“Most of us have two lives.”  says Steven Pressfield, in the War of Art, “the life we live, and the unlived life within us. Between the two stands Resistance.”  Pressfield includes John Lee Hooker’s poem from “Boogie Chillen “as an example of Resistance:

One night I was layin’ down,

I heard Papa talkin’ to Mama.

I heard Papa say, to let that boy boogie-woogie.

“Cause it’s in him and it’s got to come out.

I experienced  “boogie-woogie” in journals for decades expressing my heart in what needed to be said and come out –  a collection of feelings written over time in journals, now kept in boxes.  I still boogie-woogie every day filling blank books to add to more boxes.

I know the enemy of “Resistance” that tells me I will only write short stories.  That I will never write a book or my memoir. That I will never have my own blog. What will I write about every day?  Then, I remember all those books of journals piled in boxes that had allowed me to practice and grow in my writing in baby steps, day after day over decades.  Resistance keeps me safe and comfortable, it keeps my writing voice hidden in the pages and privacy of blank books that become only journals, not real books.  Resistance shouts at me and says writing on Facebook is just connecting with your friends in a few short sentences that tells of who’s who in the photos.  That they don’t have time for my boogie-woogie.

When I did make time to write more than just a few lines on Facebook, it became the catalyst I needed to write to and with an audience.  It gave me the self-confidence and space I needed to write a few lines that grew into paragraph after paragraph of short stories.  I didn’t care about the numbers or anyone clicking in. I needed to boogie-woogie, like Papa said to Mama about their boy.

The time came when I needed more space to boogie-woogie on a blog of my own that reaches a bigger audience. I only know that the enemy called “Resistance” cannot steal or hold me back any longer of what is in me and has got to come out.

There will be no life unlived in me.  You might read about it on my blog in short stories and maybe, one day, in my first book or memoir.

It’s in me and it’s got to come out.

b o o g i e – w o o g i e!”

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