“Write Like You Are Not Afraid”
This is a quote by Pheobe Waller-Bridge. She is one the most inspirational women I have known in my life, and her genius and fearlessness live through many women worldwide, I’m sure.
For me, it’s something I have been trying to do and a piece of advice I have been trying to follow, but so far, it has never been easy. You see, I was born into an interesting family, like many others, in the sense that I was different from most of them from the beginning. From a very young age, I was always trying to find ways to escape the mould they were trying to fit me in. Still, I was either too terrified of getting caught or easily swayed by the “logic” of the worthiness of the situation, and the trouble I would be in was more substantial than my own dreams. I was brought up to believe what people think about you matters more than anything else in the world, and as a “good girl,” you have one job only: to satisfy everyone’s expectations of you. You can imagine the pressure and, more importantly, the fear you will have to carry within you. The fear of never being good enough.
Now imagine what that mindset can do to an aspiring writer. To someone who should have the courage to put herself out there and to let people see hidden sides of her, not-so-perfect ones. To someone who inevitably needs to be honest about what she thinks of others and life. Years ago, I had a mentor; she was a writer and a force of nature. I remember asking her what happens when people from your life start showing up in your writing, and everybody who knows you start putting two and two together and a secret is revealed? Aren’t you afraid you will hurt someone’s feelings or get into some sort of trouble? She took a deep breath, smiled and said: “That’s all part of the thrill!” She then explained how all that is inevitable and that you should not ignore your truth because you want to protect someone else. I often think about her whenever I want to write something unconventional.
To be brave is to be vulnerable. I learned this from Brene Brown. Another inspirational woman who has a special place in my heart. In her latest book “Atlas of the Heart” she says:
When you hold someone accountable for hurtful behaviours, and they feel shame, that’s not the same as shaming someone.
I must come to peace with it; if I write something about someone I know that makes them uncomfortable or embarrassed, that is not on me. I am sharing my truth with the world, and as long as I am not being deliberately hurtful, I should be able to write about anything I want. These past couple of days have not been easy on me. I got dragged into a shitty situation because I spoke up and wrote what I thought about something in a setting I deemed safe, but boy, was I wrong! In these moments, I relive all those years of fear and pages upon pages of writing I used to hide and destroy so no one could read them. There’s another quote from Brene Brown that has become my motto these days:
I’ve learned that power is not bad, but the abuse of power or using power over others is the opposite of courage; it’s a desperate attempt to maintain a very fragile ego. It’s the desperate scramble of self-worth quicksand. When people are hateful or cruel or just being assholes, they’re showing us exactly what they’re afraid of. Understanding their motivation doesn’t make their behaviour less difficult to bear, but it does give us choices. And subjecting ourselves to that behaviour by choice doesn’t make us tough—it’s a sign of our own lack of self-worth.
This is me being brave.