The Muse has been tapping me on the shoulder now for some time.

She has been whispering soulfully, stirring something in my heart of hearts. She is the virginal seductress. And her pleasure will only be satisfied when I stop, listen and embrace her tenderly and completely. Her pleasure and mine is the communion that has been seeking me for many years, or even decades now.

She whispered to me:

“There is a book in you that only you can write. Your words, your expression, your insightfulness come through you and only you. Speaking your truth from every fiber of your being can ignite many hearts. Take up your pen now my sweet.”

It could take six months or a year to write it; I cannot leave my responsibilities and go to a cabin and live like a hermit and write. I lament.

“If I ever saw my muse she would be an old woman with a tight bun and spectacles poking me in the middle of the back and growling, “Wake up and write the book!” ~ Kerry Greenwood

I busy myself again. I ignore her. There are others to care for, others that need me. There are mundane things that need attending to today and tomorrow. Then in my mind I see an ocean stretched out in front of me, endless chores bobbing up and down in it, and no clear route to sail through. I feel blocked, held, thwarted. I feel joylessness. I am drowning.

She beckons again. No busyness satisfies me any longer.

I cannot escape the hunger that needs to be fed, the expression that needs to spill forth and land, releasing me of the imprisoned “one day I will get to it” mantra.

That day has come. I sit at my desk restlessly. I grab paper and begin.

I write and write. I underline. I scribble out. I chew the end of my pen. I pace backward and forward. I write some more.

The next day I do it again.

“This is the other secret that real artists know and wannabe writers don’t. When we sit down each day and do our work, power concentrates around us. The Muse takes note of our dedication. She approves. We have earned favor in her sight. When we sit down and work, we become like a magnetized rod that attracts iron filings. Ideas come. Insights accrete.” ~ Steven Pressfield, The War of Art.

To read more please follow this link to my original article on Elephant Journal https://www.elephantjournal.com/2015/06/write-that-fing-book/