Writing about writing.

When you run a game store that doesn't have tons of customers, those who do come in like to talk to you, this wasn't a big deal for me usually as I was bored a lot of the time. A surprising number of them wanted to talk to me about the writing they do, this ranged from one guy who had actually written several novels for National Novel Writing Month, to pretty much everybody else, who talked a lot about writing, called themselves writers, but didn't actually write anything.

A while ago an article floated around my Facebook feed with a title something like "Don't feel bad if you don't write" I don't remember the name exactly and can't find it, so this story will have to remain anecdotal. Within it the writer explained how lots of emphasis is put on writing every day, and getting it publicly released and that this is probably not the best way to go about things, and writers shouldn't feel bad if they just don't have it in them to put words in order once in a while. This is true and I don't disagree with it.

However, it reminded me of those customers I mentioned, as well as the members of a number of web forums dedicated to writing, who probably took the wrong message from the piece entirely. The biggest problem I've seen is that the person gets so caught up in world building that they never actually write a story, world building is cool and I have done it a lot for D and D campaigns and such, but you need to ask yourself "Does my generic fantasy story really need a lovingly crafted map of the entire planet before I actually know what the plot is?" Here's a hint, the answer is virtually never yes, unless you are JRR Tolkien perhaps.

There are also people who think they can make a living selling story ideas, that with no actual story to back it up, they can find someone willing to pay them to write it, now I suppose there are probably some folks out there on the internet willing to pay for a story tailored to their interests, but I suspect they are unwilling to pay in advance and I know that an actual publisher would look at a proposal like that and shake their heads sadly.

I guess my question is for these types, why call yourself a writer if you won't actually write? What is so appealing about giving yourself this label but not doing anything to back it up? You don't have to write all day every day, and you don't have to write for anyone other than yourself if you don't want to, but you do actually have to write something, sometimes, otherwise what is the point? It's not like being a writer gets forced upon you and becomes a job that you do the bare minimum at because you have to, if you don't want to write all you have to do is... don't write. So if you call yourself a writer it must be because you like to write, and therefore why are you avoiding it?

I know I won't get answers here, I don't think I know anyone who has these issues and none of my old customers read my blog anyway, but it was on my mind today for some reason.