Yesterday a friend sent me a video of Glennon Doyle’s morning meeting from a few days ago. The meeting’s about how to avoid deathbed regret. Glennon says the only way she knows to avoid it is to try to avoid bedtime regret. When she was first starting out writing, she told herself that she would write for an hour a day in her blog and then hit publish at the end of that hour, no matter what. So that’s my goal for the  next month. Except I’m aiming for just fifteen minutes. Because an hour ain’t happening, y’all. I am way too terrified to commit to an hour, alone with my brain and a kajillion words that I can choose from.

I’ve always wanted to write, and I have off and on for most of my life. But there’s been way more off than on. I want more on. Way more on. I’ve always known that I was a writer (and that is super scary to admit, because judgy people, and judgy me, and now I feel like I have to actually do it), but nonetheless I’ve spent a lot of time in my adult life trying to figure out what I want to do when I grow up. I’m mostly a freelance copyeditor and a little bit a freelance writer. I fell into copyediting, though. It wasn’t really the plan. So I keep thinking, What am I really supposed to be doing with myself? Because it couldn’t be just writing. What kinds of stuff am I supposed to write? How will I find the time to write? I can’t make a living off of writing? I mean, what the hell, it’s not like I’m going to be some sort of J. K. Rowling and make loads of money from my writing. So I keep questioning.

But what I know, on some level, on some days more than others, is that the answers to all my questions don’t really matter. I just have to write, no matter what else I do or don’t do. As if I wasn’t already sure that I’m supposed to be a writer, Glennon said that you know you’re a writer if you question whether or not you should be a writer and if you’re jealous of other writers. Check and check. I’ve tried waiting until I’m ready, but like with a lot of things in life, that doesn’t work. I just have to do it anyway. It won’t kill me. I never felt ready to have kids, but I knew I didn’t have forever to get that done, so we just had some kids, bam bam bam, and it was insane and I felt woefully unprepared and like I was failing all the time, but I am here, and my husband is still here, and the bam bam bams are still here. And we’re okay, and sometimes I even feel like the bam bam bams are wonderful creatures to behold. And I still feel like I’m failing a lot. But the kids love me anyway. So it can be with writing. My writing won’t ever love me, but I can forgive it for that. I can do it and that won’t kill me and I’ll probably get some satisfaction out of it, even though it won’t be perfect.

It’s been longer than fifteen minutes. I didn’t do it perfectly! I broke the rules! But I made up the rules! I can break them! Now I’ll hit publish. Bye-bye, bedtime regret.