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People approach the motivation behind an action usually from a linear, cause-and-effect perspective. This isn’t necessarily wrong: we eat because we are hungry, and we drink because we are thirsty. However, increased complexity begins to blur the lines between a cause and its effect. Sometimes we might eat not because we are hungry, but because we are sad. Writing motivation, that is, the force behind the production of text, is such a complex issue.

To some extent, you can claim that writing motivation originates from the desire to write. I write because I want to tell a story is probably a basic, simple way to describe it. But there is a problem there. “I want to tell a story” indicates volition. Writing fiction cannot be a process you do willingly.

Any author will tell you: they hate writing; every word, every sentence, every page and every chapter. It’s exhausting, life-sucking, it messes with your head.

So, why do we do it?

Writing Motivation Is about Needing, but of a Specific Kind

We write because we have no choice. You write not because you want to, but because you need to. This is the same with every artistic expression. However, an important clarification needs to be made.

To complicate matters further, the need that is the fuel behind writing motivation is not a need imposed by a specific subject. What I mean by that is the following: You can’t write fiction because someone asked you to. “I’m writing because my publisher expects new material” is one reason why many published authors write bad novels. “I need to write, only hard work will bring me recognition” is one reason why many indie authors produce mediocre works. By the way, “I’m writing because I want to write” is another instance of a subjectified need – it is your own self that is the subject, imposing you to write.

So, where does non-subjectified need come from? What is it, really?

Need without a Subject: The Only Writing Motivation that Works

As I mentioned earlier, the drive behind writing fiction (skilfully, anyway) is a complex thing. It is a need, yes. But it is a self-generated need. Like spontaneous combustion, it simply ignites seemingly out of nowhere. Your experiences, your thoughts, your emotions and ideas are all part of the picture, but think of them as kindling: they will catch fire, but the spark is of a different kind. It exists nowhere and everywhere. The force providing writing motivation can be neither resisted nor understood.

All this may sound a bit abstract as well as Platonic – that is to say, idealistic. And to an extent, it is. However, at the same time I can’t help but feel humbled by its truth. I have never written anything worth a dime that wasn’t a semi-subconscious product. Perhaps writers can relate better to what I am describing, but an author is never fully in control of her or his novel.

As perhaps readers familiar with my academic research know, one of the Gothic novels I have studied a lot is Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Contemporary critics of the novel mentioned that they felt a vague sense of threat, as if the author was transgressing something. However, they mentioned that they were unsure of the source of this threat. More importantly for the topic of authorial intention, they mentioned how they doubted Bram Stoker knew either.

Concrete Tips to Motivate Yourself to Write

Well, pardon the shamelessly misleading title, but I only used it to make a point. Googling phrases such as “How Do You Motivate Yourself to Write”, “Tips to Keep Book Writers Motivated”, or “Writing Motivation Tips that Work”, will get you nowhere. You will get some ritualistic and generic advice, probably no different than what you get asking how to exercise.

The honest truth is this:

You don’t need writing motivation, and if you attempt to write fiction without feeling a maddening, irresistible need to do it, you will invariably produce something substandard.

As authors, can we afford to do that? Perhaps not always. Sometimes you simply have to keep going, trying to finish the damn chapter so that you can continue with the part of the novel that you can’t resist writing. At the same time, however, don’t fool yourself. Writing that you produce without feeling the need to is simply cohesive glue.

A Cute but highly Educational Story about Writing Motivation

I learned to read and write before I went to school, for purely practical reasons: I had to find a way to read Donald Duck comics myself, as my folks got bored doing it for me. One day, when I was perhaps seven years old, I read a Donald Duck mystery which was divided into two parts. The first one ended in a cliffhanger, and I sadly had no access to the second part. That was seriously devastating. I solved the problem the only way I could: I took pen and paper and wrote the ending the way I imagined it to be. Those three paragraphs were my first work of fiction.

The moral of this story is that writing – like any artistic expression – is an answer to a problem. In a way, writing helps you change your humdrum or unpleasant reality for a better one. Hence the need to write.