9 Secrets Your Story Is Keeping from You

1. It’s already been done by other writers

   Thousands of others. Thousands of times. And some of those times were classic.

2. It doesn’t care if you know

   In fact, it wants you to know.

   “The truth will set us free.”

3. It plans to keep being done by others

   Even after everything you’ve meant to each other.

   “It’s not my fault,” your story says. “They pursue me. I have to let them have their way—it’s just my nature.”

   Those are the words of an addict. And there is no such thing as rehab for unfaithful stories.

4. And yet it will still keep coming to you. . .

   . . .in the middle of the night: when you’ve got insomnia, when you’re most yourself, most alone, most wounded, most vulnerable.

   It will swear you’re the only one who ever really understood it.

5. It will mean it

   It really will.

6. You can try to escape it

   You can get a great job that has nothing to do with it, fall in love and get married, have children, buy a home, invest your money wisely, go on with your life. . .but you won’t be able to get it out of your system. It will always be there, waiting patiently.

   It knows you can’t stay away.

7. You can try to treat it in an honest and honorable manner

   You can set schedules, make plans with it, be forthright about negotiating for what you want, what it wants, what you both want from this relationship.

   But it’s a liar. It’s not going to stick to any plans.

   It knows this perfectly well, even while it’s enthusiastically agreeing with everything you say.

8. You can try to purge yourself of it

   Throw yourself at it, merge with it, spend all your time with it, force yourself to admit to all its warts and blemishes and wrinkles. . .but as soon as your get yourself out of its clutches and think you’re finally free, it will come slipping back into your subconscious, refreshed from the conflict and full of its own impossibly imperfect beauty. And you’ll be hooked all over again on the heartbreaking potential in it, the complexity and anguish and glory.

   And you’ll take it back, suckered even worse than before.

9. For all life. For all eternity

   And do you know why?

   Because you’re an addict, too.

UPDATE: 9 Secrets You’re Keeping from Your Story