When I was in high school the school counsellor asked me what I was going to do after school. Of course I said, “I’m going to be a writer.” At this point I had already written a novel, had a one act play produced that did quite well in the local festival and had the same play reach the top five in a province wide playwriting competition against adults. So I was well on my way. Not to mention that even with the three or more hours of high school homework and studying I had every night, I regularly managed to pound out another two to four hours of writing a day too. Mind you, I didn’t have a job. Still, I was a writer and that was that. My school counsellor didn’t see things quite my way. “You can’t be a writer,” she said. “You won’t make any money.”
I recently saw a similar conversation directed at one of the kids I met this summer. “You can’t be a writer. Why not do what your parents did? They’re successful.” I’m afraid to say, this girl is already is writer, and a damn good one at that. With no real training, she just writes from the heart. Says what is on her mind, and it blows me away every time. So telling her that she can’t be a writer isn’t going to play out well for anyone.
Besides, being a writer isn’t something we choose. It’s what we are. You don’t decide to be a writer. Not in my experience. You either are one or you aren’t. You either spend hours fiddling with words, desperately searching for a way to make your words better, to ring truer, to be brighter, or you do something else. Find excuses. Do laundry. And not everyone who likes to write is a writer. But when you are a writer, having someone tell you that you can’t be one – doesn’t work. You can’t just stop being a writer. There isn’t any way around it. It’s like telling someone that they can’t be human. How the heck would you pull that off?
So to all you struggling writers out there. Don’t listen to the can’ts. Don’t worry about the don’ts. Just write. You have to anyway. So why fret. Trying to explain this passion to those people is a waste of time. Besides you have better things to do – like writing.