If you’re not sure you want to keep writing, simply don’t write.
I’m certain every writer I know has questioned, at least once in their writing life “Why am I doing this?” or “Am I meant to be a writer?” or something to similar effect.
As if being a writer didn’t come with enough uncertainties (can you even call yourself a writer?) and lapses in confidence, we’re also prone to worrying about if we should be doing it at all.
I’ve asked it of myself many times, and I expect I’ll ask it again in the future.
Since I was a little kid, I’ve known writing was a part of me. This is common to many writers.
It only started to get tricky when I got older and had to start thinking about what I wanted to “do” with my life. As soon as I decided to make a living with my writing, things got complicated.
Writing was suddenly hard.
It tormented me.
I became unsure of myself, of whether it truly was the calling I’d always thought it was.
But I kept at it.
After a while, I (unintentionally) started ignoring the calling by working as a copywriter and a ghostwriter – jobs that still let me write, a lot, but didn’t actually require me to put any of myself into the work. I always thought I’d work on my passion projects on the side, but I never did. Steven Pressfield would call this a “shadow career”.
And then I quit writing.
I quit most things.
But I did so with purpose, though I had no idea what I was doing at the time.
I pared my life down to the essential.
I didn’t intend to do it, and I had no conscious experience of what was happening, it just happened. I was about halfway through my first pregnancy and found myself with an enormous drive to focus on only that. I didn’t want to think about anything but preparing for and raising the baby. I still worked in my copywriting job, but as soon as I could, I went on maternity leave and didn’t look back.
My daughter came, and 100% and then some of my life focused on the little person. I’m certainly not unique in this by any stretch.
I did not think about writing at all.
As the months moved on and I got used to being a mother, I started moving my thoughts back to other areas of life. Life had been pared down to the basics, and yet my writing crept back in.
It was primal and unconscious. An essential.
That’s how I know this is who and what I am and what I want. I got rid of everything in my life. The things that returned are those that matter.
How To Tell If You Truly Want To Be A Writer?
If you’re not sure you want to keep writing, simply don’t write.
Don’t think about it. Think about everything but.
Try new things. Commit to this for at least a few weeks, months even.
If it doesn’t come back, move on with the relief you’re no longer wasting your time on a life that’s not truly for you.
If writing comes back, grab it, hold it, own it. Answer the call. Dedicate yourself. It’s who you are. Be a writer. It’s who you are meant to be.
