A bit ago, I signed up for a writing course that was not a craft seminar, but a program that promised to help me identify and get past my own writing resistance. That sounded pretty magical, and I hurriedly forked over my electronic dollars without thinking it through. Alas, I didn’t get much from the program.
Participating in the course paralleled my recent acquisition of an Al-Anon sponsor, and an earnest effort at beginning to work the Twelve Steps. I zoomed through Steps One through Three: LFG! I’m all in! And then I came to Step Four, and I felt that familiar resistance, that same demon that often greets me when I have even a passing thought that perhaps I should writing rather than doomscrolling. Molasses, in thought form.
My resistance is caused by fear. Fear that I don’t know what I’m doing, that I don’t belong here, that I’m too old, I’ve waited too long, all the “real” writers are already here and well-established, and there’s no room for one more. The Internet is full; go away. And also, fear that other people’s lives urgently require that I put my own life on hold, indefinitely, in case something bad happens (hello, codependency!).
Step Four: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
A few years ago, I caught myself saying aloud to my therapist, “I don’t know what to do, but I have to hurry!” We both laughed at the absurdity of this statement when I said it. It was regarding my job, (before my retirement), and the increasing anxiety I felt to to do something, fast, and yet to not really know how to do it because my field was changing so quickly. I couldn’t keep up with my younger co-workers, who were zippier, less wrinkly, and who blessedly had no likelihood of cataracts for the foreseeable future. It took some effort to remind myself that I, too, had once been the fast one, and now things were shifting.
Saying “I have to hurry, but I don’t know what to do” opened me to an understanding that resistance often pushes me in one of two opposing modes: paralysis or rushing.
Just for today I will have a program. I may not follow it exactly, but I will have it. I will save myself from two pests: hurry and indecision.
- Al-Anon, Just for Today
In these last two weeks, with democracy under threat and anxiety levels high, my resistance has directed me more often to Ka-Boom shower cleaner and a stiff scrub brush than to my notebook. It caused me to remove every single vegetable bin and piece of glass from my refrigerator in a two-hour diversion cleaning. It’s been somewhat fruitful: My fridge is spotless, my oven is goo-free, my bathroom is sanitized, the sheets are fresh and crisp. But these things will not remain so forever, and I will face resistance again, maybe later today, even.
I am not here to tell you that I have figured out the end-all solution to writing resistance, any more than I have figured out how to conquer it when I open my Blueprint for Progress and continue my Step Four journey. But I have recognized that I can, and will try, try like a motherfucker, to give myself some grace. I will not run from the resistance, at least not all the time. My heart’s wish is to be a bit kinder when I feel that, to not run away, to STAY, as the meditation teacher Pema Chodron exhorts me. Stay, stay. Stay with it.
And so.
Writing becomes the thing that it wants to be, and when I imagined this Substack, I had no idea that I’d be focusing on the intersection of writing and Al-Anon recovery, but here I am. I hope this will speak to others of you in recovery who write. Keep coming back, to the literature, and to the rooms.
A benediction, a closing prayer: Peace be with you all, and especially to those of us in the US as we approach next week’s Presidential election. Keep breathing, keep writing, stay aware of writing resistance. I’ll try, too. When you get anxious, come back here, and admire my clean fridge, and listen to Herb Alpert and the walk-on song to The Dating Game.
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