respite. And there are many days I don’t feel like writing.

It is hard to write.

It is hard to sit in front a blank page and not let the white swallow you. It is hard to write that first word. It is harder still to keep writing, though distraction, through self-doubt, through another rejection.

But for me, it is hard not to write.

Writing lets me open myself up and reveal who I am. Writing lets me to empty the dark parts of myself onto the page. Writing lets me describe the beauty and the crush of the world. Writing lets me say the things I would never say out loud.

Hanging above my bed is a passage about writing from one of my favorite writers, Terry Tempest Williams. She writes:

“I write because it is dangerous, a bloody risk, like love, to form the words, to say the words, to touch the source, to be touched, to reveal how vulnerable we are, how transient.” –from Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert

I write for all those reasons too. I write because words give me the most peace, the most pain, and the most relief.

Check out the video “Art is Hard” from Cursive. It is one of my favorite songs from one of my favorite bands.