Neil Ellis Orts
I'm going to go with Rainer Rilke on this. If you can NOT write, step away from the word processor.
Really, unless you have a particularly commercial mind/ideas, there is so little financial reward in this game. I've known so many writers and only one has been on the NYT bestseller list---and that's still a pretty high percentage. So, unless it's a need that won't leave you alone, I recommend putting this energy into a social life, a family, a charity---any number of things that I'd like more time for if I didn't have to write around a full time day job.
Also, and no one really wants to say this, but unless you're doing technical writing or ad copy or celebrity profiles something else that's very utilitarian or commercial, for the most part, no one is really asking you to write. No one really wants another creative writer. Not many people are sitting arount thinking, "gee, I wish someone else would start writing." Maybe editors who have to publish a catalog of books every year, but even they are looking for a finite number of us.
But if you read that and you still Need to be a Writer, then there's nothing to be done. Write. A lot. Because a lot of it will be crap, but when you get something that you're happy with, it's just the best feeling ever. And you think everything you write is brilliant---well, that's another discussion, but do get with people who will give you feedback and keep it real with you. Learn to revise and edit your own writing. Learn when to let something go and move on to something else. Learn to find the motivation from within because it's very hard to find it from outside your own skin. Not impossible, but hard.
And if you get to where you're occasionally published or published regularly . . . I have to tell you, seeing your name in print has never grown old for me.
There's a lot more advice to give. Magazines are published monthly to give it to you. The main thing, to recap, is that if you can stop it, do. If you can't, then write without apology, write seriously, don't think about writing, don't want to write, write.
Really, unless you have a particularly commercial mind/ideas, there is so little financial reward in this game. I've known so many writers and only one has been on the NYT bestseller list---and that's still a pretty high percentage. So, unless it's a need that won't leave you alone, I recommend putting this energy into a social life, a family, a charity---any number of things that I'd like more time for if I didn't have to write around a full time day job.
Also, and no one really wants to say this, but unless you're doing technical writing or ad copy or celebrity profiles something else that's very utilitarian or commercial, for the most part, no one is really asking you to write. No one really wants another creative writer. Not many people are sitting arount thinking, "gee, I wish someone else would start writing." Maybe editors who have to publish a catalog of books every year, but even they are looking for a finite number of us.
But if you read that and you still Need to be a Writer, then there's nothing to be done. Write. A lot. Because a lot of it will be crap, but when you get something that you're happy with, it's just the best feeling ever. And you think everything you write is brilliant---well, that's another discussion, but do get with people who will give you feedback and keep it real with you. Learn to revise and edit your own writing. Learn when to let something go and move on to something else. Learn to find the motivation from within because it's very hard to find it from outside your own skin. Not impossible, but hard.
And if you get to where you're occasionally published or published regularly . . . I have to tell you, seeing your name in print has never grown old for me.
There's a lot more advice to give. Magazines are published monthly to give it to you. The main thing, to recap, is that if you can stop it, do. If you can't, then write without apology, write seriously, don't think about writing, don't want to write, write.
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