Writing - Why do I write?

Why do I write? Why does anyone write?

Writing is about communication. It’s about getting ideas out of your head and putting them down into a form that is easy to understand (or at least sometimes it is). Writing letters, writing texts or Facebook updates or Tweets. Writing poetry or lavish love letters or fiction. It’s all about communicating.

Maybe sometimes it’s not about communicating with the world or with a certain someone, maybe sometimes it’s just about communicating with yourself. After all, the self can be a very confusing person to talk to, especially when one is so easily distracted.

So… why do I write?

Personally, I write because I can’t imagine not writing. For as long as I can remember, I have written stories and poetry. Not all of it has been good, some has been downright bad – so bad it would make your eyes bleed to read and make you deaf should you ever hear it read out loud. I don’t think it would be too far off to say that I write to calm the voices in my head.

It gets awfully messy in my head and well, writing helps to calm that down.

I write to keep myself sane.

Lazy Writing

It is now 2012! A new year! A new start!

Writing wise, I don’t feel like I did a lot of it during 2011 but looking back at what I actually have done, I did more than I thought. Some original stuff and some fan fiction. And I did a whole lot of editing too, mostly on Nate.

So whilst I know I did a lot of writing, I feel that somewhere during November, during the dreaded Nano, I began to get very lazy in my writing. So even though I was still writing, I wasn’t always content with what I wrote and even when I was, afterwards, I felt like maybe I could have done better. I could have added more flavour, more voice... I settled too easily and said ‘that’ll do’ too much when what I should have been saying is ‘I can do better’ and ‘let’s try that again’.

So that is one of my many resolutions for 2012. I’m going to try and cut back on the lazy writing and try even harder to make my writing the best it can be. I know I can do it because I’ve wrote things in the past where I was really proud of it and felt I did the best I could.

I have just finished another fan fiction and I plan to start another one soon. But unlike the one I’ve just finished, this new one is going to be the start of my resolution. I plan to use this new story to rediscover myself as a writer, to rediscover the passion and non-lazy writing that I used to do.

I also plan to focus a lot of attention on Nate. Last year, during the first few months of the year, I worked really hard to complete Nate and then following on from that, I edited it over and over and over again until I finally felt like I was happy with it. So this year, I want to see the fruits of my labour come to bloom. I want to get Nate out there and that means sending out query letter after query letter after query letter. There will be rejections, piles of them most likely, and whilst I won’t like it, I’m prepared for it. I know that I won’t hit gold first try but if I want to hit at all, I have to try... I have to put Nate, and myself, out there.

So those are just two resolutions and both seem to revolve around something very simple. Stop being lazy.

This year, in 2012, I want to stop being so damn lazy.