7 steps to fall in love with writing again

Did you love writing when you were younger? You can find that joy again.

You’re reading Soft Hobbies, a weekly newsletter for creatives in all mediums, with a special focus on writers. Here you’ll find resources to nurture creativity, advice to overcome perfectionism, and inspiration to make time for art. I’m Auzin, a Seattle-based writer in the fiction, poetry, and tech spheres. Feel free to visit my author website or check out my socials.

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I hear this from friends and acquaintances all the time: “I used to love making up stories when I was a kid. I would spend hours writing and it felt so natural. Now, writing feels like a chore/I only write for work or school/I’ve never tried writing for fun as an adult.”

I resonate with these stories because I was the same way. Here’s an abbreviated version of my path:

• I loved writing as a kid and as a young teenager —>

• A traumatic event in my life and its aftershocks stopped me from feeling comfortable writing and sharing my words with others —>

• I wrote secretly for the rest of middle/high school, majored in English in college and wrote almost nothing of note, blogged obsessively on tumblr, gained a writing community and lost it, learned nothing about publishing…—>

• Until I finally felt comfortable calling myself a writer at age 28, when I taught myself how to submit my work and started publishing regularly with literary magazines —>

• Now, I do technical and content writing for my day job, with fiction/poetry writing (and this Substack!) as the outlet for my personal writing.

I can’t tell you the definitive reason why this happens to adults — why do we stop making art? It’s different for everyone.¹

Some reasons why you might have stopped writing for years (or even decades!):

1. Someone very close to you, such as a family member or teacher, cast harsh judgement on your work when you were younger, or even told you to stop. This emotional blockage remains with you every time you sit down to create.

2. You were required to do so much reading and writing in school that you started to associate the act of writing with schoolwork. Writing lost its association with fun, joy, and freedom in your mind.

3. You believe the kinds of writing you used to do are childish, uninteresting, and not suited to adult life. You might not be creating much.

4. You achieved some sort of success with your writing early on, which makes everything else you write seem lesser by comparison. You don’t see the point of creating unless it will bring you the same recognition, and you’re afraid of not living up to your own standards.

5. Your life is overrun with responsibilities and “saying yes;” your own needs and interests are on the backburner. You never feel like you have enough time to sit down and write. You may need to prioritize rest first.

Do any of these sound familiar? Maybe multiple? I definitely resonate with 1 and 5. Everyone’s situation is different, so please take what resonates in this post and leave behind the rest.

And before we continue, note that I am not a mental health professional of any kind, nor am I an expert on creativity or the human brain. I’m speaking from my experience and my friends’ experiences of what works and how we can reconnect with the activities we love. I’m sure to miss some things, so hit reply to this email or leave a comment and let me know!

Your custom guide to creative joy

So, how can you get back into writing? How can you feel free in your creativity and just write, without all that baggage? Let’s come up with a plan for you.

Step 1: Make the time.

I truly believe you need less time to write than you think. The important thing is to be consistent. Can you find one hour in your week to be alone, quiet, with your own thoughts and the blank page? If not in your home, maybe at the library or a coffeeshop? You can also try virtual coworking or find an in-person coworking space near you.

Start with one hour and see how steadily you can keep that appointment. You can write a book with one hour per week—it’s better than zero hours! And you can always increase the time spent writing if you find more time in your schedule later.

Your creative routine should be customized

Step 2: Remember the joy.

This step is a research project, and you are the subject. Try to find the earliest instances of your writing, when you deeply enjoyed it. Elementary school diaries, messy stapled zines, a book report you were really passionate about. It’s better if these items are tangible, but you can pull up old Word docs if that’s all you can find. Ask your family for a box of your childhood stuff and start digging.

Once you’ve found a smattering of your old works, try to read them without judgement or shame. It’s okay to laugh, though! Whenever I do this exercise, it brings up a lot of laughter.

Look for some common themes in your old work. This sounds unlikely — who was thinking of “themes” while writing as a kid? But I bet there are some common threads that connect to what you were interested in at the time. These are the ideas that got you excited to create, that caused you to joyfully put pen to paper.

When I went through some old “books” I made in elementary school, I was struck by how little the literature elements I’m drawn to have changed. They’re even in the books I love the most now. All the themes were already there in my writing; I’ve just added more interests over time. Some themes I saw in my childhood writing were: happy endings, an end to war through diplomacy or divine intervention, talking animals, magic, youthful chosen ones, and using both words and images to tell a story. What common threads do you see in yours? Write them down.

Step 3: Talk to yourself.

Hand-write a letter to the version of yourself who loved writing the most. What would you say to yourself at that age? What advice would you give, or ask for? Compliment their work. Update them on your life, and don’t share the letter with anyone else. Bonus points if you use a nice pen and fancy stationary.

Step 4: Seek out fun.

Brainstorm some projects, and pick the one that sounds like the most fun to start. If the word “project” sounds too daunting, just call them stories, poems, scribblings, etc. List all the words you’ve been mulling over in your head, all the script ideas and slant rhymes.

If nothing’s been itching at you, make something up! What sounds fun to write right now? Not what’s necessary, or important, or interesting, or original. Just fun. What’s exciting?

I know this is a tough step if you’re just getting back into writing. Maybe you have no idea what sounds fun or what you feel like writing. Here are some ideas for a jumping-off point. You just have to pick one to move to the next step:

• Continue one of those childhood pieces you reconnected with in Step 2.

• Re-write the ending to a book, movie, or TV show that had a lackluster ending.

• Copy the rhyme scheme or subject matter of your favorite poem.

• Use a prompt generator or writing prompts list. Here’s another one.

Remember, you’re literally just looking for what’s exciting to you right now and what makes you want to start typing right away. It can be silly or childish! You won’t be showing this piece to anyone.

I’m a huge defender of fanfiction and I’ll tell you right now, nothing will get your fingers flying like writing a fanfic for someone else’s IP. All the world-building and character development has been done for you, and you can just play around in the sandbox. There are a lot of misconceptions around fanfic that I plan to address in a future post :)

Step 5: Get to writing.

Okay, have you chosen something to play with? Get writing! Take that full hour you claimed for yourself and start playing. This is not to make money or show to an audience. This exercise works best if you affirm that whatever you come up with will never be shown to anybody.

You’re free! You can do whatever you want. Shame and copyright infringement don’t exist in your journal or your Google Doc. Doodle in the margins, write in pink glitter gel pen, give yourself a sticker at the end of each paragraph. Do what makes your heart happy.

Step 6: Assess your progress.

Think about how this journey has gone so far, and envision the future. If you’ve completed all the previous steps, just know that I’m proud of you! On your next writing session, assess how you’re feeling. This might have been a challenging set of exercises. Do you want to continue, or change your approach? Maybe find an accountability buddy or a feedback partner?

Your writing practice might benefit from giving some thought to the future. Picture yourself 5 years from now, and think about what role you’d like writing to have in your life. What do you want to accomplish? This doesn’t have to be something huge like “write a novel.” It can be as simple as “I write poetry once a week” or “I’m not afraid to show my fiction work to my friends anymore.” Write down a handful of ideas. It’s okay if you don’t know how to get there yet — consistently tapping into your creativity will show you the way.

Step 7: Keep it going.

Repeat these steps as often as you wish, and don’t let go of that one hour per week. Your writing time can shift around, but keep showing up for yourself. I promise it’s worth it, and the benefits to your confidence as a writer and your inner peace will be exponential.

I can’t really tell you where to go from here, but I will say that creative confidence feels like self-knowledge, self-trust, and feeling joy from the process, not the outcome. I hope this guide has been helpful. The comments section is open for all your advice to fellow writers who are trying to reconnect with their enjoyment of writing!

1. This video is a worthwhile time investment if you’ve stopped drawing and want to get back into it, btw.