Top 100 Writing For Yourself Quotes
#1. I think you become a writer when you stop writing for yourself or your teachers and start thinking about readers.
Avi
#2. For such a long time, when you're a writer, you really are just writing for yourself, and maybe a few friends. So it's really amazing when your book gets out there and more people are reading and responding to it. It really makes the world of the books feel real.
Cassandra Clare
#3. I learned the enormous power of writing for yourself, especially now that people seem to be receptive to the fact that women can write.
Maya Rudolph
#4. Writing for yourself is like exposing your diary. It can be a little embarrassing at times, but if it helps somebody get through the day just by hearing a song, it's well worth it.
Sevyn Streeter
#5. I think all writers write for an audience. There is no such thing as writing for yourself.
William S. Burroughs
#6. Books are great for if you want to work on the craft of writing for yourself, or, you know, to write novels or indie films, stuff like that.
Thomas Lennon
#7. Writing a log line helps you define - for yourself - the essential elements of the plot. It will also let you know immediately if major components of the plot are missing.
David Macinnis Gill
#8. Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.
[The New Statesman, February 25, 1933]
Cyril Connolly
#9. Imagine yourself in the scene. See what there is to be seen. Listen to the sounds. Touch the world. Smell the air. Taste it. Use all of your senses. Then evoke those experiences for the reader. If you give the audience the flavor, they'll flesh out the moment in their own imaginations.
David Gerrold
#10. Writing is one of the few professions in which you can psychoanalyse yourself, get rid of hostilities and frustrations in public, and get paid for it.
Octavia Butler
#11. Everything is in a script for a reason, and only by being part of a writing team (or writing it yourself), do you really understand the intention of every beat.
Peter Jackson
#12. Kids love me because I write stories that tell them about their capacity for evil. I'm one of the few writers who lets you cleanse yourself that way.
Ray Bradbury
#13. Writing is like giving yourself homework, really hard homework, every day, for the rest of your life. You want glamorous? Throw glitter at the computer screen.
Katrina Monroe
#14. You've gone far away to a place with no horses and very little grass, and you're studying how to write a story with a happy ending. If you can write that ending for yourself, maybe you can come back.
Jennifer Echols
#15. Ask yourself, what makes my book so different? So interesting? Don't write to be a best seller. Write for and from your heart, not your wallet. Write something you want to be remembered by.
Leon Nacson
#16. Writing a novel, in an unplanned and unpredictable way, makes you engaged; it takes you into yourself, and it becomes something between you and the character for a moment, and then you move back into the structure of the book. I love those moments, because they are completely unbidden.
David Bezmozgis
#17. Never reward writing with not writing. Rewarding writing by abandoning your schedule is like rewarding yourself for quitting smoking by having a cigarette.
Paul J. Silvia
#18. You don't market-research a novel; you really are writing it for yourself. It's a hobby, in many ways. The problem becomes what you do when you're confronted by criticism. You just don't listen to it.
Bret Easton Ellis
#19. You always had the power, my dear. You just had to learn it for yourself. Glinda the Good Witch
Susan Boles
#20. Do it because it's in your heart. Not because you want something in return. Employ your time in improving yourself by other men's writings, so that you shall gain easily what others have labored hard for.
Socrates
#21. I wrote for many years without showing my writing to anyone, because I was constantly comparing it to what I was reading. You have to compare yourself to the best and feel totally inadequate.
Pankaj Mishra
#22. What is good for you creatively is usually bad commercially. You thrive financially by sticking to a series and not fiddling about too much. You do yourself harm by moving away from the series and the genre. By trying things not based in that particular mode of writing, you will just lose readers.
John Connolly
#23. Originally consists in thinking for yourself, and not in thinking unlike other people.
James Fitzjames Stephen
#24. Teaching was great for me, because I got to show people how writing can really change the way you see not only yourself but the world.
Sarah Dessen
#25. It takes so long to write a script, thinking to yourself, "Am I wasting my time? Am I putting everything into this thing that maybe just won't ever exist?" I always think, God, acting is so much easier. At least for acting you have the source material already.
Jason Schwartzman
#26. I don't even use italics or boldface; that's clutter, not clarity. Fancy fonts are fine for blogs, just as calligraphy is fine for diaries. But when you're writing for anyone other than yourself, you want to get as universal as possible.
Andrew Vachss
#27. When you write, produce, engineer and mix everything yourself, it tends to take a long time to do anything. And when you're a perfectionist little monster, it makes it even harder. But it's a blast and I wouldn't trade the opportunity for all the ice cream sandwiches in the universe.
Adam Young
#28. Have the courage to write whatever your dream is for yourself.
May Sarton
#29. If you aren't willing to put your best work out there, write for yourself. Don't ever publish.
Eliza Green
#30. The best person to write for is yourself - and what better place to start than in a journal.
E.L. James
#31. Never write when you are not in the mood; when you are not feeling it. If the words do not flow freely, and come to you almost magically, then put it down and do not force yourself to write in the book, or it will reflect in your writing and it will be terribly obvious.
Wayne Hoss
#32. The ultimate thing is creating your own stuff and making projects for yourself. That's what Seth Rogen does. He's writing and producing a lot of the movies that he's the lead in.
Hannibal Buress
#33. For the kind of places I've written for and the kind of writing that I've done, the general way to think about your audience is to think about somebody who's like yourself, but in a completely different discipline.
Louis Menand
#34. There is only one thing that you write for yourself, and that is a shopping list.
Umberto Eco
#35. Writing is a process of creating yourself again and again for an ever-searching mind.
Debasish Mridha
#36. Believe in yourself and start achieving your dream. It waits for you on the other side of the publish button.
Dan Alatorre
#37. When you finally start to write something, do not let yourself stop ... even when you are convinced it's the worst garbage ever. This is the biggest caveat for beginning writers. Instead, force yourself to finish what you began, and THEN go back and edit it.
Jodi Picoult
#38. If the stuff you're writing is not for yourself, it won't work.
Stephen King
#40. If you're chained to a computer all day, you're not using up much energy, even if you drag yourself to the gym a couple of days a week. And to make matters worse for me, I've had a secondary career right along with my romance writing - cookbook author, under my real name, Ruth Glick.
Ruth Glick
#41. Surely the whole point of writing your own life story is to be as honest as you possibly can, revealing everything about yourself that is most private and probably most interesting for that very reason.
Judith Krantz
#42. Writing is one of the few careers for which you essentially train yourself, the other two major ones being juggling and pickpocketing.
Maureen Johnson
#43. Writing becomes a really good creative outlet when you're sitting there and feeling creatively frustrated or stilted, but also you then get to write parts for yourself.
Zoe Lister-Jones
#44. Writing is very hard mostly because until you try to write something down, it's easy to fool yourself into believing you understand things. Writing is terrible for vanity and self-delusion.
Mark Vonnegut
#45. To make my diary a little different I am going to call it a Thought Book ... I have thoughts that I never can use unlesss I write them down, for Aunt Miranda always says, Keep your thoughts to yourself.
Kate Douglas Wiggin
#46. The first person you should think of pleasing, in writing a book, is yourself. If you can amuse yourself for the length of time it takes to write a book, the publisher and the readers can and will come later.
Patricia Highsmith
#47. Set an intention to heal any unexpressed anger that may be present in your life. Go to a quiet place with pen and paper. Take a few deep breaths. Ask your anger to speak to you. Write down the thoughts and feelings. When you are finished, forgive yourself for holding on to the anger for so long.
Iyanla Vanzant
#48. Writing so that I can act became a way of having not more control over my future but not having to wait for permission. You can choose yourself. Hmm, who should play this part? I nominate me!
Brit Marling
#49. Even if you're in the thick of revising another work, write something new. Something small. It's important to keep telling yourself stories.
Don Roff
#50. Fiction is about everything human and we are made out of dust, and if you scorn getting yourself dusty, then you shouldn't try to write fiction. It's not a grand enough job for you.
Flannery O'Connor
#51. What's crucial is whether your writing attains the standards you've set for yourself. ( ... ) Basically a writer has a quiet, inner motivation, and doesn't seek validation in the outwardly visible.
Haruki Murakami
#52. When you are a free and independent writer, without employer, without hours or deadlines, you have to play little games to force yourself into the actual writing. For me, one game is to announce...that I have finally decided on my next book, that I am ready to write it...to put my pride on the line.
Irving Wallace
#53. If you've broken any promises you've made to yourself, now is the time to make up for it.
Gina Greenlee
#54. Everyone who is human has something to express. Try not expressing yourself for twenty-four hours and see what happens. You will nearly burst. You will want to write a long letter, or draw a picture, or sing, or make a dress or a garden.
Brenda Ueland
#55. I always think [W.S.] Merwin's poems will last of anyone writing today. If I had to bet on posterity I would bet Merwin. My poems could easily evaporate. So I don't know. If you find yourself as a writer thinking about posterity you should probably go out for a brisk walk or something.
Billy Collins
#56. Writing for the theater, you find yourself living a nocturnal life.
Irwin Shaw
#57. I see so many bands, that are trying really hard to write for a person that they've never met. I get the idea behind it and the idea of helping people, but I feel you help people more by exposing yourself.
Andy Biersack
#58. You can't set a clock for yourself. If you do, you are not a writer.
Matthew Weiner
#59. The personal screenplay- where you dive into the terrifying depths of your soul, unearth the most intimate details about yourself, and put it on paper for the world to see. Proceed with caution, for madness lies ahead.
A.D. Posey
#60. If you detect a needlessly complex style when you read, look for characters and actions so that you can unravel for yourself the complexity the writer needlessly inflicted on you.
Joseph M. Williams
#61. By using stale metaphors, similes and idioms, you save much mental effort, at the cost of leaving your meaning vague, not only for your reader but for yourself.
George Orwell
#62. I'm not sure why writing for others became harder. Probably a reluctance to give away anything you might conceivably use yourself caused a block. I did it, but it remained hard when it had once been easy.
Dick Cavett
#63. If you want to write for yourself, get a diary. If you want to write for your friends, get a blog. If you want to write for others ... become an author.
James Patterson
#64. Be bold, and try not to fall in love with your faults. Don't be so afraid of giving yourself away, either, for if yo write, you must. And if you can't face that, better not write.
Katherine Anne Porter
#65. But, Erin. If you are trying to make a writing career for yourself, you will get rejected again and again and again. You must keep going. You must learn not to take no for an answer.
Jennifer Echols
#66. When you are writing a novel, you as the author will wear many hats. You are the writer, reader, and most importantly you are the character. If you can do those things your book will become reality to readers.
LaQuita Cameron
#67. You write music for yourself and if you just open that door and let people in, the audience is going to grow and it's going to become more accessible.
Yukimi Nagano
#68. Mostly it's lies, writing novels. You set out to tell an untrue story and you try to make it believable, even to yourself. Which calls for details; any good lie does.
Anne Tyler
#69. Diplomacy in a sense is the opposite of writing. You have to disperse yourself so much: the lady who comes in crying because she's had a fight with the secretary; exports and imports; students in trouble; thumbtacks for the embassy.
Carlos Fuentes
#70. True writers know that writing is not something they feel required to do,
or to make a living they must do, it is quite frankly like breathing. Some
can breathe often and fluently, some short breaths, some a long exhale
and for many of us it is the patient steady breathing surrounding life.
Milissa R. Bailey
#71. I find that by putting things in writing I can understand them and see them a little more objectively ... For words are merely tools and if you use the right ones you can actually put even your life in order, if you don't lie to yourself and use the wrong words.
Hunter S. Thompson
#72. Exerting yourself to the fullest within your individual limits: that's the essence of running, and a metaphor for life - -and for me, for writing as well.
Haruki Murakami
#73. Ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write [create]? Dig into yourself for a deep answer.
Rainer Maria Rilke
#74. Do not do what someone else could do as well as you. Do not say, do not write what someone else could say, could write as well as you. Care for nothing in yourself but what you feel exists nowhere else. And, out of yourself create, impatiently or patiently, the most irreplaceable of beings.
Andre Gide
#75. Take lots of time for yourself, discovering yourself-pursue not only a profession but other life passions, I always make time to rock climb or hike or write a few short stories. Also, find good people and surround yourself with them. Most importantly, always believe you will, unequivocally.
Sarah Silverman
#76. It's no good looking to writers for definitions of what constitutes proper writing, because you will drive yourself crazy, and you won't find anything that you can build into a coherent whole.
Nick Hornby
#77. If you write for yourself, you'll reach all the people you want to write for.
William Zinsser
#78. When you do a writing job for a studio, one of the things you want to do is satisfy the expectations of your employer. That's a little bit different than when you sit down and write something to satisfy yourself, because then you're the employer.
Joel Coen
#79. There is sometimes a feeling in crime fiction that good writing gets in the way of story. I have never felt that way. All you have is language. Why write beneath yourself? It's an act of respect for the reader as much as yourself.
John Connolly
#80. When you have been writing for a lot of years, you have to make an effort not to start repeating yourself. It occurred to me that I tended to tread certain ground automatically, because it was comfortable, but that there were areas I avoided automatically because they made me nervous.
Merrill Markoe
#81. If you can write (and don't kid yourself that you can, if you can't) and you have ideas that are commercially viable and will engage the reader's interest, go for it. Make sure you have something unique to offer. I enjoy the work of writers who give you something you won't find anywhere else.
Joel McIver
#82. When I was speaking about communicating, I meant that the listener - we have to reach the listener; otherwise, of course, you're writing the piece, as I say, only for the satisfaction of seeing it on the paper for yourself, and then it ends right there.
Leo Ornstein
#83. Thank your readers and the critics who praise you, and then ignore them. Write for the most intelligent, wittiest, wisest audience in the universe: Write to please yourself.
Harlan Ellison
#84. Education isn't something your professors make for you. It's something you make for yourself.
Lance Olsen
#85. People keep asking me ... How to instantly become a better writer? It's simple: Use "power words" and see for yourself.
Ziad K. Abdelnour
#86. The advantage of writing from experience is that it often provides you with details that you would never think of yourself, no matter how rich your imagination. And specificity in description is something every writer should strive for.
Christopher Paolini
#87. The act of writing means you wish to communicate. Whether you're writing a memoir for yourself you put in a drawer, or you write a poem and you send it to a little magazine, or you write for publication, it always means - the form follows function.
Harlan Ellison
#88. You can write better about a place you've seen for yourself. You don't have to have been there - I've sure written about places I've never seen - but it does help.
Harry Turtledove
#89. For the length of time it takes to write a book, you need to believe that you're the only writer in existence; the only one who matters. You need to shut yourself away and allow the creativity to build up, not leak out through worry and comparisons and doubt.
Martin Cosgrove
#90. Writing this record let me recapture who I am. It is summed up in the title Be Not Nobody. You need to feel comfortable in your skin and do whatever you need to do for yourself, to heal or to grow.
Vanessa Carlton
#91. I always thought that poetry is the verdict that others give to a certain kind of writing. So to call yourself a poet is a kind of dangerous description. It's for others; it's for others to use.
Leonard Cohen
#92. It's a sort of philosophy you cook up for yourself. You probably write things the same as everybody else, but it's your own personal way of saying things.
Jim Capaldi
#93. Perhaps then one reason why we have no great poet, novelist or critic writing today is that we refuse to allow words their liberty. We pin them down to one meaning, their useful meaning: the meaning which makes us catch the train, the meaning which makes us pass the examination.
Virginia Woolf
#94. Better to work for yourself alone. You do as you like and follow your own ideas, you admire yourself and please yourself: isn't that the main thing? And then the public is so stupid. Besides, who reads? And what do they read? And what do they admire?
Gustave Flaubert
#95. Forget all the rules. Forget about being published. Write for yourself and celebrate writing.
Melinda Rucker Haynes
#96. You never stopped thinking of yourself as a writer biding his time in the Department of Factual Verification. But between the job and the life there wasn't much time left over for emotion recollected in tranquillity.
Jay McInerney
#97. In writing novels, you have to believe in yourself or there would be no way to sustain it. But you also have to give good evidence regularly for having that faith in self-either with quality goods or with, at least, "good efforts." Working hard will do when inspiration is not forthcoming.
Rachel Kushner
#98. Write plays that matter. Raise the stakes. Shout, yell, holler, but make yourself heard. It's time for playwrights to reclaim the theatre. We do that by speaking from the heart about the things that matter most to us. If a play isn't worth dying for, maybe it isn't worth writing.
Terrence McNally
#99. When you finish for the day, write a note reminding yourself of what you plan to do next. This helps you to remember today's great idea when you get back to work tomorrow.
Nita Leland
#100. As a poet or a novelist or a painter, you are pushing yourself all the time, always looking for a new way to approach something, challenging yourself and never, never trying to write the same book twice.
Paul Auster
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