I write to stay alive. My thoughts run, jump, and leap in so many different directions. Happiness, sadness, regret, anger, joy, impatience, contentment, peace, and affliction all fight for dominance in my body. My emotions wage war on one another, leaving me a slave to their variance. I was forced to move at their will, being pulled back and forth like the tide. I was a shell, an empty hull, so ripped apart by feelings I lost the ability all together. Then one day, I picked up a pencil. A blank sheet of notebook paper lay before me, the possibilities endless as I became lost in its emptiness. I began to write. Words became sentences. Sentences became paragraphs. With every word I scribbled another emotion was calmed. I was entranced by the concept of writing and the spell has yet to be broken. I write to keep my emotions at bay, the written word my whip that I use to tame the tigers. I am the master of my own destiny, I control my life, so long as I control my words. The day I stop writing is the day that ends.