Expecting Mastery From Shortcuts is Like Expecting Orange Juice From Apples

I wrote about a million words to arrive at the fifty-two-thousand in my memoir.

It took this many words for me to get to the core and the essence of what it was like to be arrested by the FBI, go to federal prison, and lose everything, including myself, along the way.

It took this many words to uncover the truth behind my desire to end my life.

It also took this many words to articulate how I found my self-worth, how I forgave myself, and how I reinvented my life from scratch.

Basically, it took a million words for me to distill all the unnecessary bullshit and get to the truth.

I needed to live up to the reason my heart gave me when I was sitting in the prison library, ready to give up on writing, when the pain was too much.

“To help one person.”

I would never be able to help that person if I hid from my truth.

One of my main goals in writing is to learn.

I want to explore the deep, dark, terrifying crevasses of my mind.

I want to go on an inner journey, bring back what I find, and alchemize it in a way that transcends a mere intellectual understanding of my discovery.