“Do it from the heart or not at all.”

Jeanette Winterson

Sometimes I believe in synchronicity. No, correct that statement - I ALWAYS believe in synchronicity, and sometimes it proves itself to me beyond doubt.

For the past few days I've loved, loved, loved being a writer.

(Okay, I realise it won't last...writing can be a struggle too)

I have always, always put my own writing into second place - last place, even. Regarded it as a sort of guilty pleasure that I can only allow myself to do IF I DESERVE IT when I've done lots of other (money-earning) work first.

I've felt the need to accumulate a load of credit in my own personal Bank of Self-Punishment...

A growing realisation has come upon me that this is not the road to happiness and fulfilment.

(Yes, it has taken me all this time...and me university-educated as well.)

Then I watched Imagine: Jeanette Winterson - My Monster and Me  (Sorry people outside the UK who won't be able see this and Brits too, once the allotted time on iPlayer has elapsed)

I couldn't describe the effect it had on me better than Lucy Mangan from The Guardian

"By the end of it you felt as refreshed and exhilarated as if you had been bathing in a rough sea. And if, afterwards, a melancholy descended as you realised how rare, how profoundly, depressingly, vanishingly rare it is to hear anyone at all, but – I'm afraid – especially a woman, speak so passionately, eloquently and above all fearlessly about her life, loves and work – well, maybe we can start the demand for more here."

SO...enough of this fannying about, Caroline Coxon. Just follow your heart.