Finding the Love to Write Again

Have you reached the point where the pressure to write something good has gotten in the way of remembering how it felt to just love writing?

A fellow author recently reached out to me for what she calls my annual pep talk. It often comes around this time of year, when autumn is ready to sleep and winter is only a few more cold nights away (we both live in the Rocky Mountains).

There are seasons when writing feels effortless—when ideas flow faster than we can type, and every word feels alive. And then there are the other seasons. The quiet ones. The ones where the words don’t come, or when they do, they sound flat and unfamiliar. The blank page starts to feel like a wall instead of a doorway.

If you’ve found yourself in that place, you’re not alone. Every writer—no matter how passionate or experienced—loses their rhythm from time to time. But here’s the good news: you haven’t lost your love for writing. It might just be resting, waiting for you to make space for it again.

It's not unlike gardens hibernating in winter. Sometimes our joy for writing takes a long winter nap, but when spring comes, we clean off the mulch and debris, uncover the protected plants, sprinkle them with water, a little fertilizer, and as the weather slowly warms, those gentle buds and bulbs push through to bloom in a burst of color that we expect, yet still surprises.

Sometimes, the joy, or love for writing, is just buried beneath a little debris and needs a little clearing away to let the water and sunlight reach its roots.

Writing doesn’t have to be perfect to be worth doing. In fact, it’s often in the imperfect, clumsy drafts that the joy begins to return. Instead of chasing the “right” words, try chasing the honest ones. Write about something small—a moment, a memory, a sound, a feeling. Describe your morning coffee, the walk you took yesterday, or a thought you can’t shake. For my friend, a recent road trip she took led her back to a place from the setting of one of her books. In that moment, she caught a glimpse of the joy she thought she'd lost.

It helps to remember that writing is not just a product. If your idea of success is to win a big publishing contract or make a lot of money, then you're chasing the wrong success (in my opinion). I believe you have to find the joy first and the right kind of success will follow.

You don’t have to write something publishable every time you sit down. Some days, the words might feel heavy and awkward. Other days, they might flow easily again. Both are valid. Both count. What matters is that you’re showing up, giving your creative self a chance to breathe. And it's about your words and the characters' words, not someone else's words.

The world doesn’t need you to write perfectly—it just needs you to write honestly. Your voice, your experiences, your perspective—these are things only you can offer. And even if it feels distant right now, that love you had for putting words together, for capturing thoughts and feelings, is still inside you.

Next time you sit down to write, write something just for you. Forget about what it should be, and let it be what it is. With time, the debris will clear away, and the love for writing—the kind that feels like coming home—will find its way back.

If it's meant, it always does.