Becoming the Writer You Want to Be

It is often said that writers write. They don’t think about writing. They don’t talk about writing. They don’t act like writers, but they write. But too often writers also resist writing. Why?

What are you bringing to the keyboard?

So often, writers bring more than the writer to the keyboard. They bring a host of other selves: the self that is critical, the self that is scared of what others will think, the self that worries if this would pay the bills, the self that wonders if they could even do what they set out to do. Then when all these selves compete, the writer becomes exhausted and would rather do something else, watch another episode on Netflix justifying it as a way to be creative or do the dishes saying that it’s a distraction piling up in the sink.

This dude got with all his voices and is doing the job of writing. It’s just a stock photo, but you wanna be like him, don’t you?!

But this is only a way to get rid of the noise, momentarily. But the ache, the draw is always to the page, back to the art. This happens whenever the writer goes to a book event and hears another writer share or to the bookstore and scans all the completed, published manuscripts. There is the pull back to the piece. But whenever the “resistance” or “friction” or whatever we want to call it comes up, there is the retreat. My wife has listened to a podcast about a writer who writes a book a year and I asked who it was. She responded, “I don’t know. Old guy, white? Some of his books were made into movies.” “John Grisham?” I responded and let out a small laugh. “Yeah, him!” The reason I reacted like that was that I used to do a John Grisham impersonation on the podcast that Kate and I did, making fun of his Southern drawl and the kind of work he wrote. But part of me was probably jealous of a guy who was that prolific and didn’t know what AI was about. His philosophy was to do one page a day, which equals 365 pages a year, which equals a book.

Not only about getting your butt in the chair

The math is easy, but the work not so. The philosophy of getting the butt in the seat and writing is sound, but Grisham has probably reconciled with those voices more than most people have. Listening to him talk about his writing career and journey sounded much like my own. He shared that while attending a community college, he took a writing class where his professor thought he had plagiarized a writing assignment because she did not think a nineteen-year-old could use words like he did. She immediately gave him an F on the paper and that plummeted his grade to a D for the class. He was devastated and left the school. He eventually found a career in law and then made his way into writing. In college, there was a similar thing that happened to me. I was called out after class and asked if I plagiarized a work. Mind you, this was before TurnItIn and AI. As an Asian refugee, still with an accent, you know why she would say this. But I simply said I always loved writing. She did not give me an F.

However, what happened to me was very different. I allowed the various voices to get to me easily. Perhaps that college prof did not come back to haunt me, but questions about my skill or identity did. So the career was a roller coaster of sorts. Since grad school, I always wrote and found ways to get published. This was the writing high for me. Finally, when I wrote and published my first book after completing my dissertation, it was like I struck gold. But something about it never completely satisfied. The critic came back to claim the seat. And also the one that said that if I achieved success then I would easily lose it. So the second book was a slog. The piles of manuscripts on the hard drive stacked up and distractions got in the way. Even after a major university press green-lit my next book, so many life events came up, which meant my resistance was in full force, trying to keep me from what I was doing.

There’s never a perfect time to write, so write all the time

Of course life was difficult at that time. We were financially struggling, and I was trying to sell a house and help my wife’s business after a financial shake-up in 2025, but like I tell writers, “If you are going to wait until everything is perfect in your life to start, you never will.” Writers who think that another workshop or a weekend retreat will help them complete their work never find themselves done. There is a story about how a writer was offered a stipend, a venue to teach, and a place to stay so that he could finish his manuscript, and he said it was the worst thing for his writing career. This is not to say some grants and fellowships are not helpful. I applied for a post-doc, but did not receive it. I wondered if it was another excuse not to do the work. But the point being that there is never any good time to write, just like there is no good time to do life. I know a friend and theologian who was very consistent with his writing. He is a professor, director of a graduate program at a university, and at that time was raising another child in his 50s. I thought it was impossible to do so, but he came out with another book during that time.

Dealing with the resistant voice

Going back to the resistance, we need to come to terms with it if we cannot sit for a page a day. We need to convince it that what we are doing is valuable, or else why do we keep going back to the page, why talk about the book, why think of the manuscript? When I am encountering resistance, this is my process. First, I find a quiet space, someplace safe, and talk to my resistance. “What do you want from me?” I let the answer emerge. Is it to know that I am on track? Is it to slow down? Is it to answer the questions those other voices are asking? Second, I ask it to help me. I say, “You are here not to harm me, but to serve me. However, the best service is to help me write at this time. So, can we write a page, two hundred words, five hundred words without critique or criticism? We can deal with the consequences later.” Usually, it relents and gives me an all-clear. Third, I write until I cannot write any more. I take a break, thank my resistant self for doing a good job staying at my feet like my dog, Layla, or cuddling up next to me like my cat, Roxy, and I take a walk or do something else.

This is what I’ve coached many people to do, and it has helped people do what they need to do for themselves, to write and be the writer that they want to be. Give it a try and see how it works for you.

Is a creative coach right for you?

If you need coaching through your identity as a writer or any other kind of identity work, please sign up here to find a way out of the mire and onto the road of a kind of person who does what they set out to do. There is no willpower involved, no time spent on past traumas, but a way to map out who you are so you can move forward who you will be. See you on the other side.