Today served as an unfortunate foil to yesterday in that I let myself succumb to shitty moods and so forth. As such, this post’s chosen title is particularly relevant, so instead of talking about what made my day shitty we’ll just get to that instead. You people, thank the stars or the Gods or whatever (Xenu? Praising Xenu is an option, I guess), aren’t my therapist. Moving on.

I find myself contemplating the difference between saying “I write” and “I’m a writer” (I shy away from contraction in titles whenever possible; don’t judge). It’s a very small difference in phrasing that holds a substantial meaning, to be sure. I’d like to be able to say I’m a writer, for example, but lately I feel it’s more appropriate to say I write. It’s something I do because I can’t envision life without writing, but I also don’t write for a living. I’m willing, of course, to say I’m probably splitting hairs in terms of writing versus being a writer.

I’d like to say I’m driven by thoughts like these. Driven to challenge myself, to better myself, and so on. However, a lot of the time I end up feeling frozen with uncertainty instead. Hence saying I write instead of saying I’m a writer. At some point or another, I need to push myself to get better at finding publishing opportunities, putting myself out there as a writer, and taking risks. Self-doubt and my own-worst-enemy style of self-criticism won’t even permit me to say I’m not good at writing. I think I can say that at this point (Actually, I know I can say that at this point because it’s insulting to the people who support me to say otherwise). That’s the point I feel I can call myself a writer; when it becomes a more integral part of who I am than it is now.

However, I also accept that these could be the ramblings of someone in a particularly bad mood who has condemned himself to one hundred days of blogging, no matter the mood, circumstances, weather, or whatever. That’s a pretty substantial possibility.

Tomorrow will be better, because I’m certainly not willing to let it be any worse. Also, it looks like I failed in not treating this as my source of therapy. Womp womp.