The Traditional Rules for Being a Writer Weren’t Written For You

The idea of a ‘writer’ is often so specific that it doesn’t account for the diversity of needs that actual writers have, and the many things that make us different from each other.

Photo by Jessica To'oto'o on Unsplash

When I first decided to be a writer, I was seven or eight years old. I decided that ice skating was not something I wanted to do anymore, and that I wasn’t enough of a prodigy to be a pianist, so it seemed like a good decision.

It meant I could spend endless hours reading and writing — two things I loved, and still do.

But I didn’t trust that instinct, and I was still figuring myself out. So I explored several ideas of my future-self over the years:

• Writing
• English
• Medicine
• Archaeology
• Anthropology
• Sociology
• English (again)
• Journalism
• Writing in general

Writing was always my starting point, and it turned out to be the end-point, too. Only when I finally made the decision to go with it, I didn’t have the background knowledge I needed to…