DOES WRITING A BOOK FEEL LIKE facing a hazardous obstacle course? It doesn’t have to, because the biggest challenges to writing a book are not what you might think. Specifically, when writing memoir, the biggest obstacles are not a lack of material, nor a lack of ideas. Or time. Nope. They are not a need for more research before you write or needing to wait another day/week/month/year until you see how this thing you’re writing about turns out. What are the biggest obstacles to writing a book? Let’s enumerate them.
The Biggest Reasons Not To Write A Book
You recently identified the reasons that writing a book is important to you. (Didn’t do this step yet? Please go back and read this post on how memoir will save your life). Get out that list of things, or at least bring it to mind. Got it? Good. That list represents only ten percent of the forward motion in the battle to making you an author. The other ninety percent is figuring out what is holding you back or, more to the point, deciphering why you do not want to write that book. Because you don’t. Or you would have done so already.
Having worked as a memoir teacher, and now an online memoir coach, with literally thousands of people both in my online memoir classes and in my one-on-one manuscript services, I can tell you with great certainty that I know what the problems are and that they break down into two lists consisting of the things you have been told and those you have not yet been told.
The main reason that books do not get written is because of what you secretly believe in your heart. We just need to replace those useless little nasties with practical, do-able information that comes to you from someone who has actually written and published four-mass market books, countless personal essays, magazine pieces and newspaper copy. Sound like the right person for the job? Good, because that would be me.
So, let’s jump right in and see if any of these statements resonate with you:
Things You Have Been Told About Writing
Do any of these sound familiar?
- If you write that book your family will be upset.
- If you write that book, your sister/brother will say it’s didn’t happen that way.
- Writing has no real value.
- You already have a full-time job.
- Real artists starve. Is that what you want?
- When did you become a writer?
- A memoir? Seriously? You haven’t lived enough.
- Wait until you retire to write.
- You have no idea how to do that.
My responses to these follow in the form of another list.
Things You Have Not Yet Been Told That You’ll Need to Know to Write a Book
- If you write that book your family will be upset.
They might. But let’s write it first and see what you’ve got. And while you do, don’t share your work with anyone who depends on you for food, sex or shelter. It’s one of my many mantras. If you want a reader, get yourself someone who is invested in your success, who is a competent reader and who understands books.
- If you write that book, your sister/brother will say it’s didn’t happen that way.
They will. And from this day forward, here is your response: “You’re right. It didn’t happen that way to you. It happened that way to me.”
- Writing has no real value.
It has inestimable value. When we share our stories, we share our humanity.
- You already have a full-time job.
Good. Then you won’t starve. You have to earn the right to write. From this day forward you are to write three pages a day, five days a week. That’s 15 pages a week, 60 pages a month, meaning you’ll have a first draft in 5 months. Problem solved.
- Real artists starve. Is that what you want?
You already have a full-time job, remember? And if not, my hope is that you make time. For that, see answer just above this one.
- When did you become a writer?
Today, that is, if you write something with intent.
- A memoir? Seriously? You haven’t lived enough.
What is a memoir? It is not one long book that begins with your great-great grandfather and ends with what you had for lunch today. I just want you to go from here to there on one area of your expertise. You have a hundred of them. High school seniors are writing memoir when they write college essays. Second graders are writing memoir when they write about what they did on their summer vacations. Memoir is about something you know following something you did.
- Wait until you retire to write.
Whenever a brain surgeon tells me that he is going to start writing when he retires, I always say I am going to take up brain surgery when I retire. Sometimes he gets the joke.
- You have no idea how to do that.
You are about to find out. That’s why you’re here, right?
You Have to be Taught To Write a Book
There is no shame in not knowing how to write a book. I don’t know how to build a plane. Do you? No one is born knowing how to do this. You have to be taught. In my case, it was four of the best editors in New York publishing who taught me, carefully helping me through my four books, leaning in and instructing, informing me about the need for an argument; how to set up a book; the divine beauty of writing in three acts when writing memoir; good characterization, dialogue, tempo and more.
If you’ve gotten this far in these two posts, you are making remarkable strides toward your goal. You are making real progress. You are getting there. Be reassured that you are now well on your way to your goal of writing a book.
So, let’s move you forward. That’s right. Today. Right now. Right here.
Below, let’s perform a little new year casting off ritual, shall we? And trust me, we’ve all done far sillier things than I am about to propose, and all in the name of the new year, getting a new start and shucking off some old bad habits.
Go to the comments below. Write down your reasons for not writing that book. Go on. Share them and blow them away like the bad little nasties they are. Teach me a new one or confirm one that I already know. Take one of mine listed above and expand on it, or edit it slightly. What have you got?
Let’s do this. Just leave them here. Literally. Let’s shed them here and now and then let’s move on together to that book you were born to write.
Photo credit: Visual Hunt.
Evelyn Krache Morris says
Some of mine are: Great, just what the world needs, more navel-gazing. And anyway, she’s been in remission for 4 years now. There are hundreds of cancer books out there, what makes me think I should write another one? (I might have an answer to that last one. I trained as a military historian, so I have a *lot* to say about the cancer=war metaphor.)
marion says
Thank you, Evelyn:
Please remember that there are, oh, hmm, a bazillion books published each year in America alone that argue that meditation/being present/paying attention will save/improve your life. Arguments that work get written about constantly. Your take on it depends on your area of expertise. You have hundreds of them. This is what differentiates you in the market — what it is you know after that you’ve experienced. You an do this. Let me know how I can help. And thanks for coming by.
Becky Spies says
I have several reasons that keep me from writing consistently. 1. The writing is painful and draining. I have never spoken to anyone many of the things I write, so it is a sort of therapy, which takes an emotional and physical toll each time I write. 2. I’m still not sure how the memoir is going to fit together. I have a few prominent themes but no structure, so my inner critic keeps telling me that it’s not going to work. 3. There are a lot of people who will not be happy about what I have to say. As a lifetime peacekeeper, it goes against everything that I have practiced in my life just to survive.
Marion, thank you for your words of wisdom. They help me re-focus and get back to work!
Jan Hogle says
1. I’m not famous so my memoir is of no interest. However, I have written 130,000 words of memoir over the past 6 years. Now what?
2. I want my family to know who I really was before they came along. But, do I know who I really was in the past? All those words have helped me figure it out. But what to do with the pile?
3. I want to leave something that someone will actually read someday. 130,000 words won’t cut it because that might be 400 pages.
4. I have not done drugs, abused alcohol, engaged in promiscuity or committed murder. Therefore, no one will read it anyway.
5. Can’t figure out what my message/story is.
6. Can’t figure out how to structure it…. “Times I Didn’t Die”?
7. I haven’t had cancer yet.
Joely says
It’s too hard. It’s too ugly. No one will ever read it anyway.
1. life is hard. and anyway, what’s harder, examining my life for what i’ve learned and documenting it — or facing the rest of my life without doing so
2. yep. and that is what will help other people see themselves in what i have to say.
3. uh, Marion – a little nudge with this one? :) xox JJ
MaryAnn Smith says
1. I have a problem with finishing things. Books, poems, crochet projects, crafts, you name it, I get bored with it, and there it sits.
2. Like others said — no one will read it. Who gives a crap?
3. It may be controversial, not within my family, but among others. I was bullied, ostracized, teased, and prejudiced against, but I fear it will not be taken as any of those because my ‘problem’ was not the color of my skin. Instead, it was the color AND texture of my hair (red, Red, RED!!! And mad, crazy, frizzy, curly.) I don’t think my story will be taken seriously because I’m not a minority in the usual sense.
Robin Fisher says
When I took a course with you last fall, the other writers in the course seemed far more experienced, interesting and sure of themselves! I had always thought the story of my past remarkable and moving, but the other memoir writer’s stories were amazing! The topics and themes they introduced made me question whether anyone would be interested in what I had to say. I have stopped and started this story so many times. I feel both drawn to tell and discouraged and stuck.
Julie Ellis levine says
Robin, I am moved by your response. you Have a story and it IS worth telling! Isn’t it crazy how we can be our own worst enemies?
Something in you made you want to start and even after you stopped, something brought you back.
Get in touch with the feeling of excitement you had when you first decided to write. Tap into it and make the commitment to follow through.
This has so much more to do with how you feel about yourself than getting it published.
You can do it!
Isadora says
I write and I create and I develop scripts halfway and web series halfway and solo shows half way and my memoir halfway or way too much–
My memoir, I’ve been thinking about for over 10 years and recently wrote over 200,000 words and it’s still not a book because I don’t know how to take anything I make and turn it into something. So what do I do with all of these stories and words? Its just lots of ingredients.
And then I get so discouraged because I have all these false starts and I feel like such a failure. Its been 30 years and creatively, (except for when I was an actress and had the benefit of a writer and director), I’ve made nothing that reached completion and found an audience.
And when I’m writing my memoir and still looking for ‘what it all meant’, all I come to is: ‘What does it matter? I’m a failure. That’s what it all came to. I learned nothing.” and that’s not an ending and it leads me away from whatever ‘argument’ I started with and then my ‘argument’ becomes: “it doesn’t matter what you did in your life, it all ended in failure.” and that’s a good argument nor a book I want to write nor would anyone want to read.
So I can’t find the argument that I can say, Yes! that’s it! that’s what I’m saying! and so I keep writing stories and hope to find someone to read it all and corral it all together and say, this is what you do.
Maybe its a holdover from when I was an actress. I need my writer and my director and now, on my own, I flounder.
And that’s why I can’t write my book.
Kerri says
I’ve wanted to write for as long as I can remember. I have a thousand ideas, but none of them feel round, whole, complete enough to be one solid piece of work. So I continue to get words down and I wait. I now have so many words saved I feel overwhelmed by what to do with them. I don’t know how to shape them into something worthwhile.
Donna Newman-Robinson says
For the BIG word that begins with F!!! Not that one.. the other one: FEAR..
Fear of failure.
Fear I am not good enough
Fear no one will read it.
Moving forward I will feel the FEAR and Will do it anyway!! (That is write my book-length memoir!
Jeffrey Juli says
Like Mary Ann above, I have a problem finishing things no matter how important or interesting, my mind gets focused on other things. A dreamer in other words. Another is laziness. I work almost full time and don’t feel like doing much on days off. My sisters, believe it or not, haven’t discouraged my writing ability. One friend was concerned and brought up some things necessary for publishing a book (Chicago Manual Style and having contacts). But being the professional writer that you are Marion i’m sure that some of your materials/courses cover those obstacles. Thanks for your encouragement.
Friederike says
Daunting task. Writing essays in school was a nightmare. Work I haven’t really done before. Hesitant about what I am getting into. Doubts I can do it right. Want it to be helpful and organized by key points not just a chronicle. Want to bear testimony to something greater than myself.
Kathy says
1. I don’t seem to do anything without a deadline.
2. I crumble under criticism, especially from my youngest sister, who scoffed—“who would want to read your boring life.”
3. Finding that structure Marion talks about feels overwhelming.
4. So many marriage books already exist. Does the world need another?
5. It takes a lot of time alone to write.
6. What if no one, even family, wants to read it?
7. It’s hard work to write.
8. It feels silly or self-indulgent to write memoir.
9. Going through some of the past is still painful.
10. Afraid of writing about my father without becoming bitter.
MaryAnn Smith says
1. Fear not; I am the same way. Need a firecracker under my butt to move me sometimes, but ironically it’s when I write with clarity.
2. Younger sisters are a pain. I am one, so I know. :-)
3. Amen, I hear you. I’ve been working on this for several years. I understand it, but applying it in my feeble brain is a whole other matter.
4. The world hasn’t heard YOUR story.
5. That I have no problem with. I’m medically retired and do what I want all day. Except write every day. Hey, it’s that deadline thing.
6. Your story will resonate with someone.
7. Boy, and how. But if I don’t write something every day — even responses to strangers’ posts — my head wants to explode.
8. It’s not. Remember that memoir is writing about something that happened to you and it affected you. Odds are other people had the same, or similar, things happen to them but don’t realize it. We all need to know we’re not in the game of life alone.
9. Yes, it is, but opening the flood gates can be cathartic.
10. Writing is rewriting. Get it out first, then edit.
Linda Lee/@LadyQuixote says
MaryAnn, how nice of you to write this great detailed response to Kathy!
Your point #7: “….if I don’t write something every day — even responses to strangers’ posts — my head wants to explode” made me smile. A few years ago, I woke up one morning and thought I had the most brilliant idea for the name of a new blog: “I Write to Keep My Head From Exploding.”
A quick search on WordPress revealed — surprise! — the title was available, so I activated it. Then I discovered — surprise again! — that the dot com domain was also available, so I snagged that, too. I was the proud owner of the brand new IWriteToKeepMyHeadFromExploding (dot) com website, YAY!
Then I had my morning coffee, and as I woke up a little more, I realized that my new domain name, though true, was kind of silly and creepy. So I cancelled everything and got a refund on my credit card for the domain. In order to cancel with the dot com provider, I had to explain why I was canceling. I said something like “I am canceling because I Write to Keep My Head From Exploding is a creepy name for a blog. It only sounded good to me because I hadn’t had my coffee yet.”
Lol! When I read what you wrote in your comment, I just had to share that with you. Ok, now it’s time for me to do what I have to do every day, to keep my head intact.
Carol says
I read every reply and now I’m smiling. Ditto to almost every comment. Have not touched my MS in months. Wondering if my head will explode any second. Writing is good for me even if no one else reads what I write. BUT I have reached a point where I do want other people to read what I have written. Tying up some loose ends to focus on completing a MS this year. Overcoming fear and inertia and self-doubt requires focus and dedication I have lacked.