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Mark David Gerson
a book bubble about
The Voice of the Muse
Self-Help
Author Insight
The Call to Write
When people ask me why I write, the only answer I can come up with is, “because I can’t not.” It may sound flippant, but it’s true. As much as I love all the books I’ve written (don’t ask me my favorite!), the act of writing does far more for me than the finished product ever could. Dorothy Parker is reputed to have said, “I hate writing; I love having written,” and I understand where she was coming from. Writing can be hard work. Not coming up with the stories or finding the right words. (I show how easy all that can be in this book.) What can be challenging is the personal transformation that is always part of the process when you write from the deepest places within you, when you write from your authenticity, when you write from the heart. When you do all that, you don’t write what you know; you write to discover what you know. And that can be as emotionally challenging as it is creatively satisfying. But here’s what I know about my call to write: The sentences I write are the seams that hold me together. Perhaps, that’s the real reason I write. Perhaps, in the end, it’s the only reason. What’s yours?
Book Excerpt
The Voice of the Muse
Have you heard the call? Have you heard the call that thrills as it terrifies you? Have you heard the call to set something down on paper? To tell a story...one you think you do not know? To inspire others...in ways you do not yet understand?
Perhaps you fear the pen that stares at you across the desk, the blank screen that glares at you accusingly.
What does this Muse want of you? Why won’t it go away?
It won’t because it can’t. It can’t any more than you can ignore it.
As long as that siren sings to you, neither you nor it can rest until you answer. You know that. You know that or you wouldn’t be reading these pages. You know that or this book wouldn’t have leapt out and demanded your attention.
Your Muse, too, demands your attention. For you do have a story to tell. You have words to share, words that demand to be heard, words you need to hear.
It doesn’t matter if you don’t know what they are. That’s why I’m here.
It doesn’t matter that what you know or suspect of them scares you. That’s also why I am here.
It doesn’t matter that you don’t know how to begin if you haven’t begun, how to continue if you have already started or how to complete if you find yourself stuck partway through. That, too, is why I am here.
I am the author of this book. And I, too, hear the voice of the Muse, my Muse. It whispers to me, shouts at me and prompts me to release its words — our words — onto the page. It urges me to inspire and reassure you, to tell you that it’s not only possible but safe to listen to the voice of your Muse and answer your call to write.
That’s why I am here. That’s why you are here. All you need to do to begin to heed that call is take a deep breath, turn the page and read on.
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