Stop Talking Yourself Out of What You Want

A Dose of Fiction - Five women face the pull they’ve been postponing for years.

This week’s Daily Dose followed five women gathered around a familiar table, talking about what comes next.

Not ambition. Not goals. Just the quieter questions that tend to surface later in life. Why did I stop wanting things? What would it mean to start something now? What if I can’t stay with it?

No one made a plan. No one announced a new identity.

What happened instead was smaller and more honest. They named a pull they’d been managing quietly for years.

Below is the full collection from this week, read straight through.

1️⃣ The Question That Wouldn’t Stay Small

They were halfway through dinner on Riley’s veranda when the conversation drifted, the way it often did, toward what came next.

Not plans. Not goals. Just that loose, unsatisfying word. Next.

Val picked at her food. “I’m so tired of saying this but I’m going to anyway. I still don’t know what I want anymore,” she said, almost apologetically.

Riley nodded too quickly. “I’m right there with you.” She felt that familiar tug toward the notebook she kept near her desk, the one she told herself was just for lists and sketches. She rarely allowed herself to reach for it.

Quinn leaned back in her chair. “I keep thinking I should want something,” she said. “But I can’t tell if that’s real or just leftover momentum from work.”

Raven listened. She always did. Calm, grounded, entirely at ease in herself. She’d made her choices and lived inside them long enough to trust her footing. Her thought went to her horse and rider training center. Her legacy.

Skylar hadn’t spoken yet. The others knew her story. Three novels. All published. All bestsellers. When she did speak, it was usually because it mattered.

She lifted her glass, then set it down untouched.

“It seems we’ve all asked that question as we get older. When we leave our jobs, or pivot from them.” she said evenly. “We don’t know how to answer it. I believe I have suggested at some point, to most of you, to try journaling”

The table went still.

Riley’s face flushed. She remembered the very day she and Val shook hands on that very suggestion. She stole a quick glance at Val who lifted her shoulders in an apologetic shrug.

Neither said anything. They didn’t need to. The question had already landed, and it wasn’t leaving.

Breaking the silence, Riley picked up the casserole dish and passed it to Quinn. “Seconds anyone?”

2️⃣ What’s the Point of Starting Now

Knowing the answer, Raven asked Skylar how her new book was going. Everyone stopped eating to listen.

Skylar didn’t hesitate. “I’m deep in the research. I’ve met several times with the Sabákari Council of Elders. It’s going to be the most challenging book I’ve done. It’s not about old bones and their mysteries this time.”

No one was surprised. If Skylar wrote it, it would be published. That wasn’t up for debate.

“This one’s different,” Skylar added. “It’s about the Sabákari, their lives, culture, beliefs. Their stories. Their first ancestors. It’s… important.”

“And terrifying?” Val said gently, smiling.

Skylar smiled. “That too.”

Riley watched Skylar closely. She’d expected excitement. Pride. What she saw instead was concern.

“Do you want to go through all of it again?” Quinn asked. “Agents, editors, deadlines?”

Skylar shrugged. “Eventually. Maybe. Right now, it just needs to exist.”

That caught Riley off guard. She frowned. “What if it doesn’t go anywhere?”

Skylar met her eyes. “Then it will still have been written.”

Riley felt a flush of something she couldn’t name. She thought of her notebook. Of the guilt that came with wanting to sketch when she had nothing to build. Of the voice that said it was frivolous now.

Skylar leaned back. “The point isn’t publishing. The point is not ignoring the pull.”

No one argued. They didn’t need to. The point had already been made.

3️⃣ Who Decides What Counts

The talk turned practical, almost by habit.

“How long does something like that take?” Quinn asked.

Skylar answered easily. Timeframes. Research. Discipline. She didn’t romanticize it.

“And the industry?” Val asked. “Does it even want stories like that anymore?”

Skylar paused. “Publishing is a way,” she said. “It isn’t the only way.”

That surprised them.

Quinn thought of the boxes in her storage unit. Case journals from Homeland Security. Notes she’d written every night on assignment. She’d never called it writing. It never occurred to her to.

Riley stared at the grain of the table, her fingers itching to draw something, anything.

“I wouldn’t even know how to start,” Val said. “I’m too old to learn a whole new thing.”

Skylar shook her head. “You’re not learning a new thing. You’re just writing. There’s a difference. You learned how to nurse. After you got your license, you learned by doing. That’s how it is. You just write …. something. Anything.”

Raven finally spoke. “You don’t lose the ability to learn just because time has passed.”

Her confidence wasn’t loud. It didn’t need to be. She knew who she was.

Skylar added, “Getting something onto the page matters long before anyone else sees it.”

The room shifted. Something heavy moved aside.

4️⃣ The Fear of Not Finishing

Later, when the light softened and the food was mostly gone but the wine glasses were full, the doubts crept in. Not loudly. The way they always did, once no one was pretending anymore.

“What if I start and can’t finish?” Val asked.

She didn’t say the rest, but everyone heard it anyway.

What if I disappoint myself. What if I prove I waited too long.

Riley felt that one land hard. Energy wasn’t endless anymore. Neither was time. Starting something felt heavier now, not because she couldn’t do it, but because she didn’t want to abandon it halfway through like so many other quiet desires.

Skylar nodded. “This book scares me more than the others,” she admitted. “Not because of sales. Because of responsibility.”

No one interrupted her.

“If I begin it,” Skylar continued, “I have to stay with it. I can’t rush it. I can’t fake it. And I can’t walk away without knowing I listened all the way through.”

Raven watched the canyon darken beyond the railing, the shadows settling into familiar shapes. “My protégé writes every day,” she said. “She’s sixteen. No goal. No audience. She just writes because she has to.”

“That must be nice,” Quinn said.

“It’s not about age,” Raven replied. “It’s about permission. Somehow she has it. Her mother and grandmother never told her to make it practical. They gave her the space.”

Riley swallowed. She thought about how often she pushed past her own signals. How often she told herself later, when there was more time, more clarity, more reason.

Skylar said quietly, “Finishing isn’t the promise. Depending on what you’re writing, it might be listening. Or patience. Or just staying present long enough to see what wants to happen.”

That settled something Riley hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

It wasn’t about failing to finish.

It was about starting something honest and being willing to stay with it, even when it got uncomfortable.

No one rushed to speak. They didn’t need to. The fear had finally been named, and it no longer held the room.

5️⃣ Because You Can’t - Not

By the time the evening began to wind down, no one was trying to convince anyone of anything.

The conversation had slowed. Plates were stacked. The canyon air cooled, moving across the veranda in steady breaths.

Riley reached for her notebook without comment and began to sketch. Not a plan. Not an idea she intended to explain. Just a few lines. A doorway. A shadow. Enough to start.

Quinn watched her for a moment, then said, almost to herself, “I might open one box of journals. Just one. I’ve never looked at them all together.”

Val nodded. “I want to write something that doesn’t have to be useful. Just something that sounds like me.”

Raven didn’t say anything. She didn’t need to. She sat back in her chair, certain in a way that came from having already chosen her own work in the world. She trusted what she was seeing.

Skylar looked around the table and felt something ease. Not excitement. Not triumph. Recognition.

“I don’t think this starts with wanting to write,” she said. “I think it starts with realizing we can’t not.”

Riley kept sketching. “Maybe I’ll write in sketches,” she said. “That might be how it comes out.”

Skylar smiled. “Then that’s how you write.”

No one applauded. No one announced a plan. No one promised to finish anything.

But something had shifted.

Not toward publishing.

Not toward outcomes.

Toward honesty.

Toward listening to ourselves, to the signals we’ve learned to ignore.

Toward letting what had already been waiting finally have a place to land.

And that was enough to begin.

I wrote these pieces while thinking about how many women carry the urge to write for years without knowing what to do with it. Not because they lack discipline or confidence, but because they don’t want to turn it into a whole new project they have to manage.

For readers who want a way to begin without overcomplicating it, I put together a short free resource called 3 Steps to Finally Start Writing the Stories Only You Know.

It isn’t expert-driven. It doesn’t assume you’re trying to publish. It simply offers three methods for getting something honest onto the page and staying with it, even when it gets uncomfortable.

You will get the link when you join as a subscriber.

No pressure. No timeline. Just a place to start if the pull you felt this week isn’t going away.