I was absolutely blown away by the response I received to the post of a few weeks back: “6 Lifestyle Changes You Can Make to Protect Creativity.” In this post, I came forward with some of the surprising, painful, and ultimately liberating truths I have discovered on my road to becoming a successful author. I talked about how success isn’t always all it’s cracked up to be and how, if you’re unprepared for its reality, it can quickly turn itself into soul-sucking drudgery.

I felt compelled to write that post simply because the things I have been learning in the past few years were things no one else really seemed to be talking about. In the face of the many kind emails I often receive saying, “you make it look so easy” and “I don’t know how you do it,” it would have been disingenuous, at best, to pretend the journey to success as a modern-day author really is as easy, happy, and fulfilling as we’re always told it should be.

I wanted to share that post. But I wasn’t sure how it would be received. Would people get it? Were my experiences too specific to my own life to be insightful for others? Would my feelings perhaps even be criticized as ungrateful when I have been lucky enough to live the dream of so many writers?

But you did, indeed, get it. Oh boy, did you get it!

I knew in my heart that post was important, but I had no idea how important. Not only was the site flooded with comments and shares, but I don’t think I have ever received more emails about a single post. I was deeply touched and encouraged, and I thank you all for that. But, even more, I realized the tremendous importance of this universal conundrum: how to strive for worthwhile success, in all its many facets, while remaining centered in the values that make life and art truly meaningful and fulfilling for us all.

One of the emails I received was from Bill DeWitt:

Would you talk a little more about … why not to write from a motivation for publication and fame, and what motivation should guide you? And even some ideas how to better get there?

In that original post, I discussed several steps you can take to protect your creative energy. Today, at the urging of Bill and so many more of you, I want to talk about some of things you might need to be protecting your creativity from.

5 Reasons Writers Write That Make Them Unhappy

As any writer who has sought to create complex and realistic characters knows motivations are tricky. The reasons we choose to do things are often dimensional, sometimes paradoxical, sometimes hidden even from ourselves. Very often, we can do things for the right reasons and the wrong reasons all at the same time. And other times, motivations that started out as one thing can slowly morph into the other, as time and circumstances evolve our understanding and experience of life.

That’s just the way it is. It’s neither good nor bad, but simply a truth we’d all do well to recognize and prepare for.

Total disclaimer: Every single one of the following “negative reasons” for writing have been huge catalysts in my own journey at one point or another. And, truthfully, they were all effective in their time and place. I probably wouldn’t be the person I am today without them.

But they’re still negative. We need to recognize them as such, uncover the deeper primal motivations driving them, confront them, and use them as launch pads to greater growth.

1. Greed

Ah, money. I often think of Jo March’s statement in the 1994 adaptation of Little Women, in which she growls:

I hate money!

What she meant was that she hated that she and her family needed money. Because wouldn’t life be so much simpler if we could forget about food and just live for the rarefied gratification of art and philosophy?

Everyone wants to live a life of fulfillment, and for most of us this starts with finding a livelihood that supports that—in every sense. If you can make your living doing whatever it is you love best, then how awesome is that?

But there’s a dark side to “filthy lucre.” It is archetypal in its symbolism: of safety and security, of personal validation, of power. It requires almost superhuman courage and honesty to be able to take only what you truly need to live on and reject the rest.

Instead most of us are always in pursuit of “just a little more.”

Just a little more security.

Just a little more comfort.

Just a little more admiration.

Just a little more power.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to earn a living from your writing. There is also nothing inherently wrong with seeking a certain measure of monetary proof that you and your writing have worth beyond your own interests.

But it’s a hairline between a healthy pursuit of money and the subtle cancer of greed.

2. Inferiority

Another thing we talked about in the previous post was how there’s no such thing as “enough” success. It’s not like you reach a certain goal or milestone—publishing that first book, selling a thousand copies, winning an award, earning a living—and suddenly you feel like: “Oh, yeah, this is it. I’ve totally made it. Now I can relax and enjoy myself.”

Success is a drug. One success, however small, just makes you hungry for the next… and the next… and the next… and the next. Until one morning you wake up and realize you have no clue what “success” actually means.

For most of us, I’d venture this mindset arises from a sense of inferiority. It’s almost ironic. Just about every human ever born (and, for my money, you can remove the “just about”) feels inferior to every other human ever born. So we all spend our existences running around like hamsters, trying to “out-success” each other, so we’ll all see what amazing people we really are.

I believe almost all the atrocities in this world come down to the individual’s inability to find acceptance and forgiveness. As in the Gaslight Anthem song “National Anthem”:

With everything discovered just waiting to be known
What’s left for God to teach from His throne?
And who will forgive us when He’s gone?

We can only show compassion and love to others to the extent that we are first able to accept and extend that same grace.

Trying to fill the hole of inferiority by shoveling is successes is like trying to fill the Grand Canyon. Not gonna happen in this lifetime. The more successes you gain, the more you realize it’s a losing battle—and the more inferior you feel.

3. Insecurity

Publishing a book is hard. Not only are you putting your heart and soul out there, you’re also pulling back an irrevocable curtain on your skills. Whether your writing is truly any good or not is suddenly out there for everyone to see and judge. And judge they will.

At first glance, you wouldn’t think insecurity is a reason we write. In fact, it seems like it would be a reason not to write. But I see it all the time: writers who put their work out there, not really believing it’s any good, and yet craving desperately the validation that someone will impossibly think that it is.

Certainly, I do this as well.

The problem with this is twofold:

1. The opinions of others, even a consensus, do not necessarily determine the worth of something.

2. Sooner or later, someone will hate your writing.

If you’re putting your work out there with the (probably subconscious) belief that if people like your work, then it has value—well then, you must also submit to the flip side. Whenever someone doesn’t like your work, it must therefore have no value.

That’s obviously baloney, on a number of levels. But we all feel it, deep in our guts. If we’re not able to reach a place from which we write for reasons beyond the validation of others, we will live in a constant state of fear, discouragement, and despair.

4. Jealousy

Jealousy is a big thing among writers. This is both surprising and not. After all, we’re humans, and humans are very good at feeling that, if we’re just a little better than Brother and Sister over there, then we’re also worth just a little more.

But the jealousy of one writer for another is also pretty nonsensical. Your success in no way endangers mine. In fact, not only do I get the opportunity to learn from how you gained your success, I’m also likely to benefit from the goodwill and enthusiasm you’re cultivating in the reading community.

Readers don’t just buy one book. They buy one book, read it, love it, and immediately want to repeat the experience. Who says they can’t follow up Stephen King’s latest with yours?

Jealousy is insidious, dangerous, and entirely without merit. It is grounded in a belief that “I have to be better than you to matter.” Craziness.

Yes, look upon your fellow authors’ successes and be inspired to emulate them. But your worth and the worth of your abilities has absolutely nothing to do with how you compare to others. There will always be someone behind you on the track and someone ahead of you. In fighting that reality, you’re really fighting no one but yourself.

5. Self-Belittlement

So many writers denigrate their own talents. We all have those moments when we re-read a passage we excitedly wrote a few days ago, only to find that, to today’s eyes, it looks pretty bad. Certainly it doesn’t compare to the masters of the craft.

Cue the self-flagellation.

Writers are so hard on themselves.

Who cares if you can’t write like Faulkner? Who cares if you’re not writing as well today as you will next year or in twenty years?

Yeah, I know. You care. And this burning need to get to a place where you feel good about your writing keeps you going—because writers are also tenacious little dogs. That part is good. The part that is not good is the part where you’re not having any fun.

Writing, as much as any other human pursuit, is a process of continual growth. And just like that gawky period of adolescent growing pains, it is often ugly, messy, and difficult. It is an exploration of the deepest parts of yourself—your soul and your brain. It is a refinement of your thought processes. It is an admission and acceptance of your fundamental beliefs.

That’s rough. But it’s also unspeakably beautiful. Don’t miss out on the beauty of your ever-evolving imperfections because you’re so busy berating yourself for not being flawless. You try, and for today that is enough. As Samuel Beckett said:

Try again. Fail again. Fail better.

The 1 Happy Reason You Should Be Writing

The one common thread in all of the above reasons for writing is that they are all pursuits of affirmation. The money, the acclaim, the good reviews—they all tell you, “I can do this, I am good at this, I’m not just kidding myself.” Once everyone else thinks you’re great, it gives you permission to believe it yourself.

Here’s a truth: I don’t regret, in any measure, having been driven, for a time, by the above motivations. The results have been affirming. They have answered a question in my soul. I can look back to who I was ten years ago before I published my first book, and I can see how much confidence and, yes, peace, I have gained by reaching my goals. I don’t have as much to prove to other people as I did, but even more importantly, I don’t have to prove it to myself.

That’s worthwhile.

But here’s a greater truth: Success may have given me the courage to see and claim my worth as a writer and a person, but success is not my worth.

Having achieved my version of success, in large part, I can look back at it and realize that rather than “me being nothing without it,” it is, instead, “nothing without me.” I could quit right now, walk away, live like a homeless person, and never write another book—and, so long as I was at peace with that, my journey would be just as worthwhile.

The same is true for writers who have yet to find commercial success. Your success as a writer and a person has nothing to do with external validation. Indeed, leaning upon exterior validation is a crutch. It’s great when it comes, but it is only truly a success when it is a beacon of the greater light shining within that writer.

So Why Should You Be Writing?

At the end of the day, there is really only one good reason to write. There is only one reason that will bring you fulfillment regardless your external circumstances, regardless the amount of money you’re making or the number of books you’re selling.

You must write because there is a call upon your mind and soul.

Because you can’t not write.

Because you are compelled to explore yourself and the world around you.

Because you are willing to be courageously honest with whatever answers your questions may find.

Because art is the highest endeavor of man.

Because in the act of creation, you are adding something to the world rather than just taking.

Write because this is who you are and what you were meant to bring to this life.

None of the rest of it matters. Not really. Not in the long run. And if you can keep it in its proper perspective right now, in the short run, you will have found the secret to living a centered, empowered, kind, genuine, aware, and meaningful life. Period.

Wordplayers, tell me your opinion! What is the ultimate reason you write? Are there any negative motivations distracting you from that? Tell me in the comments!

Click the “Play” button to Listen to Audio Version (or subscribe to the Helping Writers Become Authors podcast in Apple Podcast or Amazon Music).

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