Dear Young Writer,

I want you to know something I’ve always known my entire life:
All good writers are depressed.
Not so much sad,
But feeling pressed
Under the constant thought capitulating continuously from being fought,
“I’m not good enough. This is never going to be good enough.”

If you want to be a writer there isn’t a right or wrong way,
To write is to cast an open mic session on your heart and your head.
It’s simple but effective in the ways you word things most commonly said
Into things that sing tunes that have never been written.

I’m beginning my letter to you with the words said a million and one times
And right now it’s a million and two,
But it means that number multiplied to me and hopefully to you.
It’s that:
Ernest Hemmingway once said, “Live life to the fullest”
So if the fullest for you is vacationing to a world of words that paint the picture of lives and people you wished you knew,
Then there is no other answer but to write.

What I’m trying to do for you is not just to inspire the hearth in which you spark your fire and love of writing,
But also a chance for you to see what writing can do
For you and for the people who surround around you just to see you use a pool of syllables that sound like honey you crushed in the palm of your hand and bled onto a paper.

Young writer, I want to let you know as my own worst critic and as your friend,
That you’re worth every word you scratched out, looked up,
Spit into a world other than the one you’re already in.
So begin, young writer.
I want you to begin.

When you were a kid, I bet you would sit at a desk and make up stories;
I know because I did the same.
I created every city, town, name, and damsel in distress
Trying her best just to save the town that had a name I no longer can remember.
You see, when you were a kid it was easy to squeeze in make believe with a piece of lined paper;
You found yourself creating scenes and dreams worth living,
You were giving every second of playtime to writing up mini stories
And you called it:
Pretend.

But when you got older and the world unfolded beneath your fingertips,
The word “pretend” slipped somewhere in between a crack of growing up
And just not wanting to pursue scribbling on papers
Or hanging them on the refrigerator for the sake of the trees.
Plus the loads of homework and papers and the stress that wasn’t eased,
They made it difficult for you to imagine that there’d ever been a time to make-believe,
Instead just deceived that the world was on your side and would abide by your will to write constantly.
But it was considered “slacking off”.

Instead, you began writing to get away rather than to pretend.
You wouldn’t put a period as the end of your story
Because it lived on in your head
You read and read between lines of other people and yourself,
Figuring out what made you love it so much and why other people were caught trying not to write but instead say,
“C’mon, man, stop jotting down ideas and go party. Do drugs. Think less. Don’t try.”
But it was something with a pen and paper that in your mind,
You didn’t feel left behind but on a journey.

You were that kid at the foot of your bed penciling in poems
With the sounds of your peers getting drunk outside your window,
And I know because that’s me every Saturday night and God, I love it.

It’s just a world you have the power of controlling.
You were God and the pencil was only your right hand man Jesus.
But the dealings of revisions and bad grades and technicalities made you eager to never write again
You dwelled in the fact that every single writer had to be the same.
Not a name or a piece could identify you as being different.
We live in a world of blacks and it was better to be an abyss color than trying to shade it.
That’s why “I’m not good enough” became not only your entire story
But it lasted for a long time as a thought in your head,
You believed it.
Believed that you weren’t a good writer.
Believed that loosening the grips you should have held tighter on your writer self would help clear your mind.
Young writer, there are no breaks in writing,
Only stanzas and spaces.



Get Lost.

No writer ever wrote anything worthy without unlatching himself from the cords he was tied to,
Whether it’s someone or something
Get lost and let your mind canter a ballad,
Set a new scene, don’t forget, be open and write about it
Instead of throwing a fit over your countless tries to make a phrase work:
Touch the backspace button so many times that you begin to see what your heart really wants it to be
Because the question is not asking, “What do YOU write?”
It’s “What does YOUR HEART write?”
There isn’t an answer because your heart has a new beat every second
And I reckon that with each new beat comes a new desire
Ready to fire out from a cannon of inspiration crawling into your mind
Leaving no traces left behind that it was ever a bad idea
Get lost
Because you will always earn back what you lose
So if you choose to throw yourself into territory unknown
Mentally and physically
Your power is unceasing and for all of the seconds you feel uncomfortable being lost is another chance to find yourself at no cost.
Stick to what you don’t know rather than what you do.

And just get lost.
I don’t believe that prompts are what made books like The Sun Also Rises and The Catcher In The Rye.
And if they did, count me out but I’d rather laugh out loud in Hemmingway and Salinger’s faces rather than congratulating them on creating a plot they found printed on the back of a writing resource.
Get lost
And Fall in love.

You cannot write if you don’t love every single word you edit in,
You cannot write if you’re only trying to fit in with a crowd rather than writing because it means more to you than your entire life.
If there’s one thing I have taken away writing it’s that if you don’t love your story, poem, the way the words flow in and flow out
Looping, flipping, and skipping through your tongue
Then you don’t love it at all.

Fall in love.

With the characters
Both yours and someone else’s
If you don’t cry when he dies valiantly from fighting
Or taken flight into the Sun for the sake of just wanting to soar
Then what is the point of putting so many words in their lives if you couldn’t care any more than to close the story with ‘the end’?
Because that’s not really caring about what you create
Never hate whatever you write, always love it
There’s room for hate in other places and you can fill your mind with thoughts that shoot your stories down
But just because you cannot publish something doesn’t mean it places an epitaph on a grave
Preventing you from re-pressing the save button and instead saying,
“Here Lies a Work I Hated Yet I Will Never Try To Better It”
That’s not even writing, that’s just remembering
So if you think that is letting your heart release a song it’s been trying to sing for days,
Then I want to also know your definition of the word “passion”.

Never say sorry.

Know that what you write is what you mean
And if a critic or a friend tells you it’s too scandalous or violent,
Then realize that what your mind and soul released was what it meant.
A hundred thoughts can be pieced together so perfectly that people elsewhere may think the exact opposite as your critic or friend.
Never say sorry for what you write.
Good or bad it’s not to sign, seal, deliver or send a message to every person,
There will be people who hate what you write
And there will be twice as many people to replace the faces of those who hate it and hate you.
They clutch to it when they’re in the dark going to bed,
They put a flashlight on the pages under the covers
Finding that the characters and them are secret lovers abiding by only one rule and that is to read

Be heard:
You write because your voice is not enough

You write because no matter how sad your body feels
Your heart always has an idea to better it.


People will not always like you
It’s not your role or job to make them change their mind like clothes you just washed.



And if someone says they cannot stand you,
Sit them down.

If there is ever a time when someone interrupts you,
Cut them off.

Be impolite:
Say “sorry” less and “I meant that” more often.

If there is ever a time where someone chooses to speak louder than you,
Scream.
Make them believe that what you wrote is the best thing you’ve written yet.

Write everyday.
Exercise your ability to create.

One day you will die out
And if what you wanted to come out of what you had is not there
Then you must have closed both a door and a window on yourself
And said, “to hell with it”.

Twenty-four hours are placed in a day
And if today is as bad as your writing can get
Then let it out.
It may be the worst piece you’ve ever written
You can be forgiven but let it out
Because nothing is ever finished in writing.

If you’re published,
Keep working.
Change the story a billion times
Because editing isn’t a crime.

We live in a Times New Roman world
And it’s your job to choose if you
Bold
Italicize
Underline
It’s your story and impact.
In fact, you should never let anyone choose what you do with your own story.
You are the author and creator.
Believe that you are here for something more
Than being an extra man in someone else’s army.

It’s not your purpose to fight a battle you did not start.
Sparking a flame for someone else can only risk you being burned.
In the end, you have yourself to depend on.
Whether it is right or wrong, believe that you must be there for yourself.

Your voice is a weapon.
Use your thoughts as darts and arrows
Let your voice bellow through victory and defeat
Carry a sheet of paper on with you and press “Try Again”.

Don’t ever be discouraged,
Push the limits, take chances, write and say profanities in every chapter.
Smile towards the last page of your creation and feel the sensation sending something someone has never felt before
That’s the feeling of rebellion.

Even if you’re in hell and aimlessly reaching up,
Still soften your eyes and fix them on what you’re aiming for.
Forwards, go on, young writer just go on.

Have only pure love
For yourself and for writing.
It’s the only tool that can save you from self-destruction.
I’m giving you an instruction to remain in love
With writing and with your gift to write.
Believe me, it’s a gift worth sharing.
Be daring,
A rebel,
And always love what you can do
No matter how much you hate it.
Hold onto your talent.

All good writers may be depressed,
But in a hundred years, the voice you had will be suppressed
But the voice within holding the song of stories that you wrote
Will still be printed.

When you see yourself in a library,
You will feel legendary living in such a time
Where even the smallest of copies can make you feel so alive
Remind yourself that writing is important and without it
We cannot quote
We cannot compare
We cannot share the thoughts and the tears we spent staining each page a night
Try if you might, just to picture yourself making someone cry over something that you wrote.

The same person you read five minutes ago was once in your shoes
But his feet grew so he passed them onto you
And now it is your turn to wear the soles down;
Look around, young writer, we all have shoes to fill.
Be hopeful that you will be heard in time.

It may be hard now but satisfying the dream that started with your mother having to write down the words for you because you could not spell
Has carried on through the best of times and the times you thought to be going through hell.
I swear it is a dream worth pursuing.
I’m telling you that I know because this has been my dream since I was four and a half.
I am baffled that I am writing this to you
Sustaining this type of dream, remembering that I almost gave it up
But one English teacher changed my mind completely
So much that I cannot imagine the question “What do you want to be when you grow up”?
Without having said blankly, “A writer.”
I even wrote this in the middle of his class.

Begin.


Young Writer,
I want you to remember
You are a good writer and you are talented.
Everything you say and write down has a purpose.
You are appreciated and heard.
Love what you have the ability to do.
Have only love for what you are made of,
You are extremely gifted.
You are one of a kind:
A lucky penny.
A polished diamond.
A sun that continues to shine even in the rain.
A crystal in the midst of Hot Springs, Arkansas.
You are unique despite what you think, hear, or see.
Young writer, I know that you are talented and special.
Love yourself, and understand that people love what you can do.
It’s treasured.
You are treasured.
And I hope you remind yourself that everyday.
Much love,

Elizabeth