Trusting Your Voice

I spent months on my first blog post. Months.

When it was time to let go into the world , I made sure to have a few close acquaintances read it over. I got humbling praises.  I thought it smart– responsible, to send it to the one person I knew who is a published writer, who would also graciously consider editing it while also giving me valuable feedback.

I was desperate for feed back.

It was in that desperation for validation that I could slowly sense my power disappearing from my grasp.

I felt like Ariel of The Little Mermaid, in that pivotal moment when she lost her voice.

This sweet, well meaning person sent me my piece back, most of it was crossed out– it was too wordy. She had made comments on every sentence.

Every single sentence.

My art was crossed away, punctuated, and changed by small degrees. And the comments–gentle suggestions– like a soft hand on your shoulder guiding you in the right direction, made complete perfect sense.

She had edited well.

I was grumpy that whole day. A little emotional. Snappy. I drank two beers on day 21 of my 30 day alcohol fast. When the day was coming to a close and I revisited the new “edited draft” that I spent some time fixing up, I saw something that was foreign to me.

My piece was no longer my piece.

My first venture in writing had ceased to be fun, ceased to be freeing. My creative side suddenly felt barren. I lost sight about why I wanted to write in the first place–to have a voice and to share that voice with others.

In perfect synchronistic fashion, the piece was about finding people who value your voice. The Universe in her tricky ways was testing me. The test was in my strength of voice.

How fiercely could I protect my voice and not let it slip away to someone with differing views than my own.

How willing was I to let go of perfection.

My voice is far from perfect, I wouldn’t want it to be– I just want it to be mine.Tweet

Authentic, honest, imperfectly…mine.
I’m forever grateful to my kind hearted friend who probably spent a few hours of her valuable time to give me some great advice and a candid critique. She is a real life Angel. But her voice is a lot different than mine.

My voice– however deeply flawed cannot be silenced.

And if it could?
Well then I have no business writing at all.

Xo,

Side note!! –> I respectfully took much of my friends advice and my first piece wouldn’t have been half as good without it. Cheers to good friends in all our unique glory!