To the Discouraged Writer

I’m sure you’ve heard it a bunch of times; that being an author is unrealistic. You said you didn’t want to go to college, and they chided you, saying that college was the key to success. Maybe they called your ambitious goals ‘farfetched’.

Maybe at first you were determined and unyielding. “It’s been done, and if God wants me to, I can do it,” you might have said. But as you continued, you saw little improvement in your writing.

As the years went by, you had little success. You’ve maybe never finished even a first draft of a single project, or come across an original story in your mind that didn’t have numerous, large plot holes that you couldn’t cover up.

There have possibly been times when you’ve fallen in love with some of your stories or characters, but then a critiquer told you that they aren’t good, or you’ve been humiliated because you showed them to others, and they were displeased and laughed at them.

Don’t stop loving those stories and characters, even if they’re flawed and hardly anyone else does. Jesus still loves us despite our flaws and unpopularity. He does this because He created us and we’re all special in our own ways. Two great reasons to not stop loving your broken characters, stories, plots, settings, themes.

God’s still working on His creations, so you should still work on yours.You’re not the only one with supposedly ‘bad’ quality writing, the only one who has never finished a full draft, the only one with many abandoned stories crowding your storage, the only one who’s been hurt by honest criticism, and you’re not the only one who has felt like giving up. I relate, and I know many others do relate.

Keep on, my fellow writer; dreamer. Because many other young writers, like myself, are in this with you, and because maybe someday your dreams could become reality. Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart (Psalms 37:4).

With God’s help,

Daniel Amador