Writing about your life is a self-scare—you have to look at it before you can share it. On the courage memoir takes, and the safe space that holds it.

The strange paradox of trying to be someone else in order to be yourself—and why the masks have to come off before the real book can be written and you can find your writing voice.

There’s a particular ache that lives in the heart of so many aspiring authors—especially those called to memoir. It’s the ache of an unspoken truth, a story that’s been quietly waiting inside you. But then life gets loud again. Days pass. Responsibilities pile up. And the story? It keeps waiting.