Like I’ve been saying blarghers, one word can do a lot. One, singular word. That’s all it takes to create an entire novel. To run away with one word and an idea. So here’s another single word for you. Why?

Why do you write, make art, do whatever it is you do? Good question right? Do you have the answer to it? I’ve got the answer to mine.  Might as well talk about it. So why do I write?

Well, I’m still not sure to be honest. It started when I was eighteen, the summer after graduating high school, right before starting college. My best friend and I decided to write a novel out of the blue, it’s not something that you sit and think about, it’s something that just happens. And it did…and it was horrible. The story I mean, not the writing. That was the best experience I ever had. It was pure, fun, without worry. No thoughts of publishing, how to do it and more. It was just about the story. I must have caught onto something important because its seven years later, and I’m still doing it.

So is it about the long haul? Fame, and fortune? Possibly. But no. At the end of the day, I love writing for what it is. The discipline, which sure, can be hard at times, but I love it. For the creativity, and the endless outcomes you can end up with by starting with a blank page and some thoughts. I love it for where it takes me and who I get to interact with, sure they’re fictional, so what? Some of the characters I meet are nicer than a lot of real people.

Come on…you know that’s true. Plus, they don’t cut me off in traffic and drive with their hazard lights on…or FORGET TO USE THEIR SIGNALS!

Yes I love it, yes I want to make a living from it. But even if I never do, I’m still going to write, no matter what—to the end of my days. It’s just one of those things, I didn’t decide it, it happened, that’s the end of it. Writing picked me. Oh well. I can live with it. Writing brings me back to life, makes and helps me examine it, and I love it for that. It lets me go places I might never be able to visit otherwise. And I love it for that. It’s an active meditation that calms me down, letting me think through my fingertips, and I love it for that.

It makes me happy, endlessly so. For someone battling depression, and adhd, that means a lot. Happiness, that’s what it’s about. Living my life and being happy. Can’t speak for you, but I want to be happy. You?

Writing isn’t about the fame and fortune. Would it be nice? Yeah, of course, I’m not going to lie. Would it be nice if people across the world read, shared and love my stories. Absolutely. Right now, I’m an unknown Indie author that the vast majority of readers are going to overlook, and that’s okay too. Because I’m not even writing for them. I’m writing for me. I’m writing what I love, the characters and worlds I want to craft. And I plan to do so until my last days. It means too much, it means everything. Why else do something and let it consume you? Right?

So ask yourself why you do the things you do. Do you really want to be doing all of them? Are there some you’d rather be doing but you’re not? Decisions—decisions. Choices and what not. Think about it. I write for me, and maybe for those that do want to read what I write. And to those few people, thank you. It means the world.