You have a dream: the dream of being a writer. Achieving a dream, an objective, or a goal, always requires effort, learning, faith, commitment, perseverance, and optimism… And not for a single day, a week, or a month: it requires all of this forever.
However, achieving your dream of becoming a writer is possible. Today we want to give you four concrete keys to start walking the path that will lead you to your goal, silencing that inner voice that tells you that it can’t be, that deep down, you will never achieve it.
Your dream of being a writer must be genuine.
Why do you write? Why do you want to be a writer? Answer these questions with complete honesty.
To achieve your dream of being a writer, your desire should be genuine, springing from your innermost self. Writing should be in you like a gushing spring that nothing can blind; even if you didn’t want to, you couldn’t stop writing.
If you write because you want fame, money, or recognition, if you write because it is fashionable or because someone urges you to do so, it is very likely that sooner or later, you will lack the motivation to persevere in the pursuit of your goal. You can still wish to achieve fame or economic success through writing. These are legitimate aspirations. But even if those aspirations carry weight, they should not be the primary engine that drives you.
Rather, that success comes as a consequence of having a deeper mission, more linked to your essence, to what you are, and what you seek to convey with your work. It is not money or fame that drives you to write. Your desire is something else: to create a work of art, to leave a legacy that transcends you, to share an idea, a vision, a way of seeing the world, to entertain others… Working towards that idea is how recognition and financial success will also come.
So your dream of being a writer must be genuine, but how do you know if it is?
You will know that your dream of being a writer is genuine if you are willing to do anything to achieve it, except what goes against your principles or other people’s. Because it is almost certain that to achieve your dream, you will have to do many things that seem difficult or rough to you right now, which will shake your placidity and drag you out of your comfort zone. If you’re not up for it, your yearning doesn’t have a strong foundation.
You will know that your dream of being a writer is genuine if you don’t set conditions to achieve it. If you don’t say to yourself: “I would try if I had the certainty that I am really good/this idea is worthwhile”, “I would try if I had the certainty that I would sign with a big publishing house and have thousands of readers”, “I would try if I didn’t have to work too hard, learn new things, change my habits”….
You will know that your dream of being a writer is genuine if your desire is independent of your level of motivation, and even on those days when you feel up to it.
Articulate your dream.
It may seem excessive, but an important step to achieving our dreams and goals is to articulate them correctly and coherently.
Of course, your dream is to be a writer. But have you ever articulated it clearly? Have you stopped to think about why you want to be one? What is the origin of that desire? Have you weighed what is involved in achieving that dream, what you have to do to achieve it, and how it will change your life when you do? Probably not.
Commonly, we think about our goals abstractly – they are more like palpitations, vague flashes, and sensations of longing… They must be properly articulated thoughts, built with complete and well-structured sentences.
That is why the first step to achieve your dream of being a writer is to articulate it correctly. These are two big differences if you want to become a professional writer and have a book out by the end of this year or if you have a goal to retrain as a descriptive essay writer and start working in an essay service. Develop your goal in breadth and detail, nuance it, and flesh it out. How can you do that? In the simplest way for a writer: by writing.
When you write down your ideas, you automatically focus on them. It is virtually impossible to put an idea down on paper while thinking about something else. That’s why writing is such a powerful tool for concentration and visualization.
By writing down your dream, you free up mental space: all your ideas are now in a document you can return to whenever you need to refresh your motivation. If you establish a routine of rereading that document periodically, you will stay connected to your dream. You will memorize some of its phrases to repeat them daily as mantras and not lose sight of why you are making an effort, and, in addition, you will be able to measure your progress.
Think: what should you do every day to achieve your dream of becoming a writer, is there anything you need to learn or improve? What should your life, your days, be like to achieve your dream?
By writing, you will put your ideas in order, and in doing so, you will come up with new possibilities to materialize your dream. You will also understand the steps you must take to achieve it. And the text you write will be a perennial reminder that you will never forget it.
Protect your dream.
Dreams almost always involve high hopes. They are aspirations that we find difficult to achieve. When that dream also involves creative work, such as writing, our environment can be very hostile to our dreams. We have already talked on another occasion about the hidden face of creativity.
That’s why you must protect it. Don’t share your goals with just anyone, especially those people who don’t believe in you, who don’t think so you can achieve them, who mock your dreams or try to dissuade you from even trying.
These people can act as sounding boards for your limiting thoughts, make them take shape, and push you to believe that what they tell you is the truth and that it is certainly not possible for you to achieve your dream of becoming a writer.
Fighting those people’s beliefs and fighting your limiting thoughts will drain you of the energy you need to work every day to achieve your goals. That’s why it’s better not to share your goals with certain people.
Even so, it is inevitable that you will receive negative feedback from someone with whom you have decided to share your dream. Someone who will tell you that what you are aiming for is impossible, that you don’t have the necessary talent, that being a writer is not within reach of someone like you?
In that situation, don’t just believe the person’s words, but ask yourself: does he/she have any experience on which his/her opinion is based? Has he/she ever tried something similar, is he/she a person who has pursued his/her dreams or is he/she someone who has given up on them because he/she considers them impossible? They made it, and so will you.
Be your own motivator.
When you embark on an ambitious undertaking, when you’re working hard to reach your goal and make your dream of becoming a writer come true, it’s normal to feel discouraged at times.
You may be tempted to believe that if you haven’t reached your goal the first time, you will never reach it. You may indulge those insidious negative thoughts that your inner voice keeps whispering to you, especially when you’re tired or something hasn’t gone the way you expected. Don’t do it. Remember that those thoughts come from your brain trying to keep you in your comfort zone to keep you safe. Your brain does not want you to reach your dreams. Your brain wants you to stay there where there are no threats.
In addition, to achieve your dream, you must establish new routines and habits and learn new things… which will also demand effort and focus.
In short, to achieve your dream of becoming a writer, you must do what you have never done before. That’s why you must be willing to be your biggest motivator and push yourself sometimes to do what you have to do.
Motivation is not going to come from the outside. It has to come from you because you set the goal of being a writer.
Be like a demanding, uncompromising coach to yourself, urging you to push yourself and do your best. But do it with respect and compassion for yourself. Always remember what your burning desire is and how you would feel if you left this world without achieving it. Remember also that if you persevere, you will be taking a step closer to your goal every day, and that fact is in itself a reward, a small foretaste of the happiness you will achieve when you reach it.
Demonstrating every day that you are willing to give your best will make you feel good and will provide you with the energy to keep going until you succeed.
Because you are going to do it, you are going to achieve your dream of being a writer.
