Hey everyone. Here we are with the second stand-alone post of this series. I actually had a different topic in mind for this second post, but it was a difficult topic to write about, so I switched and decided that this was something a bit more personal but still informative and a good stand-alone post. So, without further ado…
Hardest Thing for Me About Being a Writer
Being a writer is hard. It can be fun, fulfilling, amazing, creative, and a lot of other positive words too. But if anyone ever tells you that being a writer is not hard then they are lying. Being a writer is one of the hardest things that I have ever done in my whole life. Harder than moving to another country alone to live for a while, harder than graduating from university, harder than moving away from my hometown, harder than learning a second and then a third language. Writing is hard.
But if you’re like me, writing is not something you really chose to do. Writing is something you feel that you need to do. I went through a long period of time where I stopped writing for a variety of reasons. That was pretty much the worst period of my life. I didn’t realize that writing was what I was missing though, until I started writing again. Until I took some time to be like, “Hey. Remember how you used to love writing?” and I sat down and wrote and realized I felt better afterward.
So, if you’re like me, then writing wasn’t really something you chose to do. A writer is simply the person that you are. If you’re like that though then there are a lot of problems that come from that. I decided that for this post I wanted to kind of discuss what the hardest parts for me are about being a writer in the context that writing is simply something I have to do to feel whole.
Finding Time/Making Time
One of the hardest things for me as a writer is finding or making time to actually do my writing. Writing takes some serious focus on my part. Especially when it comes to things like world building or serious and important scenes in my story. Because of this I find it hard to take time to simply sit and write. I can’t just write for a few minutes today and then a few minutes tomorrow I have to really sit and consider and spend a minimum of one hour on my writing with some serious focus.
I am a busy person. I have two jobs, a social life, and hobbies other than writing. It makes it very difficult to even find time to try and do writing. I’m very bad at setting aside time to do my writing and actually following through with it on my own. Sometimes I will say, “I will write on this day at this time for 2 hours” and then when that day and time comes, I always end up saying, “I’m too tired. Or I’m not inspired” and I find it difficult to make butt-in-chair time.
Finding a place to write
When I was younger it was much easier to write anytime and anywhere. I would sometimes write my story in pieces while I was sitting in a lecture or a class. But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve found that writing requires more focus and more of a quiet place to think and focus on my story without outside distractions. Sometimes I can’t even use music while I’m writing because even that feels like too much of a distraction from my writing focus.
The place that I live is a rather loud and boisterous environment. It is rather difficult to write at my own desk because the noises of the other members of my house (while not annoying) can be difficult to write around. However, I am one of those writers who needs a table to write (by hand or by laptop) and my local library does not have seating areas with tables and my town does not have a café. The next town’s library does but is still a rather loud place to try and write in.
Using the right tools
This is a very personal writing issue for me. I have a joint condition that makes writing by hand difficult. If I write by hand too much or too long my joint either stiffens up and I can’t bend it or it becomes too loose and dislocates easily. Because of this difficulty I sometimes find it difficult to write my stories by hand, which is actually my preferred method of writing.
These days I spend a large majority of my time writing on my computer. I am not a big fan of writing on my computer because often times my typing speed (which is rather fast) can be faster than I can think of the next line in my story and the pause in typing can often jolt me out of my writing zone. Finding the right writing tools to help me not only avoid physical pain but stay focused on my writing is one of the hardest things for me as a writer.
I wanted to talk about these things today not to complain or even to discuss my own personal solutions on how to solve my own writing issues. I wanted to talk about them to highlight that everyone has writing issues. Everyone has things about being a writer that are harder for them. What’s important about these things is noticing them. Understanding what is hard for you as a writer and then overcoming them. Notice those things that are difficult and might make you quit and find ways to overcome them or make the situation better.
I hope that this week’s post was at least a little bit helpful for a few people. I know for me personally being a writer is hard and sometimes from an outside perspective it looks like it’s easier for others. Let me know down below what you think is the hardest part about being a writer for you! Don’t forget to like, subscribe, become a blog page member, share, and follow me on social media at the links below. And remember,
Get Up, Get Writing, and Get Published. See you next week!