2) She asks if she should waste her time on the story -- is it worthy? What I hear? Should I waste my time showing up for myself and my story? Am I worthy? Again, only she can answer that. When you're visited by the muse and the story won't leave you alone, there are mighty forces beyond simply you wanting this story manifested. If not by you, the story goes unwritten.
3) A meltdown around the Recommitment phase. This is too hard. I don't get it. I can't do it. When I grab her by the shoulders to help ground her back in the here-and-now and out of the past of other difficult times in her life, I encourage her to view what is happening to her in the light of the Universal Story. She's being called to show up and do the work. Internal antagonists block her way. I ask her to reclaim her own individual power. Suddenly shining out from hiding and fear, the light of her spirit flickers and hope seems to fill her body as she shakes her head and straightens her shoulders. She looks at me as if I'm not there as the truth of who she truly is reawakens. She exclaims how she's never heard of such things. In her smile, I know she's tapped into a truth she's always know and only now is beginning to remember again what once she knew for sure.
4) She's writing today because I asked her to commit to writing everyday. If her commitment to me helps her show up for herself, so be it. When we commit to others, our spirits are listening. When we let down ourselves by not valuing our commitment to ourselves, we hurt our own spirit.
5) She apologizes before she begins reading. It's not very good. I haven't written forever. This is my first stab at writing again after years of doubt. It's rough. Not very good. Don't ever apologize for yourself, for your writing. You're showing up, doing the work. Hold tight to your own personal power. Don't let the demons of doubt and poor self-worth overpower your deepest beliefs. Sure they may be hiding in the muck and gore of your backstory wound. The belief in your splendor lies there, too. You know it. At least your spirit does and is patiently, heartbreakingly patiently waiting for the day you remember it, too.
What I understand now after having spent more than a year painstakingly healing my own backstory wound is how wrong I've been. I write in the Plot Whisperer books about the protagonist (and thus, the writer, too) reclaiming her own personal power that she'd relinquished along to way to a false belief system, betrayal, hurt, pain, criticism, judgment.
Yet, seizing your own personal power often leads to a crisis because the use and development of your own personal power belies the real truth. Standing in your own personal power puts you in direct opposition to someone else's power and ends up perpetuating duality = struggle.
The real strength lies, not in your own personal power. Rather, your real strength and the source of all strength lies at the heart of the Universal Story -- in the power of love.