The Courage to Bleed Ink: Vulnerability and Strength in a Writer's Journey

"To write is to stand exposed before the world, offering your most intimate thoughts as a gift. Some will cherish it; others may discard it. Yet our greatest power as writers lies in this vulnerable offering and the courage to be heard and truly seen." ~ Cleophus P. Franklin Jr.

There is a sacred vulnerability in the act of writing that few understand until they've committed their deepest thoughts to paper. When I sit before an empty page, poised with pen in hand, I'm not merely engaging in an act of creation—I'm performing an act of courage. To write is to bare one's soul, to expose the rawest parts of oneself to a world that may embrace or reject what it finds there. Yet still, I write.

In the brightest moments of the day or during the silent darkness of the night, when inspiration strikes like lightning across a dormant sky, I feel compelled to capture those flashes of insight before they fade. The words flow through me as if they have a life of their own, "beckoning for more as I continue to write." This calling isn't always gentle—sometimes it demands, sometimes it pleads- but it always requires the courage to listen and respond.

Let me be clear: writing is not easy. It is, in fact, one of the most challenging endeavors I've undertaken. To face the blank page is to face yourself—your doubts, your fears, your limitations. There are days when the words refuse to come, when each sentence feels like drawing water from a stone. There are moments of crushing self-doubt when you wonder if what you have to say matters at all. Writers don't just battle with language; we battle with ourselves.

"Writing demands that you strip away the comfortable layers of pretense we all wear in daily life," I tell those who ask about my process. "It requires a willingness to dig beneath the surface, to mine the depths of your experiences and emotions, even when what you find there is painful or frightening." This excavation of self is exhausting work. It leaves you vulnerable, exposed, raw. But from this place of honesty comes the most powerful writing—the words that reach across time and space to touch another human heart.

When Maya Angelou said, "There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you," she spoke a truth that resonates in the marrow of my bones. The pain of silence exceeds the fear of judgment. The agony of unspoken words outweighs the sting of criticism. To withhold one's voice from the world is to deny one's existence in some fundamental way.

I've learned that "it takes more than a creative and committed mind to write a book filled with stories that illuminate, provoke, stimulate, and make a person think." It requires persistence through countless drafts. It demands showing up at the page even when inspiration is nowhere to be found. It means enduring rejection after rejection and still believing in the value of your words. As Brené Brown wisely noted, "Vulnerability is not winning or losing; it's having the courage to show up and be seen when we have no control over the outcome."

"The toughest part of writing isn't the writing itself—it's the decision to share what you've written," I often say. "To send your words into the world is to send pieces of your heart along with them." Yet this risk brings the greatest reward. When someone tells me my words touched them, changed them, or helped them see themselves or the world differently, this is the true miracle of writing. This is why those who dare to write and share their stories endure the struggle.

As I mused in my poem 'Why I Write,' I ask myself: "Do I write for the love of it, or to narrate how a flame's hot rage began from a clandestine, subtle spark?"?

Perhaps both. Perhaps neither. The truth runs deeper. I write to make sense of the chaos within and without. I write to leave footprints on the sands of time that won't be washed away with the next tide. I write because I've been entrusted with stories that deserve to be told, voices that deserve to be heard beyond the confines of my own experience. Most importantly, I write because our words transcend our mortal limitations—they become immortal messengers, touching minds and hearts long after we are gone, creating connections across time that no other human endeavor can achieve.

"To put yourself out there to be criticized, marveled, honored, and ridiculed is hard to do," I acknowledge. Yet this vulnerability is not a weakness. It is a strength. It is the strongest among us who can stand firm in their truth even as the winds of opinion howl around them. As Ernest Hemingway once said, "There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed." And bleed we do, onto pages that become repositories of our truths, our questions, our discoveries about what it means to be human.

I am always amazed as the words magically arrange themselves, taking shapes I hadn't anticipated, leading me down paths I hadn't planned to travel. There is a mysterious alchemy in the creative process—a transformation that occurs when thought becomes word becomes story. In those moments, I am "a prisoner of the moment, snared and commissioned to service these thoughts under the late candlelight glow." The struggle gives way to flow, and in that flow, I find a joy unlike any other.

"Writing is a commitment to leave behind something of value, something that might outlast your physical presence," I tell aspiring writers who wonder if the difficulty is worth it. "Your words may be the lighthouse that guides someone through their darkest night—a night you will never know about, for a person you may never meet." This is the incredible power we wield as writers. Our stories cross boundaries of time, space, culture, and circumstance. They forge connections between souls who might otherwise never touch.

The act of writing is indeed an act of courage. It is standing at the edge of a precipice and choosing to leap, not knowing whether you'll fly or fall. But in that moment of decision, in that commitment to authentic expression, there is a freedom that transcends fear. There is power in vulnerability, strength in openness, and a profound kind of courage in allowing oneself to be seen.

So "as I sit still, mesmerized," I feel that familiar voice "beckoning me again to release the magic of prose." And I answer its call, not because it is easy, but because it is necessary. Because courage isn't the absence of fear but the triumph over it. Because every word written in truth and honesty is an act of defiance against silence and forgetting.

And so, I write…and let the stories flow. And to you who feel the call to write but hesitate before the challenge—take heart.?

The world needs your unique voice, your particular perspective, and your singular story. The struggle is real, but so are the rewards—both for yourself and for those whose lives will be touched by your words, today and in generations yet to come.?

So then, I ask of you and those who have stories inside them waiting to be told. Please. Pick up your pen. Face the page. Begin.

Cleophus (Cleo) P. Franklin Jr. is the Founder and CEO of Franklin Strategic Solutions and the Franklin Leadership Foundation. A former global agricultural business executive, he now serves as Chief Marketing Officer for education technology company Laddering Your Success. Franklin is also a Senior Corporate Fellow and Adjunct Professor at the University of Houston-Downtown and has authored seven books.