We choose only once. We choose either to be warriors or to be ordinary. A second choice does not exist. Not on this earth.
– Carlos Castaneda
So how do you do this? How do you make that choice? How do you bring the ethic of the warrior into your writing, and into your life as a writer? By doing the things warriors do. Here are three of them. Not “three simple steps.” Three difficult, challenging changes you can make to transform yourself into the warrior writer.
Train hard. Someone who stumbles onto the battlefield without sufficient training isn’t going to last long. Yet, I don’t know how many aspiring writers I’ve worked with who thought they could create a fine novel over the summer, got discouraged when their first short story was rejected by The Paris Review, or were positive it would take no more than a few months to start making good money off their fiction. I gave a student an “A” on a short story once, and she later emailed me upset because the piece had been rejected by a prestigious literary journal. I didn’t know how to tell her that getting a good grade in Creative Writing 101 didn’t mean she was a professional.
I think this mentality may be unique to writers. Do people expect to perform professionally after six months of ballet lessons? Do they think they can compose operas without studying music? Do they expect to become surgeons in a year? No, no, and no. But many expect to become skilled and successful writers with little or no training, as if it can be done by magic or sheer force of will.
Many beginning writers have stories they’ve heard of novelists who wrote bestsellers on their first try. Yeah, it happens. But people also win lotteries and survive jet airliner crashes. It doesn’t mean you’re going to. Most writers learn how to write. We take classes, attend workshops, find teachers, and study. Most of us train for a long time before we have even a tiny glimmer of success. Then we keep training. We train for the rest of our lives.
Learn Strategy. Battles aren’t won through sheer strength, or even through courage. They’re won at least partly through strategy. Yet, the value of strategizing seems to be the best kept secret in the writing world.
Strategy means planning, scheduling, and organizing. It means thinking about the things that will help your writing—and your writing career—and then doing them. Have you ever taken the time to sit down and define success for yourself? Do you know what you want out of your writing career? Do you have any idea how you intend to achieve those goals, what steps you need to take to get yourself to that publication or book contract? Have you ever set a timeline or a schedule? Do you have a plan? If not, get to work on one now. Talk to writers who’ve achieved the kind of success you’re looking for, or at least read about them. Learn from their successes, and their mistakes. For that matter, learn from your own. Speaking as someone who went for a long time without ever thinking about strategizing my writing life, I can tell you: It’s one of the best things you can do for yourself.
Don’t Wave the White Flag. Ever. “To perservere to the end in any enterprise begun” was one precept of the code of chivalry followed by all Knights of the Round Table and, if there were a code for writers, it should go at the top.
If you want to be a writer, you have to commit to it. What does that mean? Sending that short story to thirty journals? Writing a fifth novel when the first four didn’t get published? Continuing to write even when everyone is telling you to quit. Yes—but more than that. Committing to writing completely means doing whatever it takes for as long as it takes.
You can’t kind of be a warrior. You either are or you aren’t. The same thing goes for writing. Fantasy writer Holly Lisle has one of the best definitions of courage I’ve ever read: Courage means going one more step. Keep taking that one more step. No matter what, never wave that white flag.
– Carlos Castaneda
So how do you do this? How do you make that choice? How do you bring the ethic of the warrior into your writing, and into your life as a writer? By doing the things warriors do. Here are three of them. Not “three simple steps.” Three difficult, challenging changes you can make to transform yourself into the warrior writer.
Train hard. Someone who stumbles onto the battlefield without sufficient training isn’t going to last long. Yet, I don’t know how many aspiring writers I’ve worked with who thought they could create a fine novel over the summer, got discouraged when their first short story was rejected by The Paris Review, or were positive it would take no more than a few months to start making good money off their fiction. I gave a student an “A” on a short story once, and she later emailed me upset because the piece had been rejected by a prestigious literary journal. I didn’t know how to tell her that getting a good grade in Creative Writing 101 didn’t mean she was a professional.
I think this mentality may be unique to writers. Do people expect to perform professionally after six months of ballet lessons? Do they think they can compose operas without studying music? Do they expect to become surgeons in a year? No, no, and no. But many expect to become skilled and successful writers with little or no training, as if it can be done by magic or sheer force of will.
Many beginning writers have stories they’ve heard of novelists who wrote bestsellers on their first try. Yeah, it happens. But people also win lotteries and survive jet airliner crashes. It doesn’t mean you’re going to. Most writers learn how to write. We take classes, attend workshops, find teachers, and study. Most of us train for a long time before we have even a tiny glimmer of success. Then we keep training. We train for the rest of our lives.
Learn Strategy. Battles aren’t won through sheer strength, or even through courage. They’re won at least partly through strategy. Yet, the value of strategizing seems to be the best kept secret in the writing world.
Strategy means planning, scheduling, and organizing. It means thinking about the things that will help your writing—and your writing career—and then doing them. Have you ever taken the time to sit down and define success for yourself? Do you know what you want out of your writing career? Do you have any idea how you intend to achieve those goals, what steps you need to take to get yourself to that publication or book contract? Have you ever set a timeline or a schedule? Do you have a plan? If not, get to work on one now. Talk to writers who’ve achieved the kind of success you’re looking for, or at least read about them. Learn from their successes, and their mistakes. For that matter, learn from your own. Speaking as someone who went for a long time without ever thinking about strategizing my writing life, I can tell you: It’s one of the best things you can do for yourself.
Don’t Wave the White Flag. Ever. “To perservere to the end in any enterprise begun” was one precept of the code of chivalry followed by all Knights of the Round Table and, if there were a code for writers, it should go at the top.
If you want to be a writer, you have to commit to it. What does that mean? Sending that short story to thirty journals? Writing a fifth novel when the first four didn’t get published? Continuing to write even when everyone is telling you to quit. Yes—but more than that. Committing to writing completely means doing whatever it takes for as long as it takes.
You can’t kind of be a warrior. You either are or you aren’t. The same thing goes for writing. Fantasy writer Holly Lisle has one of the best definitions of courage I’ve ever read: Courage means going one more step. Keep taking that one more step. No matter what, never wave that white flag.