Whether you admit it or not, we are all after one thing. Control. Control of our actions, our emotions, our reactions, or even control over others. Then there are the people, like myself, who don't know how to take over control because we are too nice or soft-spoken. In this case, we naturally force ourselves to find a place where we become the boss. For me, I find control in writing. It's like taking everything and everyone who have ever offended you or every thought that has ever consumed you and putting it into words that string together to form a language that only your mind would understand. I don't write to publicize a story, but rather to use words to justify how I feel in a way that I understand reading it back. It's like when I sit down to write, my hands move faster than my mind ever could and every thought I have had about a certain situation is on paper before I even have the time to process the feeling behind the words that I've written. Here's the bottom line...I write in order to live life twice. With words, I am given a second chance to feel, react, and process what has already occurred. We've all had that moment where you sit back and wonder what would have happened if you did one thing differently or said something in a moment where you chose to be silent. Here's the thing about that moment; writing gives you the chance to feel it again in the way that you choose to, or to react to a situation in a way that you see fit, rather than remembering what actually happened. I'm not saying you can take the reality of the moment back, but I am saying that if you write about a scenario the way you wish it played out, that's one step closer in understanding that you have grown from the person you were while you were actually experiencing what you are now writing about. The girl I used to be would be mad at me for saying this, but I am grateful to admit that life has thrown me the perfect amount of mishaps to write pages with words that flow perfectly to the rhythm of the emotion that once took over me. You get two options: 1. to write what you're feeling while buckling under it or 2. writing from the person you became because of the endurance. I have sat and prayed for second chances more times than I can count, whether that be to have a second chance with a person or a feeling. I used to think that second chances were never my thing because I just never got them. I would get mad at this concept of having a lack of luck with getting a second try, so I would write about the outcomes my mind fantasized about. In just 500 words, I relived situations that circled my mind 500 times each restless night. That's when it clicked...writing is my second chance. I'm still unsure whether writing is healing or destroying me, but what I do know is that either way, it feels good.