How do I take myself seriously as a writer?

How do I take myself seriously as a writer?

Sometimes my brain works so hard to answer this question that I have a splitting headache for days. It’s there when I go to sleep at night and in the mornings when I wake up again. While I dream dreams I won’t remember, my brain puts in overtime looking for the solution. It makes me feel incredibly guilty.

I try to apologize, but my brain won’t have it.

“No, no, it’s okay, I’ve got this, I can handle it, don’t you worry.”

“You really don’t have to—”

“Ah, ah, ah,” it interrupts. “I’ll have this figured out in no time, really, just leave it with me!”

It shoos me out of my own head. I feel guiltier than I did before.

So I do what I can to help. I read about writing. I listen to podcasts encouraging me to promote my work. I study the writers, artists, and business mentors I love. What are they doing that I’m not doing? What am I missing? I take note whenever I see something that makes me feel inspired or jealous or curious; I interpret these feelings as arrows pointing me where I want to be. I collect information until my arms are overflowing, then I deliver the mess to my brain.

“Maybe there’s something useful in here?” I dump the enormous pile on its desk.

My brain looks like it might cry. “What’s all this?” Its voice breaks in the middle.

That’s when I realize it was just about to crack the question. My face flushes.

“Shit. I’m so sorry,” I say. “It’s nothing, really, just—”

“No, no, it’s okay!” My brain recovers. “This is great! So helpful! Thank you!”

“Really,” I say to the floor, “just forget about it.”

“Absolutely not!” It gives me a strained smile. “I’ll get right to work!”

I hang my head and sulk out, leaving my brain to make sense of my mess.

This time, I don’t try to help. Instead, I do my best to stay out of my brain’s way. I watch videos online of good dogs being good dogs. I take my real-life good dog for slow walks around our neighborhood. I listen to music (not podcasts) and read books (not about business) and talk with friends (not about writing). I sleep in, do the laundry, hang out with my wife, play bocce, do more laundry. I do not write. I do not think about writing.

It goes on like this for days or weeks. The whole time, my brain works tirelessly on the original question: “How do I take myself seriously as a writer?” I can hear it muttering under its breath, panting with effort. It rifles through files and flyers. It scribbles notes furiously; the scratching sound fills my head and makes me cringe, but I don’t complain. I’m afraid what will happen to my brain and to me if I interrupt it again.

Then, finally, just when I’ve started to think it’s hopeless—that I’m hopeless—it happens.

My brain slams down its pencil. It cries out, “I’ve got it!”

I drop what I’m doing and run. Down the halls of my own head, around one final corner into my brain’s office. Stray papers cover the walls, the floor, the furniture. My brain stands behind its desk in the middle of the mess. Its eyes are bloodshot, but it’s grinning, sleep-deprived but victorious.

I stand there panting until it hands me a bright yellow sticky note. It’s folded in half.

“Open it,” my brain says. It sounds half-mad.

My heart hammers in my chest. I take a deep breath and unfold the note. Just three words, written in my brain’s big, blocky script:

WRITE. SHARE. REPEAT.