A writer’s life is a frustrating life — so why do we keep at it?
Write a short personal essay about “What Keeps Me Going,” and send it over so the rest of us can relate.
A writer’s life is not only frustrating and full of rejection, it is lonely.
I have been writing for a little over a year, and for the first time in my 55 years, I feel my dad is really proud of me.
I have a 2-page published story in an anthology, and I recently won a poetry contest on the Internet.
I love to hear my dad boast about these accomplishments to his friends and family.
Of course other things keep me going, but that is the one that means the most.
- Jill Davis
Have you ever watched a child run?
I don’t mean during the times you are trying frantically to find him or her as they scurry about in a mall or screech through a busy parking lot.
I mean watching them chase butterflies and grasshoppers in a meadow on a summer day.
They can run for hours. They are meant to.
It’s innate.
For me, so is writing.
You see, all of us are created with a purpose.
For some of us, that purpose is writing.
We create far away places and exotic individuals because we were given the ability to tell the tale, to bring someone into a world that they do not know and allow them to live there for a time.
Because I have placed my faith in the One who created me, I must also place my faith in the fact that He knew what He was doing when He gave me the ability to bring people along with me through the simple use of words.
I just have to believe.
All it takes is a little bit of faith.
- Carron LaForce
I’m 46 with quadruple disabilities; stroke, kidney failure, kidney transplant, high blood pressure.
And I write because it keeps me alive.
- Lon Phillips
What keeps me going isn’t my by-line (that heavy black line of pride and accomplishment) above my articles, and it isn’t the framed photocopy of the first check I received for a writing assignment.
Nope.
What keeps me going is the feeling of excitement surging through my body when I’ve found the missing piece in a plot and unlocked the rest of my story; or when I’ve just picked up the perfect quote from an interview subject; or after I’ve translated
something I’ve experienced into a perfect poetic stanza.
But most of all, it’s when I wake up in the morning and realize that I’m using the gift God gave me.
Just that knowledge alone is a powerful thing.
– Mandy Hougland-Borgmeier
We keep writing because we must.
As writers, the written word is our mainstay for living, and without this mainstay, our lives might shrivel from lack of creative floundering.
We must continue to exploit our imaginations toward the minutest of pursuits or the grandest of dreams, not caring about failure, for in all writers, there is a bit of the egotist.
To see our words is to see ourselves.
We writers like ourselves when we do what we most like to do, and for us, that is to write.
– Patricia Spork
I think the thing that keeps me writing is the love I derive from it.
This may sound a little strange, but sometimes, if I don’t write, I actually get physically sick.
When I have my pen to the paper, or my fingers to the keys, I feel that much better for having done it.
I have probably made about $500 from writing in the last 5 years, but nothing makes me happier than exploring my mind and finding new ideas and things to write about.
I really feel that there is nothing else for me to do BUT write. That’s how strongly I feel about it.
What I do right now to pay the bills is my job. Writing is my career. It defines me, as much as I define it. I don’t place a monetary value on what I do.
I believe that if you first do whatever it is you do for the love, the rewards are sure to be close at hand. The most important thing to remember is that if there is no love, there is no chance for success.
– Otis Galloway
MONDAY MORNINGS & MRS. VICENCIO
by Kitty Santos
In fourth grade I was quite thin, and never did well in sports. I also wore large, plastic-framed glasses, so I was never considered for any of those fund-raising beauty contests either.
Nevertheless, I had tremendous self esteem. And all because of Monday mornings, and Mrs. Vicencio.
Mrs. Vicencio was our English teacher, and every Friday she made us write a new composition into those very formal theme notebooks, about topics like “What I Did Last Summer Vacation,” “My Best Friend,” and “My Pet.”
Then each Monday Mrs. Vicencio would read aloud to us the top three compositions that she liked best — and she always read mine.
I can’t even remember now if she ever actually announced to the class the names of each week’s best composition writers. And neither do I remember the final grade she gave me on my report card.
All I remember is Mrs. Vicencio standing in front of the class those Monday mornings, and Mrs. Vicencio’s voice reading aloud those words I couldn’t say because I always felt no one would bother to listen.
Mrs. Vicencio made everyone listen, and she made me feel that what I had to say was important.
“You’re a very good writer,” she told me one day, as I was about to graduate and leave my old school behind. It was then that she handed me a brown manila envelope, and when I looked inside I saw all my fourth grade composition papers gathered neatly between bright blue paper clips.
She smiled when she saw the question on my face. And even before I could ask, she already gave me an answer: “I read them aloud to each fourth grade class that came after you.”
Now, years later, I’ve encountered many editors who would surely never call me “a very good writer,” and I’ve written plenty of things that even I would never file in a manila envelope.
But in spite of all this, I know I would always be a writer. And a “very good” one, before this life is over.
Because someone important already thought I was, and I couldn’t let her down.
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