• Home
• Short Fiction
• Blog

X

I am a writer and a writing teacher. So I deal with my own writing motivation issues, then I turn around and help high schoolers with theirs.
My personal catchphrase and what will inevitably be engraved on my tombstone is: No one should have to dread writing.
But I do, sometimes. If I take the time to analyze why, there are usually two reasons:  1) I’m afraid I’ll fall short of my own expectations; and 2) I’m not excited about what I’m writing.
There is a great quote by public radio personality Ira Glass about the gap that creative types experience, between what they churn out initially and what they know in their hearts to be really good. Here’s a short, creative video rendition of the quote: https://vimeo.com/85040589
As you hone your craft, you will be painfully aware of how short you fall of your own expectations. The only way to close that gap is to practice more of your craft. The more you write, the better you will get.
There’s one magic solution to this–don’t quit. If you keep writing regularly, closing that gap will be inevitable. One thing that encourages me is to go back and re-read an old draft or a story I wrote a few years ago. Then I see the truth. I’m getting better.
The other reason why I and so many of my students dread writing is, we’re writing about something we’re not excited about. So here’s my oh-duh solution:  write your passion. Write about something you daydream about. Or about what you fear most. Write about something that’s stuck in your head, that you’re trying to come to terms with. Write about something that pisses you off.
Last year I had a freshman who hated to write and did the very minimum on his writing assignments. When I asked him what he loved to do, he said, “Play the video game Fortnite.”
I asked him what he liked least about the game. He said, “Bush camping. It’s unfair and I hate it. Players hide in the bushes, and they ambush you and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
That next week, he turned in the best piece of writing he’d done in the class, a persuasive essay arguing in detail that bush camping should be taken out of the game!
If you’re writing something you’re not passionate about, write about something else. If that’s not an option, research angles on the subject till you find something you do care about. Pick at it. Find something that gets your emotions going, for good or bad.
Here are two books that have inspired me and some of my students:
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life  by Anne Lamott
Tips and encouragement for any writing process, whether it’s fiction or an essay for school.
If You Want to Write by Brenda Ueland
A sparkling and encouraging book for fiction writers, filled with the author’s sense of humor. Gets to the heart of why we want to write and how to move forward doing it.