Clack

Mechanical keyboards. I fucking love ‘em. The loud clickity clack of those heavy tactile keys. When I really get into the groove, I begin thwacking them with ever more force. Writing’s often a quiet, brain-y thing. But I like it when it’s loud and physical, when my hands are hovering and pecking violently away at the keys, like chickens hunting for worms. I don’t know if that metaphor even makes sense, but whatever. I just love mechanical keyboards a lot, okay?

I’ve become far more intuitive in recent years, able to feel subtle sensations in my body and trust their guidance. But there’s one intuition I’ve had for the better part of a decade, one that’s rung so loudly and clearly through me that it couldn’t be mistaken. I’ve long known that writing is essential for me. That the more I write, the more I publish, the better my life seems to get. When I’m writing consistently, I make more money. I feel more connected to myself and the world. I feel lighter, freer, like I’ve done my work. Every incentive in my life nudges me towards writing more. Despite knowing this, and feeling it in my bones, I’ve spent the last decade struggling to get words on the page, fearful of hitting publish.

It’s January 1st of 2018. The first day of my new era. I’ve confidently declared that this day is the dividing line between my old life and my new one. Not only am I going to write every single day, but I’m going move my body, read, meditate, and eat healthfully. I’m going to transform, dammit! I make it roughly a month before the weight of this challenge buckles my knees and I collapse beneath my expectations of perfection.

I kick off January of 2021 and 2023 with a challenge to write and publish daily. In both of these, I build real momentum. I start seeing results. In my business, my body (of work), my sense of self. Maybe I’m finally breaking free, I think. Maybe I’m for real this time. Maybe the momentum will carry me along and I won’t go back into hiding. But nope. Each time, I hit some kind of invisible wall, where the discomfort of visibility becomes unbearable, and I promptly disappear from the public eye for months on end. For 10 years, this has been my pattern. Like clockwork.

Since the start of this year, I’ve written and shipped something nearly every day. Most of it’s been in private, on a blog no one else will ever see. Now I’m writing in a semi-public space, with people I trust. Something feels different this time. It’s hard to explain, but it’s like I’m slowly wading into the waters of visibility instead of dramatically plunging myself into the deep end. I’m showing up daily to build the muscle of writing and shipping, getting into a groove, a rhythm that feels sustainable. There’s a lot more intuition in the process now. I’m following the threads of whatever feels alive in me, instead of trying to force out the pieces my mind is convinced I should write.

Yes, something is different this time. I can feel it. But the funny thing is, it’s not of my own making. I haven’t magically transformed through an act of will. I haven’t buckled down and applied so much force to myself that I broke through the resistance. No, what’s happening now feels more like an act of surrender. An act of grace. I suspect that praying daily is helping.

There’s one other thread I want to pull this morning as I click and clack away on my lovely loud keyboard. Somewhere deep in my subconscious, writing has always been a way of performing intelligence, projecting an image so that people will hopefully see me as valuable, as worthy. I’ve spent a lot of time in this series excavating hurts from my mom, and it’s become clear to me where those tendencies come from. Somewhere along the way, I learned that to be worthy of love, you need to go to war with yourself and put on a show for others. You need to tell them what they want to hear, be who they want you to be. For years, I took that strategy as far as I could, and it didn’t work.

Two days before Thanksgiving—which was, ironically, one year to the day after my mom evicted me—she sent me a text. The first one all year. She wished me a happy holidays and invited me home to spend either Thanksgiving or Christmas with her. I responded with a little heart emoji and the “thank you” emoji. Nothing else. I didn’t go home. I didn’t try to force some kind of reconciliation. Because I’m not ready. I’m learning, slowly, how to live and act for myself, not for her. To show up and care for myself when I’m hurting in the ways she couldn’t. To attend to the scared little lad within me, with compassion and patience. With trust. He and I have been at war for years, so it’s not a quick turn of the page. But he’s making himself heard through this commitment to writing. His voice is coming through, where once it had been silenced. The conversation between us is alive, expanding, one loud clickity clacky morning after the next. Onwards.