By Penny Reeve

Do you know the most important characteristic of a writer? 

Yes, that’s correct. They write. 

Without writing there is no book, no poem, no blog, no review, no article, no story. Writers need to write, it’s what we do. It’s our craft, our skill, our work and can be our worship too. 

But sometimes writers find themselves facing off against a blank page and the writer stops writing.

Occasionally this space is justified and necessary. Life arrives with such unexpected challenges or grief that creativity, like creation itself, struggles and groans. In times like these writers need kindness, self-compassion and the gentle grip of hope. 

However, if the writing stops for other reasons, it may be because we’ve grown accustomed to making excuses. Excuses that fit so comfortably, or are so polished and practiced they’d put our elevator pitches to shame. 

But no matter how brilliant our excuses are, they don’t write books. Writers do. 

Perhaps it’s time to take an honest look at some of the common excuses we may find masquerading in our imagination and call them out for what they really are: Lies. 

Excuse #1 – I haven’t got time to write. 

This one is extremely common, so familiar to me I’ve worn holes in the heels and my toes are poking out the ends! The tricky thing about this excuse is that it is often partly (or even mostly) true. Like many writers I’m super busy and have many demands on my time. But the truth is I often ‘sacrifice’ my writing time for writing related activities such as marketing or social media etc. The truth is, we can all find time to write somewhere in our weeks. Even if it’s just 30 minutes. The trick is to locate that time, prioritise it with immovable boundaries and stick to it. Small amounts of writing DO add up; in word count, craft development and thinking like a writer.

Excuse #2 – I’m not in the right headspace to today. 

This excuse is flighty, temperamental and downright bossy. It demands exactly the right conditions and then flaunts our lack of progress like the shine on false gold. I don’t like this excuse because it knows me too well. It’s dressed up as self-pity but in reality, it is just pride. It says that I can do all things in my own strength, on the right day. It demands perfection of mood, mental health, emotion, organisation, whatever, before it allows writing. This excuse needs a firm hand and the wisdom of a writing life steeped in grace. 

Excuse #3 – I’ll do it later, I need to do A, B or W first.

This excuse I often dressed up as procrastination and is popular with writers all around the globe. If worked well, Excuse #3 can lead into Excuse #1 like a seamless scene change. But when we dig a little deeper we can see that busyness here is often cloaking fear. Fear of failure, fear of wasted effort, fear of rejection, fear of not being good enough, the list goes on. This fear frequently taps into the core of who we are, and I think this is why the scriptures repeatedly say ‘do not be afraid’. Because our identity is not in any external thing; the words we place on the page included. It is in Christ. The first step to facing Excuse #3 is therefore not to do A, B or W, or even to google ‘procrastination help for writers’. It’s to deliberately take these fears to God. Let him deal with them, little bit by little bit, while you sit back down in faith, and write. 

What are the excuses that repeatedly arrive in your writing life? Have you found current events triggering new ones? What might be the lies hidden underneath your excuses, and how might you answer them with truth and God’s strength?

Penny Reeve (also writing as Penny Jaye) is the award winning, Australian author of more than 20 books for children. ​ She writes picture books, junior fiction, children’s Bible studies and young adult fiction. Her most recent book, The Other Brother [insert link: http://wombatbooks.com.au/index.php/books/picture-books-5-7yrs/279-the-other-brother], is a picture book about acceptance and belonging within the context of adoption or foster care. She holds a Master of Arts in Writing and Literature (Deakin University) and is an experienced writing workshop leader, conference presenter and writing coach with a particular interest in equipping Christian children’s writers. You can learn more about Penny at www.pennyreeve.com and www.pennyjaye.com