If you want to be a writer, you have to write.
By: Kristina Martin
Tags: Change, Publishing, Writers On Writing, Creativity, Writing

If you want to be a writer, you have to write.

Some advice to light a fire under your ass.

One of my freelance clients texted me to ask if a young woman he knows can “shadow” me. She is interested in being a writer when she gets older. My first thought: Why would anyone want to shadow a writer? Second: How do you shadow a writer and what could you possibly learn from it? Will she sit and watch as I agonize over how to begin a piece? And how would I actually be able to write anything with someone else watching my every move or interrupting me to ask questions?

The answer: I wouldn’t.

So, unless I sit there and communicate what is going through my head, every second, as the words hit the screen what would this young woman actually get out of this experience? Does she want to know about the voices in my head as I write; the ones who tell me I suck and question why I am even doing this in the first place? It is not as if I have an office that I go to every day either. I work from home in our multipurpose library/music room/guest bedroom/office. Most of my days are spent wearing athleisure and drinking copious amounts of coffee. There are always dishes piled in the sink and sometimes there are children in the next room watching SpongeBob at full volume. I might stop to eat something or fit in some exercise but there are days when I don’t even shower until three in the afternoon.

Every writer has their own routine, but if you want to be a writer, what can you actually learn by observing another writer at work? I don’t know about anyone else, but I prefer to write in solitude. If I were to sit and watched someone else write, I don’t know if I would learn very much about being a writer. As John Green said, “Writing is something you do alone. It’s a profession for introverts who want to tell you a story but don’t want to make eye contact while doing it.” That’s me!

As a teacher of writing, I am perfectly able to articulate my writing process, and have, for the benefit of my writing students, but ultimately my best advice to my students is that they have to find their own process; they have to do what works for them. In my own experience, sitting around saying “Someday I want to be a writer,” but then not writing anything is counterproductive. Sit your butt down and put pen to paper or finger to keyboard. Stop thinking about what it takes to be a successful writer and just write. I think as creative people we are afraid to say “I am a writer” or “I am an artist” until someone validates our talent. Writers as a whole are a self-deprecating bunch and for whatever reason, a lot of us don’t feel like we have earned the right to say “I am a writer” unless we are the next Hemingway. And, let’s face it, none of us are that.

Here are some routines of famous writers that I have begged, borrowed, and stolen from and incorporated into my own process:

Stephen King tries to get 6 pages a day written (pretty straightforward and simple and its good to have goals).

tries to get 6 pages a day written (pretty straightforward and simple and its good to have goals). Haruki Murakami gets up at 4 a.m. works for 5 or 6 hours, runs 7 miles in the afternoon, swims 1500 meters, reads, listens to music and then goes to bed at 9. He is essentially in training and he claims repetition is the key to making these habits stick. (Wow! I get up at 5 a.m. most days and go to the gym for an hour in the afternoon, but I am not that hardcore.)

gets up at 4 a.m. works for 5 or 6 hours, runs 7 miles in the afternoon, swims 1500 meters, reads, listens to music and then goes to bed at 9. He is essentially in training and he claims repetition is the key to making these habits stick. (Wow! I get up at 5 a.m. most days and go to the gym for an hour in the afternoon, but I am not that hardcore.) Susan Sontag would tell all her friends “Don’t call me in the morning.” (that is my rule too).

would tell all her friends “Don’t call me in the morning.” (that is my rule too). E.B. White could work fairly well among ordinary, everyday distractions. He said, “A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper.” (I have 5 kids, ordinary, everyday distractions are my norm.)

could work fairly well among ordinary, everyday distractions. He said, “A writer who waits for ideal conditions under which to work will die without putting a word on paper.” (I have 5 kids, ordinary, everyday distractions are my norm.) Ernest Hemingway believed in morning pages and that you should always stop for the day not when you have run out of things to say, but when you know what is going to happen next. He found it hard to wait until the next day to start writing again and could think of nothing else until he could sit down and get back at it. (Maybe that is why his first 3 marriages failed.)

believed in morning pages and that you should always stop for the day not when you have run out of things to say, but when you know what is going to happen next. He found it hard to wait until the next day to start writing again and could think of nothing else until he could sit down and get back at it. (Maybe that is why his first 3 marriages failed.) John Steinbeck felt that writers need to abandon the idea that they are ever going to finish. He said it is better to lose track of your progress and just write one page a day. Then when you are finished it will be a pleasant surprise. He would write freely and as rapidly as possible without editing. He believed that to rewrite in process enables writers to create an excuse for not going on because it interferes with the flow and rhythm and creates a disassociation from the material. (I kind of agree, but I can still rewrite in process sometimes without throwing in the towel.)

felt that writers need to abandon the idea that they are ever going to finish. He said it is better to lose track of your progress and just write one page a day. Then when you are finished it will be a pleasant surprise. He would write freely and as rapidly as possible without editing. He believed that to rewrite in process enables writers to create an excuse for not going on because it interferes with the flow and rhythm and creates a disassociation from the material. (I kind of agree, but I can still rewrite in process sometimes without throwing in the towel.) FINALLY, Bernard Malamud said “You write by sitting down and writing. There’s no particular time or place — you suit yourself, your nature… eventually, everyone learns his or her own best way.” (AMEN!)

And that pretty much sums it up.

But here is one last bit of advice from my own experience. If you want to write, you HAVE to set your fears aside and write. But don’t just write, PUBLISH! Set up a blog, publish on Medium, write an article on LinkedIn and then push it out on your Facebook page, Instagram account, on a Pinterest board, Tweet it with the hashtag #amwriting.

Writing takes an insane amount of courage and not everyone is going to like what you have to say, So be it. Say it anyway! Take a deep breath and hit the publish or the post button. Wherever you can share your creation, share it, because that is the only way you will get better, and then you CAN, without any self-doubt say, “I am a writer.”