It’s four-thirty in the afternoon, and I’m in between appointments. Two hours from now I’ll be teaching a couple how to dance for their wedding. Yesterday they messaged me and said they’d been doing something few couples ever do–practicing. And whereas I’m hopeful (hope springs eternal), I’ve been in this business long enough to be prepared for mediocrity. Not that mediocrity would be the worst thing. Indeed, it would be leaps and bounds from where they started two months ago–rock bottom. That being said, mediocrity is not The Goal. The Goal is fabulous, stunning, like, oh-my-god wow.

Since I have a break in my day, I’ve stopped at a local park to blog. As the weather is gorgeous, I’d rather be outside of the shade of this pavilion, strolling and soaking up the sun. Alas, dear reader, I’m a dedicated and self-sacrificing daily blogger, so here I sit, writing. Truth be told, although this writing project has to happen at some point today, I’m using it to procrastinate another writing project. I’ll explain. Three weeks ago I started a short story writing class taught by my friend Marla, the goal of the class being to, by the end of the class (a week from tomorrow), produce a fully fleshed out and hopefully interesting short story, a short story being approximately 1,500 words. And whereas I’ve written more personal essays and non-fiction features of that length than you could shake a stick at, I’m not sure I’ve ever written a fiction short story of that length. Or any length.

In short (story), I’m terrified.

This feeling of terror is what I felt a week ago today when I first sat down to work on Marla’s assignment. At that point I only had a single sentence, a sentence that popped into my brain over two years ago like, Maybe that could be a story one day. Well, despite my all-day trepidation of I don’t know where this is going, shit, shit, shit, I don’t know what else to say, that single sentence, in the space of an hour, turned into three entire paragraphs, or three-hundred and nineteen words.

When I finished those three paragraphs Monday and read them in class the next day, I was elated. I felt like a rosy-cheeked kindergartner on show-and-tell day. Look what I did. As much as being enthusiastic as a writer, I was enthusiastic as a listener. Stephen King says that the author of a work is its first reader, and although my story is only a three-hundred word baby, I really do want to know how it’s going to grow up. I want to know what happens next, how this thing is going to end. Unfortunately, over the last week my wide-eyed enthusiasm about my story has turned to dread because–damn it–I’m the one responsible for writing it. In other words, if I want to find out what happens, I’m going to have to put my butt in a seat and do some actual work.

In terms of this blog, I’ve come to trust The Process. For over two years I’ve written daily and–I swear–most days I have no idea what I’m going to say. And whereas this used to scare me, now I just believe. There’s something there. Maybe I can’t see it, but I believe it’s there. Not because I have faith, but because I have over two years worth of proof. Something always comes up. My creative well is deep.

This creative confidence is something I’m trying to develop with respect to writing fiction. And whereas I wish it would simply show up and shine, I’m betting I’m going to have to work at it, to sit down every day, every damn day and practice like I ask my dance students to. Part of the problem, of course, is that I put a lot of pressure on myself. I tell myself, Let’s just sit down and play. Let’s just see what happens. Inevitably, however, I get one good sentence or paragraph and create a standard of perfection. I think, This can’t be mediocre. This needs to be fabulous, stunning, like, oh-my-god wow. This needs to pay the bills.

This, of course, is recipe for stress.

Recently I read something to the effect that when you have a longstanding desire or dream, you don’t have the privilege of getting to see from whence it springs. Think about how you can see a tree but not its roots. Or how you can see a building but not its foundation. In other words, our deepest wants for our lives (like, I want to be a full-time, paid writer) come from our subconscious, so although we’re conscious of That Which We Want, we’re unconscious of That Which Supports What We Want, of that which created what we want in the first place. I believe this is where creative terror comes from, believing that your dreams don’t have any roots or foundation, believing that you’re drawing water from a shallow well.

A few years ago I started a fiction novel. Like the short story I’m working on now, it excites me. Even though I haven’t touched in forever, whenever I think about my first paragraph, I absolutely melt. When I read it to my friend Marla way back when, she said, “Marcus, I can’t believe this is inside of you.” I think about this encouragement of hers a lot. As recently as this morning I picked up a random book and read things that I think will be useful whenever I get back to that story. My point is I think there’s something subconscious that wants me to write it, that’s supporting me in writing it.

There’s an idea if self-help and spirituality that we’re more afraid of being powerful than we are afraid of being weak. Because we’re used to being weak and we’re used to playing small. These things are comfortable, familiar. But being strong and big, being endlessly creative, the author of glorious stories? Whoa damn. My therapist says that getting what you want in scary. And although I’m not “there” yet, I agree. Just the idea of my dreams really coming true often keeps me from sitting down with my stories and finding out what’s there. Because getting what I want would mean really changing and not playing small anymore. It would mean no looking back. It would mean saying, “Here I am, World–roots deep, foundation strong–fabulous, stunning, like oh-my-god-wow supported.”