At times in your writing you’ll come across something that’ll scare you shitless. A twist in your story. A path to a darkness you didn’t know existed. A word or a phrase your character utters that makes the hair stand on your head.

Your first impulse would be to shrink away from it.

Don’t.

Whatever scares you in your writing, explore it further. Dig. There is a treasure hidden.

Breathe in, breathe out, say hello to your Fear (“Hello, Fear. How are you doing?”), and taking your Fear by the hand, march straight ahead, right into the place where you don’t want to go. 

By being there, by letting yourself feel it and absorb it and penetrate it, you’ll transform it from negative to positive.

From fear to elation.

From destruction to creation.

From chaos to art.

And often, you’ll see parts of yourself you didn’t want to see and will understand your own humanity that much better (and through your writing, will help us understand ours too).

Gif by Vincenzo Lodigiani