For some reason I couldn’t explain I had a compulsion to check an abandoned blog of mine. I kept tossing and turning in bed until I finally got up and turned on my laptop. This blog was the first I ever started and only a handful of people knew about. It was a place where I recorded most of my innermost thoughts – unfiltered.

I don’t know what compelled me to check it. I was surprised I was able to get access after only one wrong password guess. To put it in perspective, I last wrote on that blog in 2007.

Seven years.

It’s been seven years since I’ve written about my life and shared it with people, handful or not.

It’s been seven years since I’ve had the strength to share my writing with the sole exception of the flimsy 20K novella I put out last year. I have been kicking myself for procrastination but when I think about how it’s been seven years since I’ve written for myself, I understand why I’ve been taking my time.

I wasn’t ready.

I don’t know why it has taken me this long to realize that in order to be productive I need to be honest with myself. I can trace the reasons to what stopped me writing seriously over the years but also can point out the ways I have never truly stopped writing since 2007.

I have to let go of the fear, the fear that has been holding me back this whole time. It may seem like I’m giving yet another reason for my lack of productivity but, for the first time since I’ve started trying to write professionally, I feel free.

All it took was revisiting the past and reading the innermost thoughts of my 2007 self. I didn’t allow myself to delve into the older years of my writing. Reading several posts from 2007 was enough for me. I was brought to tears because it reminded me of things I thought I lost. I never allowed myself to embellish a truth or exaggerate an incident. I wrote about everything and nothing in complete honesty. My thoughts and feelings were stream of consciousness that were plain but blazing in truth.

My truth.

I revisited my worries, my hopes, my dreams, my plans. I laughed and wept as I read them. It was a cleansing ritual. I still feel a little raw and I don’t want to reread any of my former posts at the moment but it did inspire me to write this blog post and to make a vow to myself that this won’t be an empty shell of a blog. I will do my best to continue writing my truth and keep it honest. And I will try to reflect that in my other writings as well.