“So how did you become a writer?”

Every once in a while, I get that question. The understanding behind it is that I used to not be a writer. That’s probably valid in some cases, but it’s not in mine. It does point to questions of degrees in regard to what you consider a writer is.

If there’s one thing I feel confident that I know, it’s how to be a writer. How to be a successful writer is another topic, and one that is certainly up for debate. It depends on your definition of success. If your definition requires wads of cash being thrown at the writer, then there is nothing I am going to tell you here that will be informative to you.

But if your definition of success makes room for lesser monetary rewards that are still large enough to call it a living instead of a hobby — and keeps the writer away from the shackles of a regular, non-writing job — then you may like this.

Even if I had to have a dumb job I would write. I know this because all my life, even when I’ve had to have the stupidest jobs ever, I wrote. I wrote and wrote and wrote, with the understanding that it was all about the act of writing, not the act of selling the work. It didn’t matter if I finished the writing or if anyone else ever saw it. My brain has never allowed me not to write, regardless of the circumstance.

A few years ago, someone found out that, among my writerly duties at the newspaper where I work part-time as an editor, I was a film critic. Apparently, this was his big dream job.

“How do you get to do that for a living?” he asked me.

I don’t really know what answer he expected, but I chose to give him a real one, and described how I had freelanced for a long, long time before blundering into the position at the newspaper, how I did my time out of my comfort zone doing police reporting and lifestyles stories and covering various local issues and human interest stories, learning the newspaper craft. Eventually, I was able to suggest that I’d like to do some reviews, the editors thought that was an interesting idea, and so it began. Looking back on it, it was a silly choice to give that answer. I really need to get better at small talk.

Regardless, that was just the short version, obviously, and I at least understand that the long version is not only NOT interesting party conversation, but probably of little interest to most people in any conversation. In any creative endeavor, though, there is that component of self-indulgence — coupled with the belief, sometimes correct, that the story which springs forth might be of interest to someone outside your own skin after all. The self-indulgence is all about communication, though — the necessity of it, the compulsion of it.

And so the short answer to the question I posed at the beginning — dispensing with all the career nonsense and getting to the root of what writing is — is “I wrote.” The best way to become a writer is to just write. For no other reason than you have to, just like you have to breathe and eat and poop. Because you have to write when you’re out on a hike, or shopping for groceries, or in a kayak, or at a doctor’s appointment.

The best way to become a writer is to not stop writing. Ever.