Why Do I Write? A Personal Post

I love books. As a kid, I’d devour every book I got my hands on, and I read far above my grade level. In fifth grade, I was reading 12th grade level. My love for learning and reading drove me to write. I scrawled stories and notes throughout my notebooks, but it wasn’t until my college years that writing clicked for me. The discovery of anime and otaku culture in my mid-20s reawakened my interest in writing and sharing. After all, the point of writing is to be read.

I saw how many otaku had inaccurate and even troubling ideas about Japanese culture. The teacher in me winced and pushed me to start blogging to set the record straight. Although I am far from an expert in Japanese culture, I jumped into studying all I could (a good-sized section of my personal library is dedicated to Japan) and began writing. JP was born.

Writing took over my other hobbies of playing too-many video games and messing around with computer programming projects I never finished. Each post I finished left me feeling elated. I had forgotten how finishing a writing project felt. I began to dabble in fiction again for the first time in many years. After several false starts and short stories, my fingers regurgitated The Hunted Trilogy.

Now, I am not a risk taker. In fact, risk makes me gibber in a corner, but since I was a kid I dreamed of being a writer. In the past several years, I’ve lost many family members. The realization of my mortality combined with my childhood dream and overpowered my fear of risk. There’s nothing like death to get you off your duff! I hired editors and published my first three works of fiction.

The giddy kid in me who would scrawl notebook after notebook had taken over. It didn’t matter that the books didn’t sell, and I was in the hole for over $3k for the editing. I play the long game (or so I told myself and continue to tell myself). I had a few readers. That was enough. Even one is enough. The same drive to have my work read, even if it wasn’t necessarily liked, sits behind JP.

And so I kept writing. I dived into research–mmm, how I savor the rabbit holes of research. The books I write are human efforts, flawed despite my best efforts at perfection. This troubles me and keeps me awake at times. I deny the positive reviews. After all, I see the flaws, stark on the screen yet beyond my efforts to expunge. They dance around my keystrokes no matter how many times I delete and rewrite. I embrace the negative reviews, as much as they slice at me because they are true. So true.

Yet, I still write. I splash words across JP; offal disguised. Aye, I am self-critical, but I enjoy the fact no one can truly master writing. Improvement happens through practice, through trying something new or different, and old self-criticisms can be forgotten through practice. There are always new self-criticisms.

Still reading? Color me surprised (it is a lovely shade of purple, like this prose). I don’t like posting personal meanderings on JP. After all, you come to read about anime and Japanese culture, and posts like this are self-indulgent. Although, I also hope some of you find it helpful and encouraging to know you aren’t alone in your insecurities and struggle with self-doubt. I thought some of you would like to glimpse the Wizard of Oz. I have insecurities about writing. The Internet is a harsh place. I push ahead not so much despite them but because of them. I have a stubborn streak. The more a person tells me to do something, the more I dig in to resist. The more I suck at something I find interesting or important (like watercolor painting or confident quietude), the more I bang my face against it. It’s not exactly a good trait, but when it comes to writing, I’ve found it useful. Writing about anime and otaku culture certainly brings out naysayers. Publishing brings out more. Self-publishing brings out even more.

Writing should be a passion. I don’t have any illusions about working full-time as a writer. While I would love to do that and work toward it as a goal, if it never happens at least some of you have read me. That, after all, is the point of writing. Money shouldn’t ever be the goal. It is a happy side effect of people liking your work.

I plan to press on with writing books and blog posts, come 5-star reviews or negative reviews, because I like to write. Video games helped inspire me to write. Writing allows me to create new worlds or revisit old favorites. Writing is frustrating. I love and hate it in almost equal measure. Love wins out more most days. Most. Otherwise, I wouldn’t do it. I claim no mastery, quite the opposite in fact. But there are far worse ways to use time.