As a songwriter I'd say that if "you're putting your whole self on the line every time you perform" then you probably need therapy instead of gigs! One of the important lessons to learn as a songwriter is (at least in my experience and opinion) that your job is to make your specific experience more universal in order to create a good song. Which means adapting a degree of distance from it. If your songs are like your personal diary, or your own most personal thoughts, you're probably unlikely to reach most of your audience, unless they've shared precisely the same experiences. And those are the kind of songs that have given the "singer/songwriter" such a bad name.

Anne
standing on a soapbox....