Embrace the Writing Life You Actually Have
You’re not skipping your writing sessions because you don’t have the perfect “room of your own” with a delicious entire day free from other obligations.
The truth is, most writers are waiting. Maybe you’re waiting for the kids to get older, for the job to get less demanding, for the house to get quieter, for the calendar to magically open up. And that waiting? It becomes its own kind of grief—a slow, quiet ache for the creative life you keep deferring to "someday."
The Myth of the Real Writer
You wonder if you’re a “real writer” because you don’t want to be a member of the 5AM Writers Club, you think morning pages are a waste of time, and you certainly don’t knock out 1000 words every day.
And somewhere along the way, you absorbed the message that those things—the dreaded early alarm, the daily word count, the pristine writing room—are what separate "real writers" from everyone else. So, when your life doesn't look like that, you quietly conclude that you must not be the real thing and that the writing life must be for someone else with more time, more discipline, a better setup.
But here's what I want you to hear: those standards were never universal. And they were never true for most working writers. But they sure were loud.
What Happens When You Ignore the Creative Pull
But if you think too much about how your choices and calendar don’t align with your deepest desires to write more, you will spiral to THE BAD PLACE, so you avoid the whole thing and pretend your creative soul doesn’t exist.
(As if your soul could disappear if you ignored it long enough.)
And that? That ignoring your creative soul thing? That’s not okay with me.
Because here's what actually happens when we ignore that creative pull for too long: it doesn't go quiet. It gets louder, stranger, more insistent. It shows up as restlessness, irritability, a vague sense that something important is missing from your life. Your creative soul is not a hobby you can set aside. It is part of who you are and you can’t keep pretending it’s not there.
Establishing a sustainable writing practice does not require daily 6-hour blocks of time in a grid-ready office where no one can bother you.
Establishing a sustainable writing practice requires something far more accessible and radical: permission. Permission to write imperfectly, infrequently, in the margins of your real and beautiful and complicated life. Permission to count the three sentences you wrote on a napkin. And permission to call yourself a writer even on the days, weeks, and seasons when you haven't written a word.
What a Sustainable Writing Practice Actually Looks Like
Pulling our your notebook on a random Tuesday while waiting for the pasta water to boil—instead of numbing with your phone—and adding a few lines to a poem or capturing notes for a new story idea and feeling that tiny “I’m still a writer” jolt.
Remaining tethered to your creative life anyway during a rough week with sick kids or a big work deadline by scaling back your nourishing rhythms and writing practice to 5 or 10 minutes most days and knowing you will give more time to your writing soon.
Embracing your writerly identity because you’re a writer who’s in a tender, busy season and still finding your way to the page, not “someone who wishes she wrote.”
That’s the difference between feeling like a failure as a writer and believing what’s really true: you ARE a writer, and you can’t escape the creative process, even if you wanted to.
Faithfulness Over Performance
You were made for this. Not for a particular word count or a particular time of day or a particular aesthetic of writerly productivity, but for the creative act itself. You were made for the making of meaning, for the reaching toward something true. That impulse to make art belongs to you, and no amount of busy seasons or missed writing days can take it away.
This is some of what we explore in all of our Spiritual Direction for Writers® offerings and in the forthcoming book, Spiritual Direction for Writers: Everyday Rituals for Your Writing Life.
Ready to Come Home to Your Writing Life?
Become an SDW Insider today to:
Reserve your copy of Spiritual Direction for Writers: Everyday Rituals for Your Writing Life (Pub Date 9/3. Value $25)
Attend Live Monthly Q&A + Hot (Warm? Cozy?) Seat Coaching Series (7 total gatherings from March-September with all submitted questions answered. Value $1400)
Receive behind-the-scenes updates and extra resources + perks
The book will be available for pre-order in the next month or so. It’s about to get real, and SDW Insiders get the best seat in the house for only $25.
This isn’t about figuring out how to follow some arbitrary writing rules. It’s about establishing a sustainable writing practice that honors your body, mind, heart, and creative soul.
It's about building something you can actually live inside, inhabiting a creative life that fits your real circumstances, not imaginary ones.
Sign up here.
*Offer applies to mailing addresses in the contiguous US. For addresses outside the US, email me at charlotte@charlottedonlon.com and we’ll discuss options.
Much love to the creative souls + happy writing to all!
💚Charlotte