Why I Write and Finding My Publishing Niche

Adolescence and the Need for Self-Expression

As early as the sixth grade I remember having the impulse to write and tell stories.  I even started hand-writing a long since lost girls and horses story modeled on my favorite series at the time - The Saddle Club.  I was living the dream, because I grew up with horses.  I have no idea why it is considered the stereotypical adolescent female dream, but there is definitely something beguiling about the grace and magnificence of a large animal that will let you climb on top of it and direct it where you want it to go.  It cannot be that only girls find this attractive. Either way, that was what filled my passions at the age.  Although I effectively abandoned riding by high school because I was not allowed to just enjoy it and be me figuring it out on my own, I still enjoy watching horses and riders.  Being around horses and reading stories about them were two of my earliest inspirations for writing.

Picture not actually from my childhood, but one of these horses was around from that far back.

In college and grad school I sought out extracurricular opportunities to write, but I was always shy about pushing it further. In spite of being an extrovert, I am incredibly shy about opening myself up to critique.  There are a lot of reasons for why I did feel and continue to feel that way.  Once you have been given those kinds of negative self-fulfilling feelings of doubt, it is really hard to break out of that cycle. This is especially true if you are a self-perfectionist like me. Feelings of self-doubt never really stopped me from pursuing more education, but I probably have passed on opportunities I did not think would find me a good fit because I was overly self-critical instead of self-promotional. (Posting a poll about starting a Patreon when no one knows what I can or can not do - that is way out of my comfort zone.)

Why now?

I have reached the point where the itch to write is too strong to be denied.  The driving need to write is almost its own distraction.  It is time to finely hone the craft, but also get paid to do it.  The latter is why I freelance.  Not all the work I find is interesting, but I am finding the interesting jobs and focusing my effort on getting the ones that fit the professional niches I want to fill.  I look for jobs where I can write informative pieces on politics and legal issues, which are my strengths, and I look for paid creative writing experiences.

Doing a career pivot from legal analysis to writing has had more a few fits and starts, but some things are beginning to fall into place as I have improved my platform profiles.  Now if only I could get my mind to calm down and focus on one topic to write about for me, so here is a list of topics currently swirling in my head:

• Adventures in fermentation - I will make some of this hot sauce among other things.
• I will also be making something with tripe this coming week.  I have not decided what yet.
• Write a weekly short story of no more than 600 words and exercise that muscle.
• An exercise that will probably go on Patreon eventually, but I should start now. 
• Get all those thoughts in my head that have been swirling since - well before 2016 - out in a coherent, unassailable masterpiece.
• Who am I kidding, some know-it-all will come along and poke their holes.  I should know.  I have that tendency too.
• Revisit the path of my classes with Professor Taylor in law school - read Heidegger and astrophysics - or whatever else tickles my fancy to deep dive into what is fun and not work. 
• Yes, this is very esoteric but so, so fun! Welcome to my brain.
• Wait. Writing is fun too, and I just made it my work. Hhhmmm...

Some of the thoughts might go up here, and others will get stacked and saved for a rainy day.  What else is a blog but an opportunity to organize the word vomit of my brain. 

Seems Appropriately Aspirational - Unless You are Icarus

This post was definitely me writing and feeling incredibly awkward about opening the Pandora's box, and then editing the "too much awkward - I can't say that" out.  It still feels awkward.

So, so awkward.