Discover Your Writing Motivation

Through the actions and interviews of bestselling authors, you can gain a sense of how to embrace your writing motivation.

Even for highly motivated writers, why do many find it hard to complete a full-length novel? That’s a question I’ve studied for the better part of a decade. The chief answer may surprise you.

The question is complex, yet the answer for many is simple, and it’s probably not what you’re thinking.

Reasons Writers Don’t Complete Novels

People offer many excuses when they stray from their writing goals.

Writers often complain they don’t have the time to write. In contrast, those who developed an understanding of their chief writing motivation found pockets of time to make their creativity soar and productivity increase.

For example:

• It took J. K. Rowling five years to complete and get published the first in the seven book series, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Then it took another ten years to complete the other six books. As a single mom, she moved forward with her writing life while managing the household and working.
• David Baldacci worked weekdays as a lawyer, so he had to write after his family went to bed, often from 10:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m.
• For years, Elmore Leonard continued his copy writing career. He set his alarm for 5:00 in the morning so he could get in two hours of writing before heading to work at the advertising agency.
• Toni Morrison found that a busy schedule actually helped her focus, knowing she only had small pockets of time to solve literary problems and complete her writing goals.
• Many readers are unaware that before her writing career took off, Maya Angelou wrote part-time while she worked at different jobs (e.g., cook, streetcar conductor, server, singer, dancer, editor, actress, and civil rights organizer).
• Dan Brown discovered the seed for his first novel while on vacation from his career as an English teacher. While still teaching, he’d wake up at 4:00 in the morning to achieve his daily word-count goal before leaving for school.
• Balancing his career as a crime reporter with writing, Michael Connelly wrote four novels featuring the now famous protagonist Harry Bosch, but didn’t become a full-time novelist until after publishing The Last Coyote.

Besides time constraints, writers face many obstacles, including family commitments, careers, countless distractions, multiple fears (e.g., failure, success, and more), unrealistic expectations, shiny object syndrome (SOS), perfectionism, and procrastination.

Reasons Writers Keep Writing Despite Obstacles

Some authors realized their overwhelming desire to write early in life, but others identified their reasons for writing later.

The strong desire to complete and publish a book can take many forms, but for most top writers, their motivation became the driving force regardless of setbacks.

Several treated their compulsion to write as a vocation, but many offered additional reasons.

For example:

• Several authors felt they had something worthwhile to say and wanted to leave a legacy of words that would outlive their time on earth.
• Many found writing more fun than other endeavors.
• More than a few wrote to think and think to write, promoting healthy brains.
• Some wrote to make money, but even more said they’d still write if they never made enough to support themselves.
• Almost all felt writing gave them a deep sense of satisfaction, akin to completing a complex puzzle.
• Some wrote to escape from the real world by constructing one where they controlled the outcome.
• There were those who started writing to share what they had learned after researching and satisfying innate curiosities.
• There were altruistic writers who wanted to shape the lives of young and old.
• For a few writers, something significant happened in their lives, and to get those stories out of their heads, they couldn’t stop writing until they shared their experiences with others.

Regardless of the driving force, bestselling authors showed a pattern of adopting and adapting personalized writing motivations, and then persevering until completing and publishing their works.

Discover Your Writing Motivation for Your Novel

In Emily Dickinson’s poem, If I can Stop One Heart from Breaking, she captured the chief motivation shared by many writers.

Dickinson’s poem highlights what motivates many writers. A strong desire to:

• Entertain,
• Inform, and
• Inspire!

Discover your writing motivation and write a book readers will love.

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