Knowing that I'm not alone in trying and failing on my first attempt not only helps sustain my ego, but also makes it easier to look at my rough drafts and accept that there are a hundred ways they could be made better.  And once I've come to terms with the fact that a piece isn't perfect, it becomes infinitely easier to workshop and revise it.  

 

My failure to capture exactly what I wanted to say about why for writing in this draft, therefore, is actually a success of sorts.  I managed to get out my ideas, and I realized that I wanted to express them differently than I had here. Specifically, I was frustrated by the incohesive way my thoughts seemed to fit (or not fit) together; I knew that moving forward, I wanted to make a stronger thesis that ran through the course of my piece to describe how the lessons I learned while writing as a teenager would guide me as I continued writing in the future.  

 

This draft is far from perfect.  Writing it did, however, help give shape to my ideas, and allowed me to consider how I could better explain and organize my thoughts about being a writer.