I have a confession. I love to scroll through Pinterest during my evening television time. And because I try to justify this little time-waster as platform building, I have a board titled Writing. I usually pin writing quotes, pithy inspirations, or beautiful writing settings. But lately, I haven’t been pinning much of anything on that board. In fact, lately, I’ve been avoiding any writing-related pins at all.

When you’re in a writing slump, sometimes the last thing you want to read are a bunch of quotes spouting off their version of writing wisdom. Yeah, it’s probably my own voice of doubt convicting me about my terrible writing habits lately, but sometimes all those quotes just makes me cringe.

Walk with me through a few of the pins I’ve been avoiding lately:

Granted Ms. Plath led an emotionally tumultuous life, but every time I read a quote like this I have to fight the tendency to roll my eyes. There are multiple variations of this idea out there—about staying drunk on writing or writers who feel ready to explode if they don’t vent their stories.

Frankly, I’m not one of those people. But wait, does this mean I’m not a true writer?

Honestly, I worry about that sometimes. The more I avoid writing without suffering from stifled emotions, the more I wonder if I'm not like real writers who must write or suffer dire psychological consequences. 

Here’s another quote I see in multiple variations:

I get where this one is going. Writing isn’t always dependent on whether we feel like it or not. It’s a discipline. If you want to be a writer, you must sit down and write. Treat it like an assignment. Perhaps this one is cringe-worthy because it’s the voice of conviction I hear whispering in my head all too often.

This quote by Ray Bradbury states it a bit more gently but equally succinctly:

Sometimes the quotes I run across just make me feel like a scolded child. 

Oh. Is that all?

Or this encouraging little ditty by George Orwell:

But must we be so dramatic, Mr. Orwell?

I get that some people “bleed on paper” (another great quote) but I’m not one of those people. If writing were this angst-filled for me, I’d walk away. Far away. Into a field of flowers where words don’t exist.

Maybe I’m just feeling fussy with all these quotes because lately life is huffing and puffing at my door and threatening to blow it completely off its hinges. I haven’t had any inclination to put words to paper at all.

With all the talk about platform building, the landscape of publishing changing, and the almost impossible odds of actually making a living from selling books, I feel like I’ve been running on a treadmill for the last several years--not all that dissimilar from the world of work I jumped off of three years ago. Let's face it, writing to publish is business.

So where does all this leave me in my Making the Leap journey? Quite honestly, it leaves me on the side of the path, watching all the writers hurrying by with their online book tours, Facebook release parties, and cover promos, wondering what my next move in life is going to be. Will I keep writing with goals of publishing? Do I even want to try to write a book anymore?

The question I really ponder,the one I desperately hope to make peace with, is this: can writing once again be an expression of emotions, thoughts, joy, and art for me? 

Then today, I saw this quote. You’ve probably read it before, but it hit me right where I’m at:

Thank you, Mr. Vonnegut. Can I find my way back to this joy in writing? Because it makes my soul grow...because it feels like singing in the shower or dancing to music only I can hear? I hope so. The reward is enormous.