Let me back up a bit.

Once upon a time a long long time ago, I wrote freely. As a child, the words flowed. I’d written short stories, novellas, and my first novel happened in sixth grade. I truly count the first novel as the one I wrote in high school (both of which were unwillingly lost in technological troubles, never to be recovered, probably for the best). I wrote what I wanted to write. My words were my weapon of mass creation and my stories spilled magic onto the page.

Then I grew up.

I started studying writing (and LOVED it). But I fell into this sort of block where I felt like I had to write a certain way. There were certain types of stories to be written, and certain ones to veer away from. And my writing suffered because of it. I wrote a lot of junk. My stories lost their magical charm, and at times, I even stopped writing completely.

But then I went to the magical country of Greece and studied under the magical author Natalie Bakopolous. Besides Writing Workshops in Greece being the greatest experience of my life (shameless plug!), Natalie urged us to consider something that really stuck with me and completely freed up my writing. She waved her magic wand and asked us a question that released my writing from the chains of "should." She released all the pressures of having to write "well" and writing in "certain ways" and about "certain things." Her question gave me my writing back.

(I’m not kidding, this is really what it felt like).

She wanted us to consider what made us a writer. What made us tick? What stories did we always find ourselves returning to? What themes and tropes and settings did they have? What point of view did we feel most comfortable writing from? If we could write completely uncensored, free of judgement, what on earth would we write?

This also included why were we writing. What initially ignited the sparks in our hearts to make us write in the first place? Why did we keep writing now? What were we hoping to achieve in writing? What made my “writer-self” different from all the other “writer-selves” out there? What stories are inside of us individually that need to get out?

Discovering my writer's DNA changed my life.

My writing improved. I wrote more frequently. And I liked writing again.

The self is a tricky topic to discuss, even if you’re only doing it in the private space of your own head. You want to idealize yourself. You want to believe that you’re doing everything you’re supposed to and that you’re exactly as you should be.

But if that were true, no one would strive for improvement (and self-help guides, gym memberships, and healthy eating cookbooks would cease to exist).

Still, you don’t want to admit, even to yourself, that you’re not doing it right. It’s fucking hard to confront the self and figure out what makes you tick, what your flaws are, where you want to be and what’s holding you back from getting there. This is never an easy thing.

And yet, it’s what you have to do if you want your brain to quit belittling you and stressing you out for not achieving xxxx number of words of the day.

Diving deeper into these ideas and truly getting to know myself did the trick for me. I’m not perfect – I still don’t always accomplish what I intend to accomplish. I still stress myself out. But it helped ground me. It helped me understand myself, my patterns, my thoughts. It helped my writing become authentic and true to me.

And it never hurts to know yourself a little better.

You're already a writer, but it's time to fuse both "writer" and "you." It's time to discover your unique Writer's DNA, and lay the foundation to your writing dreams.

The Real+Good Writer's DNA digs into the core of your writer self. Over the next 12 days, we're digging into the stuff that makes you who you are, so you can be FREE to write what you want with confidence and purpose. Through readings, activities, and writing prompts you'll dive deep into the following:

• Figure out who you are
• Pay attention to what you read
• Consider what you write
• Turn to what inspires you
• Learn how you write
• Know why you're writing at all
• And put it all together to discover your unique Writer's DNA!

If you want to make a Real+Good Writing life for yourself, get back to the basics and figure out who you are first. This is the heart, the foundation, the DNA to all your writing dreams.