From a really young age, I’ve been drawn to writing. When I was a kid I wanted to be an author. I spent my free time writing stories about lives I hoped to one day live. I once wrote a story that was 200 pages long and took me over a year to write. But I deleted it. For me, at that time, I was terrified of embarrassment. I would work for hours into the night on these stories that, in retrospect, were pretty incredible. But once I finished that final sentence, I deleted the entire document. I was scared of what kids at school would think if they read my writing. I was convinced they would shun me and laugh behind my back and that all of my friends would turn on me. This fear held me back from pursuing the one thing I was actually really good at.

For years, I wouldn’t write anything unless it was for school. And unfortunately, school sort of ruined the appeal of writing for me. I began to dread writing. I still knew, though, that writing was what I was good at.

Now that high school is over and I’m taking a break before starting college, I’ve started to write again. For me, writing is an escape. It’s something that calms me and makes me happy. My favorite place to be is sitting at my desk in front of the window and writing. Writing gives me purpose and inspiration. Once I get an idea, my fingers fly across my keyboard for hours at a time, writing stories about my life to share with the world. My computer is full of tales of failure, success, and lessons learned. It’s full of things I thought I’d never share. I have funny pieces that I can’t help but laugh while reading and I have pieces that bring tears to my eyes by the end of the first sentence.

Writing is freeing. Something about looking at a blank word document and knowing that you’re about to fill it with a combination of words that has potential to reach out to someone else is extremely liberating. I often catch a glimpse of my reflection in my computer screen while writing with a huge smile plastered across my face. Writing is one of the few things that makes me genuinely happy. Writing brings endless possibilities to me. It’s something that I’m proud of. I can read over my work and feel a sense of pride in knowing that I wrote that. That I was able to put my thoughts into words in a way that others can understand.

The best part of writing, for me, is sharing it. When I get a notification from the Odyssey saying that my post has gone live, a feeling of real and pure happiness and excitement takes over my entire body.

If you choose to share your writing, it’s important to know that not everybody is going to like it. After sharing an extremely personal article about how my anxiety caused me to end up in the emergency and withdraw from college, I was told it was an example of white privilege. The person who made this comment didn’t do it nicely, either. It’s hard to see this kind of response to something you worked so hard on, but everyone is entitled to their own opinion and I’ll never take that away from someone. Negative feedback sucks, but it’s the overwhelming positive responses that keep me going. I worry every day that people will get bored of me and the 700 shares will turn into seven shares, and I really don’ t want that to happen. With that said, though, nothing will ever take away my passion for writing. It’s important to learn from failure. Even if my Facebook friends stop sharing my articles and the messages of appreciation stop coming through my Instagram inbox, I’m going to continue to write. At the end of the day, I write for me. I write to tell my stories and all I can do is hope that it’ll be interesting to other people. I’ll continue to write even if my work doesn’t get feedback anymore.

I write because I believe I’m good at it. I write because I want to be the voice for people who aren’t willing to speak. I write for me, for my friends and family, and for anyone who takes the time to read it. I write because some day, I hope to make my passion a career. I write because I want people to know that they’re not alone. I want people to laugh. I want to inspire people. I write because it’s my thing.