“I swallowed rules and doctrines and fears and contradictions.  But all that swallowing left little room for listening. When you take the time to be still and listen, the first things you’ll hear are the things you swallowed into your belly. You’ll hear the things you’ve absorbed over a lifetime. You’ll hear the scratches of your mother’s fears and your father’s rage. You’ll hear a chorus of uninvited voices in an avalanche of should and shouldn’ts, dos and don’ts. Sit a while longer.  What sounds and voices are yours underneath that din? The clanking of other people’s agendas is enough to make many a writer get up and decide this gig isn’t for him. Stay. What’s under your mother’s sadness?  What’s under your grandmother’s alcoholism? What’s under the programming of never beginning a sentence with”and”?  The ideas you’ve swallowed built a wall.  Shake it down.  Move into your lungs and breathe; then break the sadness loose so it can float away.” 

— The Writing Warrior, by Laraine Herring