I did my taxes last week.  I thought you should all know that.  I waited until July 15th on the off chance that they actually would magically get done.  They did not. I am never doing my own taxes again.  I am good at a lot of things.  I enjoy a lot of things.  Filing my taxes does not fall into either of those categories.   Something else that isn’t magically getting done is that book I am writing.  Or, not writing as it turns out.  I tried using the share it to social media for accountability approach.  That looks like me sitting down at my laptop by 6:30 every  morning and posting a selfie to my story so the world knows that I am doing the thing I said I would do.  But early morning selfies are tricky.  I always forget that I just woke up until I see the pic.  Then I have to take 72 more selfies until I get a decent one.  Then I write.  This is is what I have learned.  I write like I do everything in my life.  I am either all in or I am all out. There is no in-between. These past two weeks I have been all out.  And it feels like I am done.  Not just done, but mad about it.  As in fuck this fucking book, it’s stupid and I don’t even want to write it.   Which is how I know that I’ll keep doing it.   I was doing great, sitting down at the same time every day, posting my selfies to my story,  getting solid word counts.  I felt like I was really doing something.  But I don’t actually know what I am doing.  I’m just writing.  Which is probably fine because I never know what I am doing, and things always work out for me.  Usually better than I could imagine.  When I look at my life I see that things work out for me.  But I also know I have to put the work in.  None of it ever happens magically.  One might think I would stop hoping for that, and yet, I never do.   But I have this friend.   I am 100% certain this woman showed up in my world to help me write this book.    She’s a writer.  And an editor.  Among other things.   And she believes in me way more than I believe in myself.  Some days she talks me into believing in myself and it lasts for weeks.  Then I slowly start to get in my own way.  Doubt creeps in.   I am writing about a past that is painful and dark.  As I write from this place it’s hard to remember that I am not that person.  It’s hard to be the confident and strong person I know I can be.  The old story creeps up and brings those old feelings with it.  The doubt struggle is real.  It shows up as shame.  It shows up as “not enough.”  It shows up as “too much.”  It shows up as “who am I to think I can write a book?”  It shows up as “why would anyone care what I have to say?”   The worst part is that I know in my heart that none of it is true.  It’s my head that gets in the way.  My story is powerful.  My voice matters.  But that dark past is a hard place to write from. When I write from that place, I am IN that place. It’s painful.  It was suggested to me that I write about my right now.  Because my right now is pretty damn fabulous.  It’s full of love and joy and so many blessings that it sometimes brings tears to my eyes.  It’s full of amazing people and beautiful experiences.  It’s full of women who lift me and a family who loves me.  It’s full of beaches and sunshine and dancing.  But it’s still so new to me.  I recorded a podcast a few weeks ago, and that’s probably right around the time I started losing steam for this writing project now that I think about it.  The podcast was recorded with a woman who thinks I am 100% bad ass.   I have only met her in person two times, but she’s followed my journey on social media and knows enough about me to know that she wanted me to share my story.  I  shared my journey to self love with her for this podcast.  Because it really is a journey.  We started in my childhood and moved forward.   We had an hour for the podcast.  When we were finished I was worried that she might not have gotten what she wanted.  She got a small piece of the self love she was looking for.  She got a LOT of darkness.  But that’s the story.  That’s where I am in my journey.  I lived many, many years in that dark place.  I have only been here, in the healthy place, a short time in comparison.   It made me sad.   I felt like she wouldn’t want to use my story because there’s too much self loathing and not enough self love.   There’s no self love in judging myself harshly for my past. I know this.  It’s easy to say.  But it happens. It happens when I write about my past.  And the doubt comes back.  It’s a vicious cycle.  But I have awareness and awareness is everything.   I am going to keep writing.  I am going to write with the expectation that it actually will be easy.  But it won’t.  And then I’ll get mad and I’ll quit.  For a while.  This is how I do everything worth doing.  It’s not really for me unless I say “fuck it, I’m not doing it.”  It’s my go to.  And I mean it every time.  A thing to know about me is that I am persistent.  I know this about myself.   It might take years, but I’ll do it.  I already have the tattoo. I have to do it now. I fully expect the process to suck. But that’s just because I’m still mad about it.