From Premise to Published: WHY are you writing?

FIGURING OUT YOUR WHY.

Are you educating, explaining, defending, entertaining, promoting, attacking?

Are you writing for money, for fame, for posterity? Are you writing because you have a talent and you want to find a useful way to use that skill or, are you writing because you can’t help but write – it must be written and you don’t care how many read it or even if it gets published.

Do you write for one or a million and one?

“Writing” is a big category. Having the answers to some of these questions might help you be a bit more pointed about what you hope to accomplish. For me, it was a natural extension of what I was already doing. As a children’s entertainer, I wrote songs and stories all the time for my own show. After about eight years of writing, editing, re-writing, perfecting, submitting, and so on, I found myself in a contract with Brandylane Publishers for my first picture book, The Three Little Sprigs, set to be released this July.

But, before I began, I asked myself the same questions, starting with why? Here are my answers:

I do not write for money – although I’ll be happy to see it if it comes my way. Obviously, if I make money, it means people are buying my books!

I do not write for fame. I’m too old for that and I just don’t care.

I write for as many as will read it, and I hope they like it enough to share it when they are done.

As a writer of children’s books, I hope to entertain and educate – there! That's why I write. I have something to say, and for right now, I speak to kids. This was the same premise I used for my kids’ shows. I did a skit about sharing, a story about reading, a song about attitudes, and, of course, I tried to be as entertaining as possible. After all, a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down!

So, my writer friends, take a few minutes and ask yourself – WHY am I writing?