I’ve worked as a writer ever since I graduated with a journalism degree in 1982. For almost every piece of writing I’ve done, I’ve had a contract to write it ahead of time. I’ve known the topic, the length, the audience, and how much I’d be paid for my efforts.

With one major exception: my memoir.

I didn’t write a memoir because someone asked me to or because I sought publishing fame. I wrote a memoir because I had to write a memoir. I could almost feel the hand on my back pushing me forward. I didn’t know what the story would be about. All I knew was that I was solidly in the middle of mid-life and didn’t want to screw up my future the way I’d screwed up my past.

Not to put too fine a point on it.

In short, I wrote a memoir because I knew, on some level, that writing would help me heal. But once the memoir was done, I felt the pressure to publish. After all, I’d been a professional writer all my life and had been teaching memoir for years. My ego wouldn’t let the work sit in a drawer. I had to prove myself.

Ignoring the knife twist in my gut, I searched for a new agent (mine had moved to Israel), sent query letters and started to receive the expected but still demoralizing rejection letters. Several agents were kind enough to offer suggestions, and in response, I started to alter the story, bit by bit, as I searched for the most “marketable” angle.

What began as a sacred and self-validating process of understanding my life choices soon turned into a calculating commercial endeavor in which I worked to find the story that would sell. I became desperate about making my story into one a publisher would buy. In the process, I grew increasingly agitated and difficult to be around. This wasn’t some lame story I was trying to sell to a magazine. This was my story, my life. The agents weren’t rejecting my writing or my idea. They were rejecting me.

Or so it felt.

Still, I continued to shop the memoir for a few more months, until I realized–or rather, remembered– that publishing had never been the goal. In fact, whenever I thought about standing up in bookstores and reading my story aloud, I wanted to run and hide, which isn’t a terribly effective approach to marketing.

I didn’t want to talk about my memoir because I was no longer passionate about it. The writing was done, and it had done its job well. I’d come to understand a difficult period in my life. I’d forgiven my younger self and was ready to move on, free of shame and misgiving.

What I was driven to talk about were the many benefits of memoir writing itself. I’d experienced firsthand the way writing your story can profoundly change your life. Instead of talking about my story, I was–and still am–far more driven to encourage others to honor the sacred path they’ve walked by writing their own memoir.

Once I withdrew the memoir from consideration from the agents who still held it, I felt the cool rush of relief. I may not have gotten a publishing deal (thank goodness), but what I did get was a much deeper understanding of and passion for the work I believe I was put here to do.