Speaking my truth
Especially in this modern world of social media and curating your digital presence, I find that I often censor myself. I don't want to write something that might offend my family. I don't want people to get the wrong impression. I worry about everyone else's interpretation of my writing, and in turn, neglect my need to express myself through the written word. I've written my entire life. In middle school, one of the mean girls called me "the poet who didn't know it". I'm still not sure what she meant, but I assume she was being a bitch. In high school, I wrote meticulously folded TLDR notes to my friends. In college, I wrote under a pen name for the Latin@ group's newsletter. A club leader chastised me once for "inappropriate" language, so I purposely used the f word as much as I could from that moment on. A friend outed my identity to one of my professors and I felt betrayed. In Peace Corps, I wrote 3 letters a day and a blog.