Why is it that so many of us have trouble expressing ourselves in writing? It has to do with something you picked up in school. I call it "the inner English teacher." Unlike your inner child, which can urge you to play and goof off, your inner English teacher constantly warns you that you are about to commit some huge grammatical blunder or punctuation mistake. She's got you so hung up on spelling and word order and subject/verb agreement and all sorts of other stuff you vaguely remember that you're too paralyzed to write.

Your first step is that you are going to have to kill your inner English teacher. Or at least attempt it. She's got more lives than Freddy Kruger, so that's a tall order, but try to shut her up.

This doesn't mean that grammar and spelling don't count. But any professional writer will tell you that writing isn't so much writing as it is re-writing. Your first job is to get a draft on paper. After that, you polish what you've written.

The first draft doesn't have to be perfect. Nobody is going to see it except you, and it really does not matter if it's sloppy and has misplaced modifiers and commas where it shouldn't.

Relax and write the way you'd talk. One of the great secrets of outstanding writing is that it sounds natural. So just think of what you'd like to say to your mother and write it down, not caring for one moment if you're spelling it correctly or if it's grammatically correct.

Don't know what you'd say to your mother? Then just take a second and move away from the keyboard. Without even trying to write or formulate a series of words, think of what you'd want to say. Remember, you're not writing anything, you're just thinking. For instance, you might think:

• I just want something light and funny that says I'm thinking about my mom
• I want to tell my mom how much it meant to me that she stuck by me recently when I was having a really hard time
• I want to thank my mom most of all; I don't think I ever really thanked her
• I want to recall some of my fun childhood memories; my mom and I always enjoyed talking about stuff like that
• I want to tell my mom I love her, but not be all mushy or dramatic about it. She'd hate that! But I do love her and I want to tell her.

Don't write it, but figure out your goal. Now write (or type) out what your goal is. It will probably look like one of the items above. In fact, if one of those seems to fit your situation, it can even be that.

If you can, expand a bit on that thought. If you want to tell your mom something light and funny, think of a couple of things. If you want to thank her, jot down a couple of specifics. If you want to mention memories, note a particularly favorite one. In other words, without really writing, start to make some notes or list some items.

Now you will notice something peculiar. You have words on paper (or on the computer screen). As long as you have words to work with, you don't have writer's block. So start playing around with them.

• If you've just got a list or snippets, try to build some entire sentences.
• If your sentences are choppy or incomplete, fill them out a little.
• If things are a bit disjointed, at some filler or segues.
• If you've got a nice idea going, write a little bit more about it.

Once you've filled things out a bit, you can go back and "massage" the "copy" (copy is what you've written). Check the spelling of any suspicious words. Look at the grammar and punctuation. If you don't know if something is right or wrong, look it up or take your best guess. (If your mom is an English teacher, look it up. If your mom doesn't worry about grammar or writes worse than you do, just take your best shot.)

If you're really still deadlocked, consider letters2mom.com, which is a website that helps "ghostwrite" for your mom.

Ghostwriters are people who write for you. Sometimes they write everything and you just sign your name. Most political figures have speech writers and many experts (doctors, lawyers, scientists) employ ghostwriters to put their findings into the proper editorial construction.

A ghostwriter can also be the person who helps give you some ideas to jump start your own creative process. That is, the ghostwriter gives you some general direction and you fill in your own memories, anecdotes, or special sentiments.