This academic year has been an odd one for me as I've ended up on a completely different path to the one I started on. I've also discovered myself a little bit more in the process, so it all worked out well eventually.

On the writing front, I certainly feel like I've been putting the effort in since Christmas. Back in September, my plan had been to keep my writing in the background, almost as a hobby, while I studied for my Psychology MSc (secretly hoping that somehow I'd either do well in a writing competition or have a literary agent show some interest so I'd get to do my writing full-time instead of just on the side).

I'm relieved that I managed to see the light as far as the Psychology Masters is concerned. I enjoy the subject a lot and I've acquired a fair bit of knowledge over the years, but I'm missing the passion I really ought to have to excel at it. I know I've made the right decision choosing to do a Creative Writing MA - and I'm still amazed I had the courage to apply for it in the first place.

So, the year: I started out not really knowing where to turn after finishing my Counselling Certificate and (finally) beginning to deal with some of the things that came up for me as a result of the course, stuff that I never even knew was there to discover. Months later and I'm still noticing the benefits. I've found my voice and truth in amongst the confusion and I'm sure my writing will help me with that too. My next challenge will be finding a way to get my words 'out there' and then eventually stepping away from memoir completely and finding a narrative that's separate from my past. Hopefully a new project will help with that.

I've enjoyed my daily writing routine this year. At the moment, my Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays look like this:

5.30 Coffee & writing for half an hour or so until I hear the kids messing around upstairs. Then it's getting the boys dressed, breakfasted, spellings with my 6 year old, teethbrushing, and lastly shoes on, bookbags ready and in the car.

9.00 Coffee and emails, submissions (if any), and keeping in touch with any writer friends, catching up with my writing group etc, then finally - writing, if there's any time left over.

10.30 Pilates, coffee, and reading (currently 'Solutions for Writers' by Sol Stein)

12.00 Lunch & coffee, listen to music

12.30 Writing

I finish at 2pm for the school run.

Sometimes I'm able to do some reading or writing in the evenings after the kids are in bed, but I don't do this as often as I used to now that I'm able to focus more on my writing. Lately, I'm finding that I actually get a bit of spare time to watch TV (Coronation Street, Have I Got News For You, University Challenge, Masterchef, Who Do You Think You Are?) and do a spot of genealogy - my favourite pastime besides writing.

Next year, when my youngest son starts his 15 hours a week at nursery, I'll have 5 mornings a week to keep up with my course, read and write. I do worry that it won't be enough time, but he'll also be going to a childminder once a week for a session, so I should get one day where I get a longer stretch of time. I guess I'm worried that the other students will be so much further along in their writing careers than I am, and I don't want to fall behind.

I'm so excited about the MA that I can't even think about the difficulties I may have earning a living once the course finishes. At the moment, I'm just brimming with ideas. I hope to use my memoir as my main project for my course, but I also plan to edit a novel and continue with another first draft that's a bit of a melting pot at the moment.

I'm still uncertain where this blog will take me, but maybe I'll get some ideas and feedback when I start the course and meet other writers. At the moment, it appears to be like a holding place for all my plans. It helps me chart what I need to go and allows me to experiment occasionally with ideas. I know I should probably develop these a bit and think more about my audience, and when I get back to it after the school holidays, I hope to be able to give it a bit more time.

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Mark Twain once said, "Sing like no one's listening, love like you've never been hurt, dance like nobody's watching, and live like its heaven on earth." I've always loved this quote, but I wonder how many of us actually live in the moment and follow our hearts instead of wondering how silly we look? I know I'm guilty of holding back because I fear scrutiny and/or judgement, and I think it's one of the reasons I've gone long periods in my life without writing (and singing and loving and dancing...).

Now, I'm one of the most self-conscious people you could ever meet - and with that in mind, it's a wonder I ever began writing in the first place. It occurred to me the other week that this is one of the reasons many people remain stuck and find it difficult to express themselves in various forms.

When I first started studying psychology, I learned about something called the 'spotlight effect', which is that feeling that everybody is watching you - a bit like if you enter a large room full of people and it all goes silent, or if you drop a tray of plates or glasses in a busy canteen. For me, it manifests itself during activities such as singing or dancing (which I rarely do - at least not in company), or more likely - in the middle of a conversation in the school playground. Before I've got into the swing of things, I'll suddenly catch sight of myself, worry that everybody is watching me and assume I look or sound silly. So I stop.

In some areas of my life, this has proved a useful trait. For example, in my case, my self-consciousness is related to my self-awareness - and because of this, there's no part of my psyche or conscience that I don't feel comfortable exploring, so no stone is left unturned. This was particularly useful when I was doing my counselling training, and in turn has benefitted my writing hugely.

However, self-consciousness has also been the worst enemy of my writing, and I'm sure that many other writers can relate to this.

The act of putting pen to paper is in theory very simple. Most of us do it in some form every day. We also tell stories to our friends, family and work colleagues every day, and we read books. And lots and lots of people have that secret (or not-so-secret) desire to write a book. So, assuming a person has that desire, along with the time and an idea they'd like to explore, why aren't more of us making that start in the first place?

I think it's partly because of that 'spotlight effect', that feeling like we're being watched - or even worse - judged.

For years I didn't write because I thought I had to be some kind of genius, that if my story didn't drip off the pen naturally, then I probably wasn't good enough - and my desire to write wasn't enough to pin my future career hopes on, so I looked at studying a more practical subject at university and tried to forget about writing, even as a hobby (I didn't view writing as a suitable activity for a hobby - it wasn't like painting or baking or playing a sport or learning a language - therefore the very few pieces I wrote I kept secret).

Added to that, I loved writing diaries and stories based on real events - trying to capture happier times, or to understand more difficult ones, so it became doubly important to protect my precious stories by keeping them to myself, even if they stayed in my head - they expressed a part of me that was more 'real' than anything else in my life.

Thesedays, I am much better, and I've learned to not care if anybody's watching or judging my writing (and for the record, they aren't, they really aren't - at least not until you're ready for anybody to critique your work anyway), but it wasn't easy. There was always that image of that critical reader sitting on my shoulder scrutinising my small efforts and dishing out negative comments - it was the collective voice of everybody who'd ever put me down and not believed in me.

My solution was to turn it on its head. My inner critic made me angry, and I channelled that anger into determination to write what I wanted to write - and I'd carry on writing until all the negative thoughts were gone. I was literally fighting the bullies on the page. And because there are always negative thoughts to conquer, it's meant that bar the odd spell, I've carried on writing.

Learning to ignore that voice is a real challenge for both new and experienced writers - but it's particularly acute when you first set out. Even today, I can clearly remember the fear of emptying all my hopes and dreams on the page and discovering I wasn't the writer I hoped I was in my soul, that I was just kidding myself all along - and that's why I never wrote for years.

I can live with never singing or dancing again - but the thought of never being a writer - that was the one thing that I feared finding out. And so I never wrote. It's a viscous cycle.

I'm lucky I broke through the fear. And fear was all it was. It took a lot of courage, and I had to use every ounce of my determination and focus to do it - but the good news is that once you've found a way to deal with your inner critic watching and judging, it's another tool in your kit to use - just be aware of new tactics that your inner critic might employ to derail you, and be ready and armed.

Feel the fear and write anyway.

(As I know it's not that simple - here's a link to another blog post I wrote about starting to write: https://lifeandtimesofamemoirwriter.wordpress.com/2016/06/13/starting-to-write/)

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I've been very quiet on here lately, and my this is partly because I've had to make some decisions to make - about my career and my writing.

When I started my blog I had so many ideas - I thought I'd post at least twice a week about all sorts of things. But, aside from the excuse of being busy with the kids, the real reason for my infrequent posts is that I've had a bad case of blogging stage fright - and that coupled with the uncertainty of where my eventual career was headed has meant that I've really not taken the reins and blogged with conviction.

Part of the reason is that I've never really decided exactly what I want my blog to be about. My original plan was to write a blog about my writing journey, set goals for myself and experiment with ideas, and possibly write about some of the issues I've had to deal with through my memoir writing and the inspirations and issues behind them. But then, I've hesitated a few times when it's looked like I might be doing other things in my life, like training to be a Counsellor, or doing a Psychology conversion course, and wondered whether I ought take the blog in a slightly different direction.

The short version of the last few months is that I was set to start a Psychology MSC in January 2017 (slightly later than I'd planned because the course I'd originally applied to do had its BPS accreditation withdrawn just as I'd begun it, back in October last year). As it got nearer to the course starting, I began to question whether it was actually the right thing to do. I kept thinking back nostalgically to last year and how much I'd enjoyed doing my PG Counselling Certificate, and in the end I made the decision to withdraw from the Psychology to apply to do a part-time PG Counselling Diploma instead. So I looked into volunteering to support my application, and started re-reading Carl Rogers.

Then, around Christmastime, I had a breakthrough with my writing when I began the first draft of a new novel and I didn't give up halfway through. It made me realise that I want really want to do with my life is write full-time - and at the same time, I want to learn everything I can about the craft.

The resulting surge in commitment and confidence meant that in the New Year, after I attended the interview for the Counselling Diploma and didn't feel it had gone very well, I finally felt able to realistically put it to my partner and family that maybe I should do an MA in Creative Writing instead. So I bit the bullet and applied to Lancaster University's distance learning Creative Writing MA, and a few weeks ago I was accepted onto the programme. It was a strange couple of days, because it turned out that I'd also made it onto the Counselling course too, and I was in the tricky (but enviable) position of having to choose between the two. I know I'd have enjoyed the Counselling, and would have put all my resources into it, but ultimately, I also know I've made the right decision choosing my writing.

I'm so looking forward to spending two years working on my memoir, learning lots about myself as a writer, reader and editor, and connecting with other passionate writers too. I now have permission to spend long hours doing the one thing I love most in the world, and I still keep pinching myself to check I'm not dreaming.

As for the blog, it's still a work in progress, I still have blogging stage fright, but hopefully I'll find plenty to blog about in the coming months and years.

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When I was in early sobriety, I heard people talking about a 'fluffy pink cloud'. It's that high that recovering alcoholics get when they've put down the bottle and life appears to be falling back into place again - you feel excited about waking up in the morning, and full of hope for the days and weeks ahead (or at least not as full of fear as before). Not everybody goes through this, but I did. It started when I was a few weeks sober, and carried on for a good few months. In that time, I felt alive again. I sang songs in my head as I waited for the bus to to to work, and I looked forward to the weekends where I would drink tea instead of vodka and chat with fellow recovering alcoholics, safe in the knowledge that I had found my tribe. Life was safe again, and I relished every moment, absorbing the goodness and joy in the world around me.

There is also a saying in Alcoholics Anonymous: this too shall pass.

And pass it did. The fluffy pink cloud doesn't last forever, and it can be a double-edged sword. Whilst it is there, it can help you stay sober, to stay away from the booze one day at a time, but there will come a time when it starts to disperse and everyday life just becomes everyday life, in all its grey, tedious and worrisome glory. And that is when the real work of staying sober begins.

But fluffy pink clouds exist everywhere; they are not exclusive to recovering alcoholics (although I do wonder whether there is something inherent deep in many of our personalities that makes us more prone to them than most).

in my life, I experience many fluffy pink clouds, but the biggest and most glorious of all of them is that high I get when I am writing something I love, something I didn't realise I was capable of. I had it for months when I was writing the first draft of my memoir. I expect I wouldn't have written it if I hadn't experienced that high. It's like a kind of higher power that helps you to believe in yourself, that helps you to plough on and get the job done when the harsh realities of the publishing world and a lack of belief quite frankly would have had you give up at the first hurdle. Fluffy pink clouds are the magic that gets you to the other side without giving up.

And when you've got so far, you're less likely to give up (and that's the point you need to prop your dreams up with the scaffolding of determination and editing tools).

I'm floating on a fluffy pink cloud at the moment. For years, I thought I couldn't write fiction. I thought that maybe I just didn't have the right imagination. Because despite the characters and stories I told myself in my head, they all just seemed to fall apart whenever I tried to get them down on the page. Somehow all the stories I started went the same way. It was almost as if I was trying too hard. So I gave up, and resigned myself to the fact that I couldn't write fiction. No problem, I told myself. I'll just stick to non-fiction. I mean, I've written a memoir. Maybe I could write another? But when I went back to the memoir drawing board, I just kept going over the same old stories again. All roads led back to stories I'd already written.

Now, I guess this is an issue for a lot of writers. You have a something you want to say, and you just keep finding different ways to say it. A lot of writers have themes they keep on going back to. So, I had to find out what the things were I wanted to say, and then it would be easy, right?

Sort of. It still took me many, many attempts to get anywhere with fiction though. I wanted to write about addiction, about teenagers, about sex, about families, and I also wanted to write a damn good comedy. And I was attempting to write about all of these things in one book. It just wasn't going to happen - too much pressure. And I was still trying to write for myself, which was fine for the memoir (to an extent), but what I really needed to do was to branch out and think about audience more.

As soon as I took myself out of the equation, I started to think more objectively about story structure and character arcs, and it was through my reading about the Snowflake method, and authors such as K. M. Weiland and Roz Morris, that I finally had a breakthrough. One night before I went to sleep, I thought out a very sketchy plot involving teenagers, female friendships, absent families and issues surrounding sexual consent. It wasn't a comedy (alas, I shall come back to The Library Letters when I've finished), but I had a few characters I thought could try to mould. It was perfect. I began writing a brief synopsis and plot the next day, and to my amazement, it didn't sound trite, like every other attempt I'd ever made at writing fiction.

The plot's evolved slightly since then, but my passion for the book is still as strong as ever. I'm up to 12,888 words now, and somehow I know this time it's different. It might be the fluffy pink cloud talking, but I don't care. It's helped me to break through the barrier.

I expect the fluffy pink cloud will go pop when I get to around twenty or thirty thousand words (see Emma Darwin's blog post about the twenty thousand word doldrums here), but for now I'm just enjoying the ride.

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For various reasons, I didn't write very much last year at all. At the beginning of the year I was busy with university work, and I got out of the habit of setting my laptop up after the kids were in bed except to write an essay. Then I had a couple of rejections, and I went through a spell of wondering whether my writing is up to scratch and berating myself for not being better at it, while not doing the one thing which is essential - Actual Writing.

That's not to say I didn't produce some decent work in 2016. I edited my memoir a bit, I wrote a handful of short stories, and I started a new fiction project. But really, I think I spent most of the year pottering about, not doing a huge amount, and certainly not committing myself to finishing a project properly. All of it to avoid taking any risks, to avoid another rejection.

Well. Here's a thing for me to learn: rejection is essential for a writer. Not giving up is essential to a writer. Not worrying about what everybody else is doing or thinking is essential for a writer. But what a writer really needs to do above all else, and for better or worse, is to Just Write. (I think I may even have written a whole blog post about it earlier a few months ago?!)

And that's where I'm starting this year. Here's the plan which I Must Stick To:

1. Finish sending the memoir out to agents. I came to a standstill with this last year, because I was putting off getting to the end of the list and then ring at a loss as to what to do. The reality is that I probably will get to the end of the list without finding an agent (although there's always a small chance of success). So what do I need to do? Keep sending stuff out. I can't stay at a standstill forever. Surely at some point I'll come up with a plan? I need to deal with that possibility, not keep putting it off.

2. Look into the WoMentoring Project and pick out a writer/editor/agent who may be willing to help me with editing etc. Then apply.

3. I also think I need some more beta readers for the memoir, so if anybody reading this can help, or know anybody who might be interested, please let me know (obviously happy to return the favour).

4. Write a proper outline for The Library Letters. Now that I've finished reading the K.M. Weiland book, I know exactly what I need to do. However, because I started writing the novel before I had a detailed idea of the plot, it's turned into a big editing job, which I really need to untangle before I start writing again. So, back to the drawing board with characters and plot for this.

5. On the plus side, reading the book on outlining has given me an idea for a YA novel. I've spent some time working on this over Christmas and I have a plot, some characters and an outline - and I've nearly finished writing the first chapter. I want to finish the first draft of this as soon as I can and then see what I'm left with.

6. Read, read, read. This is key to everything, I think. I must read more novels - both modern and classic, plus more books about creative writing. I will also start logging all my reading on goodreads.

So that's that: my writing year in a nutshell. I have other plans too, like applying to do my Diploma in counselling again (but part-time, this time). I also want to gain some more experience for this by doing some volunteering, and I have an interview with my local Victim Support branch next week. And I really want to explore some other areas too - like spirituality. I want to get to grips with mindfulness properly this year (I know, I know, I said this last year too), but I've been reading some stuff by Thich Nhat Hanh which really resonates, and I want to find out more about Zen Buddhism.

I think 2017 is going to be a good year.

And here's my rather ambitious reading pile!

image

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When I first started writing, I had a plan. It wasn't a particularly detailed plan, but there was a focus to it. I decided, primarily, to write as much as I could, whilst learning about the process of writing at the same time. In the beginning, this was relatively straightforward. The first books about writing that I read were more about tackling your inner editor and giving yourself permission to write - badly, if need be. I read Julia Cameron, Natalie Goldberg, and Anne Lamott. And I got words down on the paper. Then I branched out with my reading and started reading books about different types and genres of writing, and about techniques. And I practiced. It was all very amateur, but it gave me a purpose while I was on maternity leave and my bigger career and life plans were on hold.

Then life got busy again, and I had to scale back on my writing and reading. This year, I've had a couple of knocks to my confidence, and recently I've felt myself turning away from my writing to focus on more everyday things. The main issue has been that I'm at a bit of a crossroads with my writing, and my life in general. If I'm honest with myself, I'd love to be writing all the time, and make it the focus of my career. But sadly, it's not an option for me. I need to train for a career that can help pay the bills, which is why I've chosen to go back to uni and do my psychology conversion course. Only now that it's looming nearer to the start date and I'm quickly running out of all that lovely spare time I had (3 days a week to myself), I'm panicking slightly. I need to make sure I've got my writing time and inspiration in the bag before I start.

So I need to make a new plan for my writing life.

I need to put my memoir on the back burner for a few months (bar the odd submission to agents, because you never know...) and work on a new project. I can do nothing more with it at the moment. So from now on, the only memoir pieces I shall focus on will be shorter pieces for competitions and any other calls for submission that sound interesting.

I need to get back to the comic novel I started (The Library Letters) and really myself a chance with it. I got up to around 17,000 words, but it's got so many plot gaps that I'm a bit stuck. I'm discovering that I'm not really as much of a pantser as I thought. I think I need to structure it more before starting writing again. So I'm going back to the books.

I'm going to start with a series by K. M. Weiland about outlining and structuring novels, and maybe even have a go at the workbooks. I will use this blog to chart about where I am with the project.

I also need to read more generally, which is another little project I am going to set for myself and I'm also going to use my blog to chart it. So, by the end of the year I will read 'Reading Like a Writer' by Francine Prose, and I will also try to finish two fairly easy classic novels that I started earlier in the year and didn't finish: Northanger Abbey and Oliver Twist.

And I hope to be writing again very soon.

(P.S. I must also learn more about blogging and figure out how to make this blog look more professional. I'm so hopelessly non-technically minded that I just keep putting it off. But I shall figure it out!)

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I was going to make my next post about writers' block, but then I realised it was Anti-bullying Week, so I changed my mind and thought I'd write about bullying instead.

I don't talk about the fact I was a victim of bullying much in real life. Nobody does. It's one of those slightly shameful subjects that makes everyone uncomfortable and embarrassed. It shouldn't be like that, but it is, and we all ought to be better at dealing with it. Victims of bullying get used to keeping quiet, because it makes other people feel better, and often we have a tendency to be people pleasers.

Comments I've had whenever I've alluded to having been bullied over the years (none recently, thankfully) include:

Kids can be so cruel
I bet they don't even remember what they did
I bet they feel really guilty
I'm sure they've grown up to be a lovely person
Perhaps there was something odd about you
You turned out alright in the end, didn't you?
Forget about it, move on, what's the point in dwelling on it?
But you didn't tell anybody...

The sad thing is that I'm pretty certain that every single one of those comments was made in good faith, and none was intended to minimise or make me feel worse. However, comments like that are symptomatic of a culture that accepts bullying, a culture that makes it okay to scapegoat and difficult for victims to be open about their experiences or challenge the behaviour of others. Basically, comments like these are actually victim-blaming.

I'm fully aware that the people who bullied me at high school may not remember what they said or did, that they may have grown up into lovely people, who may even regret their actions. However, unless they've actually made an attempt to address their actions, what difference does it make to me? Should I just forgive them to make them feel better? And I'm aware there may have been something about me (or maybe even several things) that made me a target. Or maybe there was no reason at all other than the fact I was unlucky and in the wrong place at the wrong time? I have no idea. Even if there was something different about me, does that make it okay? Should I hold up my hands and say, "Fair dos, I did insist on wearing that wanky blazer all the time and my hair was a bit ridiculous, and of course there was the time I read the Radio Times in my lunch hour, so yes, it probably was my fault."

Yes, kids can be cruel; so what? No, I never told anybody. Does that mean it didn't happen, that I'm remembering it wrong, or that it can't have been that bad? What do you mean when you say I turned out okay? How do you know? The whole landscape of my future was altered because of high school bullying, and although there were some positives that came out of it, I'd still rather it had never happened in the first place.

So, I stay silent, because I don't want to have to justify somebody else's actions, and I'd rather nobody else did either. I stay silent, because I belong to a culture that requires us to have a stiff upper lip when it comes to suffering, a culture that tells me I ought to keep calm and carry on. I stay silent because if I talk about being bullied it might define me, and I don't want to be a victim, because I am so much more than that.

But, here's the thing: being a victim of bullying does define me, because it was the catalyst for so many other things that have happened to me. If I'd never been bullied, then I might not have had such low self-esteem as a teenager, I might have worked harder at school, I might never have self-harmed, I might never have began drinking (and had to quit at the age of twenty-four), I might have been able to be a better friend, I might not have quit my degree (and had to wait years before I could do it again).

Of course I cannot make a definitive link between my having been bullied and all those facts, but it does make me wonder all the same. On the flip side of the coin, there are many positive things that happened that may not have done had I not been bullied. Having to retake my A Levels meant that when I eventually did go to uni a year later, I made some excellent friends and had the best couple of years of my life before I quit (sadly I pissed it all away, but that's a different story). And if I hadn't quit my degree I'd probably never have gone to work in libraries, which I did for a number of years and absolutely loved. If I'd never gone back home and been single for a while, then perhaps I'd never have met my partner when I did. We certainly wouldn't have our beautiful boys, who are the best things ever to have happened to me. And if I'd never got sober, I'd never have had that opportunity to really examine myself and my life. I'd never have got into psychology, or counselling, and I probably would never have started writing either. Because obviously, as a memoir writer, the primary source of my writing is about all those things that have happened to me.

So, you see, although I rarely talk about what happened to me (not through choice, I hasten to add), it has shaped my life pretty comprehensively. And on the page, I can fight it. On the page, I can talk about it. On the page, I am free.

And just to counter-balance all of those negative comments that people have made to me about bullying, the best response I ever received (and the one that still makes me smile when I think of it) was simply: "Bastards."

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Life is starting to look up again. Sometimes it takes a timely reminder of how awful certain periods of my life actually were to see how far I've come, and to help me focus on what's important in my present and future. I'm over my wobble from my last post, and also over the temptation to delete it. I've moved on. Sometimes you just need to get something out of your system. I'll trust that things will work out in the right way, and I can sleep soundly with the knowledge that I'm alright now, that I'm still alive and moving forward. I just need to remember The Desiderata by Max Ehrmann:

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.

Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.

And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be.

And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

***

As far as my writing is concerned, I'll send off the story I was preparing for the Words and Women Prose competition 2017 and the slightly longer version of the same story for the Fish Publishing Short Memoir Competition 2017, and then I want to put the lid on that particular story for some time. If I can get one of them published somewhere, then I'll know I had my voice heard and I'll never need to face those demons again.

Lately I've been ignoring my full-length memoir, and I'm wondering whether I need to do something similar with that, i.e. enter shorter pieces into competitions. I know this isn't going to be as simple as just saying I'm going to do it, because there are many other very good writers who are much better and practiced at this sort of thing than I am. I also realise I may be slightly doing myself a disservice if I do this, because once pieces are published then it's tricky to do anything else with them (most competitions don't like extracts), but I know how hard it is to get memoirs published these days, and I'm at the point of feeling like I need to do something productive, whatever that may be. I'll keep subbing for now, but realistically I know I need to gain some more writing credentials before anybody is interested in my work. Sometimes I think I need to go back to the drawing board and think hard of a unique angle to focus on, but in the meantime I probably need to get back to the novel I've been working on, while the non-fiction goes on quietly in the background.

Here's where I am today: It's half-term, and I'm tired from going out last night for the first time in a long time. Today I want to focus on my family, and Christmas coming up, and doing some reading before my Masters starts. My 2 year old is teething and grumpy, and my 5 year old is playing with Lego. And I'm here, with a jug of coffee just trying to keep everything ticking along. And the writing will happen - it always does, but maybe it doesn't need to happen today. Today I am stepping back.

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Confidence seems to be a recurring theme in my life lately. A couple of things happened this year that made me question what I'm doing and why. The events in themselves were both relatively minor, but somehow at the time seemed to speak volumes.

One of these was not getting long/shortlisted for the Fish Publishing Short Memoir Competition 2016. This might not seem like a bit deal in the grand scheme of things, but when you are a memoir writer, and competitions come around so scarcely (especially the ones with a decent word limit), then they take on a much bigger meaning than really they ought to, especially when you're so close to the stories you're writing (although I'm sure this is the case for writers of all genres).

I'd written and entered a story that meant a great deal to me. It was a story about a traumatic and scary encounter I had many years ago, a story that made me cross, disappointed and sad for the fact it happened in the first place. I hoped beyond hope I'd get placed in the competition, and I knew I'd be in a dilemma if it didn't. I'd put so much into the story, I really didn't feel I could edit it and improve it any further. It was a rare chance to have my voice heard and gain some recognition for my writing at the same time, and I was quietly, naïvely, hopeful.

The other important thing going on in my life was my application for a Diploma/MA in Person-Centred Counselling, and the interview was looming. Unfortunately, the results of the Fish Short Memoir Competition were announced and published online minutes before I had to leave for the hour-long interview - and I discovered my name wasn't on either the short or the long-list. So before I'd finished reeling from the crushing disappointment that my story hadn't made the grade, I had to get in the car to drive to an in-depth interview where I had to sell the very core of my being, and suddenly I'd lost all faith in who I was.

I knew I'd fluffed the interview as soon as I'd walked out of the building, although it's probably a good job I didn't know at the time that my getting on the Diploma course depended entirely on the answers I gave during the interview (which were graded), and not at all on my academic competence or my contributions in the classroom.

I carried on with life, telling myself that I'd surely be alright. I knew I ought to be in with a good chance of getting on the course. But then the interview dates were extended to give the external candidates a chance, and we discovered that there were so many candidates that they'd have to find a novel way of deciding between potential students. So the course we'd all begun believing it was a feeder course to the Diploma, if only we did the right things in the meantime, became a dead end for most of us. Then the rejection email came through, three days after we'd been promised an answer, and I discovered I'd been unsuccessful.

After that, I had to regroup, and I've spent the last few months figuring it out. I think I'm coming out the other side now. I've discovered that rejection doesn't mean the end of the road, and that it doesn't always mean anything personal.

I got a critique from Fish Publishing, which I was very happy with, and although they gave me a couple of pointers to think about changing (the second-person POV, and a suggestion to adjust the narrative arc slightly to focus more on the transformation aspect towards the end), the rest was all positive, and I feel more confident that I'm on the right path.

The critique renewed my faith in my writing, and I feel sure I can make the story a success. I'm editing it again now, as well as working on a couple of new stories, and hopefully one of them will find its way to publication.

And as far as my counselling career is concerned, I discovered that I was actually placed number five in my class of sixteen (only four were offered places initially), and I got a call when I was on holiday offering me a place on the Diploma course. However, by then, I'd had a rethink of my career/study options and had applied to do an MSc in Psychology instead.

I suppose the moral of the story is: don't read too much into life's disappointments. At the end of the day, nobody died and life carried on. All that happened was that my confidence got a little bit chipped. Then I found it again, and here I am, still smiling, still studying, still writing. Nothing's really changed at all, apart from maybe I'm a little tougher than I thought I was.

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I remembered earlier in the week when I was driving to university how a book helped to inspire me when I first started writing again. It was called 'Dear Me: A Letter to My Sixteen-Year-Old Self by Joseph Galliano.

I never did write that letter, though it spurred me on to get writing again, so I'm very grateful for its existence.

Anyway, I thought it would be fun to write a proper letter now, so here it is:

Letter to My Sixteen-Year-Old Self

I wish I could tell you that you're going to have the future you always dreamed of, but the truth is that nothing in life is going to come easily to you. All I can do is warn you of the pitfalls that lie ahead, and tell you a few things about yourself and the situations you will find yourself in that nobody else is going to tell you.

Firstly, although life seems to be opening up for you right now, I want you to know that you'd have been okay if only you'd worked a bit harder at school instead of playing catch up. The trouble is you've got nobody championing your academic future, except yourself (and to an extent, your parents), but you really need to know that you're capable of so much more, and I wish that you could see that and focus on your schoolwork instead of trying to snog as many boys as possible and going out smoking and drinking. You will never get the kind of encouragement you need at school, and your parents, although on your side, will never push you in the way that you need right now.

Unfortunately, you won't find that self-belief, and the drive to satisfy your intellectual curiosity until you're in your thirties, but I want you to know that one day you will find it, and when you do, there will be no stopping you. I'm aware this is a long way off in your future, and is probably of no concern to you now, but I want you to know that you're not a lost cause.

I also want to reassure you about your social status. You should never have ended up at the bottom of the heap, and I'm sorry about the dreadful first year you had at high school. You never really managed to climb back up after that, and you never found a place you belonged either. That's not your fault. You were not to blame. I can promise you that you will never find yourself in such a peculiar social setting in your life, though your experiences at high school will always follow you wherever you go, and you will always doubt whether people actually like you or not (and for the record, they always do, but you probably don't believe me).

I'm sorry to say that you're not out of the woods yet, not by a long shot, and your last year at high school will be the worst of your life, even worse than the last year before you got sober (sorry to be the bearer of bad news). And I really, really wish I could stop you in your tracks right now, before you fall in love with somebody dangerous, a wolf in sheep's clothing, and find yourself in a very dark situation, but I don't think I'd be able to stop you.

I'm so sorry that nobody else saw what was happening, but that's the nature of growing up as a female in a patriarchal society. Classic rape culture at work, to put it bluntly. (God how I wish you could look into the future to see the feminist you've become!) I still can't believe that not one adult was able to read between the lines and see how you'd been scapegoated at school, and it's the one thing I wish I could have saved you from. As for him, he'll have to live with what he did every day of his life. Oh, and the 'other' rape? You were totally right about that too, and I wish you'd had the strength of your convictions to pursue it with the police, instead of reverting to your fallback position of standing aside and letting the adults ride roughshod over your life again.

But you will learn from this. The injustice that you will feel, and the anger (though you are only barely aware of it right now) will spur you on in later years. It will be why you choose to study psychology, and later on, it will be why you begin to write - not necessarily about that, but it's the reason you need to speak out, to be understood, to use your voice, to be the best person you can possibly be.

I also wish I could get you to slow down time when you eventually go away to university, that you could stop, and look around you, and see how your life is perfect in every way. Because you're going to screw it all up, I'm afraid.

You discovered friends who didn't know you from before, who accepted you regardless, and you started to find your way. I truly believe that you could have changed your future at this point, if only you'd valued yourself enough to begin with. If you'd just gone to more lectures, spent your money on clothes rather than booze, and tried to be a better friend, you would have had such a different life. Though, I suppose you also still had that deep hatred of yourself that meant you were always going to fuck it up.

If only you'd known - you weren't bad. You could have been great. But you went down the slippery slope of alcoholism, and ruined everything. The best friends you'd ever have, the bright future (not that you ever believed it possible), all went down the pan, because you had no idea how to succeed at everyday life, at taking care of yourself, or the impact your antics had on everybody else. But mostly you.

And your fashion choices? Perfect. If only you'd worn the clothes you liked with confidence, you'd have been fab (still could be - it's not too late to make that choice). You need to know that nobody else dictates your style. Nobody gets to say what you should be wearing. Why didn't you defy your dad when he told you to take your nose ring out? You were seventeen, old enough to stand up for yourself. It wasn't his decision; it was yours.

And when you bought that purple tie-died top and black tasseled skirt from 'Head in the Clouds', you looked great (not that you'd wear it today, aged forty, and you probably wouldn't want to). Why the hell did you listen to the lads from school who asked you what planet you were from when you wore the top to class that day? You should have told them where to go. Just because they were used to you being Dull Girl, it didn't mean you had to be her forever.

At least nobody ever called you that after the age of sixteen, you can take comfort from that. In fact, it's probably more of a consolation to you than my warning of some of the terrible names you'll be called in the coming years. (By the way, you were none of those things either. Except 'Pisshead' perhaps. We'll take that one on the chin.)

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I wish you'd had more faith in yourself, in your self-worth, your opinions, and in every little aspect of your personality.

So, to my sixteen-year-old-self: Nobody else is going to tell you this, but you're amazing.

Listen to your favourite bands, wear the clothes you love, and forget about trying to be a sex goddess - the right person will think you're one without you having to work at it. Oh, and nobody but you has the right to your body, and how dare anybody tell you otherwise.

Be kind, be funny, and be a good friend. If you have great friends, you'll never really be alone, and if you can find something to laugh about at the end of the day then you'll never lose. And for those times when you feel like you really are alone, have faith. This too shall pass. Nothing is ever the end.

Have faith in yourself and Just Be.

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