Waiting til I'm Ready

“Make it more personal” he says.

I stop writing and look away from the computer screen. He has just finished reading the very first draft of, what will someday be my life story. I raise an eyebrow and question his criticism, “How can it be any more personal than it already is?” I ask.

My story is one of anorexia, religion and rape. All three of those subjects are highly personal, I think.

“You seem to distance yourself from the events, the feelings,” he answers, “You rely more on what other authors and experts have said, instead of relying on your own experiences.”

I pause. I reread what I have just written on page. I don’t see it. I don’t see what he is seeing in my story. My story is dripping with personal experience and feelings. I’m frustrated now, so I stop writing. I won’t start writing again for more than six months…..

His criticisms are echoed by others in those six months. “Make it more about you,” some say. And for the entire six months I cannot see what they are seeing. Are we even reading the same essay? I wonder.

But we are. And finally I see it. I see something that lies deeper than the words on the page; something that everyone around me has seen all along.
Underneath the words of my essay lie fear, shame, and embarrassment. I am afraid to tell the real story because it will expose me, the deepest parts of me.

After six months of nothing, I decide that I may not be ready to tell. So I reread my story. I absorb every word. And then I delete it. When I’m ready to tell my story, I tell myself, I will start with a clean page. I decide there is no other way to begin.