One thing I like about writing is that it provides such a wonderful opportunity for confidential chats with readers. In the privacy of writing, and reading, we can discuss topics that are a little touchy, a bit embarrassing, and feel less alone in the process. Feeling consumed by memories from high school. Feeling wimpy. Feeling time-obsessed. Yearning for our fathers. Wishing we were taller, or shorter, or less average. To name just a few.

I think that simply nudging yourself into unfamiliar settings - physical or emotional - can produce surprising results on the writing front.

...wrote Lawrence Block. "Someone once told me that fear and courage are like lightning and thunder; they both start out at the same time, but the fear travels faster and arrives sooner. If we just wait a moment, the requisite courage will be along shortly." (quoted from Write for Your Live by Lawrence Block)

Willa Cather said that she write best when she stopped trying to write and began simply to remember.

Writing can be wonderful therapy, and cheap at the price. At the very least, you eventually get bored by thinking about anxious topics and move on.

I'm tempted to say that the top three reasons for hopelessness are rejection, rejection, rejection. But let's cast our net wider. 1) Not being able to write as well as we hoped we could. 2) Not being able to write at all. 3) Rejection.

Fear is felt by writers at every level. Anxiety accompanies the first word they put on paper and the last.