Instead of Finding Your Why, Pretend Writing Is Your Full-Time Job

Long-term moves require a long-term mindset

I can’t teach you what exact steps you need to take to be a successful writer. I’m in the middle of figuring it out for myself. But one thing I already understood is this: If you don’t have the right mindset, all the writing tips don’t even matter.

The exact strategy to “make it” will always vary from person to person. Although you can learn from those who went before you, you’ll always need to figure out a fair part of it yourself.

But there is one thing that successful writers all have in common. Interestingly, it doesn’t have anything to do with strategy, skills or topics they write about.

Thinking About Your “Why” Doesn’t Help

Let’s dissect this popular wisdom first.

“To be successful as a creative, you need to know your why. That is, the deeper purpose behind your work.”

I spent a lot of time thinking about my why. I outlined and re-iterated my mission, pondering on the change I wanted to make.

It’s a pleasurable process. That’s why it’s so easy to get stuck in it. Many creatives get hung up on the idea that they need to define their mission and action plan before they get to work. They want to know how their work connects to the bigger picture.

But there’s an error in this logic. Sooner or later, you realize that your actual mission crystallizes through the process of writing — not before it.

Niklas Göke put it best: “It’s not the idea that starts the process; it is the process that brings the ideas.” That’s why obsessing about your why isn’t the most helpful approach. Until you start writing, your mission is more of a mirage than a real thing anyway.

Most successful writers didn’t arrive where they are because they figured out their why. The real reason behind their success is what they didn’t do.

What All Successful Writers Have in Common

A lot of Medium writers I admire don’t write groundbreaking pieces. Most of the ideas they discuss have been around for centuries.

This is often the line of attack haters use:

“Everyone already knows this, therefore your writing has no value. You don’t deserve the success you’re enjoying.”

The truth is that the success of these writers is hard-earned. Even if the ideas they’re expressing aren’t brand new, they’re usually presented in fresh and unique ways.

Most importantly, their success is earned by writing those pieces in the first place. Day after day, week after week, successful writers continue to do the work. That’s the one thing they all have in common: They didn’t quit.

The exact strategy for building your email list of growing traffic to your blog won’t matter if you don’t keep writing. Conversely, if you do the work for long enough, progress is bound to happen.

I know that, as a writer, I have a long way to go and many skills to learn. But when I focus on how much there’s still to de done, I get overwhelmed. In that sense, looking at the big picture doesn’t help.

These days, I prioritize something else. I work on cultivating the mindset I need to make one tiny step on my path every single day.

The Mindset You Need in Order Not to Quit

If you want to keep a positive attitude toward your writing, you have to deliberately work on it. When you constantly measure where you are against where you want to be, you reinforce a sense of lack. You always see yourself falling short of your own expectations.

In the meantime, many of your articles don’t take off the way you want them to. Again, if you focus on that, you’ll constantly get the impression that you’re falling behind. That’s not exactly the most helpful mindset.

Recently, I found myself obsessing over my stats… again. By doing that, I took away from the creative energy that could allow me to write a better piece next time.

I decided I had to change the attitude towards my writing. I stopped looking at my days as tiny steps on a lifelong writing journey. Although they are, I find it helpful to primarily see them as something else.

Every day I get to write is both a new beginning and a complete process on its own.

Seeing each day as a new beginning makes it useless to obsess over what happened yesterday. Every day, I give myself a fresh start. I try to turn today into the most amazing beginning of the rest of my writing career.

Then, I also look at any day of writing as complete in itself. This makes me appreciate my whole life more. Because today here I am, doing what I dreamt about my entire conscious life: Writing as my full-time job.

In this sense, I’m already living the dream. I have made a decision. The success metrics I’m chasing, such as money and followers, become secondary when I acknowledge that I’m already a writer.

This is what I encourage you to do: Own today as the writer you already are. Stop obsessing over what happened yesterday or where you’d want to be a year from now. The only time you can make anything happen is today.

Knowing this, take deliberate care of your mindset. That’s the single most important factor deciding whether you quit or not. And remember: Continuing to write is the most reliable strategy to achieve the success you want.

Today, all you have to do is to put yourself in front of the keyboard. Then, start typing like there’s no tomorrow.