When did you first consider yourself a writer?

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piscesgirl80

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When did (or do you) consider yourself a writer? As silly as it may seem, I don't feel comfortable with that title, I don't feel I've earned it. Obviously, in a literal sense, it's true, I write. I've even published poems, articles, etc. But I don't know what it will take for me personally to feel worthy of the word.

Maybe I don't feel the quality of my writing is high enough yet? Maybe it would take something huge, like making the NYT bestseller list. :D I don't know.

Curious to know what other people's thoughts on this are.
 

MidnightMuse

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The day after someone pays me to read my stories.

Got a dime? :D
 

Storyteller5

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I thought of myself as a writer when I became more serious about my writing and it became something that wasn't just for me. :)
 

aka eraser

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I've felt like a writer since grade school. I began to really consider myself one in high school when I wrote a weekly school report for the local paper.

There's something about a byline....
 

ChunkyC

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I'm with ya, Frank.

I started to feel like a writer when I applied for and was given the job of movie reviewer for my local newspaper. It also struck me that maybe just maybe I really was a writer when I typed THE END in my first novel. Even though I haven't sold a novel yet, just finishing one is enough to be able to consider yourself a writer, I think.
 

icerose

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I thought of myself when I published my first short when I was ten. Okay it was just a school contest and it was published in the school's anthology with a prize of I think ten dollars, but I still felt like a writer then and have ever since.
 

TrainofThought

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I haven’t figured it out yet. I read a lot and get motivation and inspiration from other writers. Every piece a writer offers I cherish, learn and apply to my own writing. Do I dedicate all free time to writing? No. Do I write every day? No. Do I have a WIP that I am proud of and hope to share with the world some day? Yes. For now, this is all I can offer as a potential writer.
 

cree

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The day I learned to read, I knew I'd be a writer.
So it went.
If only the rest of my life was that clear.
 

L M Ashton

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I think it was after I submitted my first article (for payment) and the editor actually loved it, which surprised the heck out of me.


ETA: I'd finished the first draft of my first novel a couple of years before that, and the second novel around the time I sold that article. I guess I really needed solid proof or something. :p
 
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cree

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It's funny how often writers feel like imposters if they call themselves writers.

To me, that quirk about writers reminds me: People think of writing as an art form.

That's a cool thing.

If you sit your *** in a chair and write for nothing more than the pleasure of creating something, you are a writer.

Just MHO, fellow writers, and have a good night. :)
 

Shadow_Ferret

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piscesgirl80 said:
I don't feel comfortable with that title, I don't feel I've earned it.

I understand completely. I was raised to revere writers. Writers are special people with a gift, the ability to look at the world and then paint a living, breathing picture of it with words that can convey emotion, pain, beauty, a veritable cornucopia of expressions abstract and concrete that are at once both intellectual and visceral.

I've can't do that.
 

Raiyah

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I was somewhere around 12 or so. I was always telling stories to people I knew in my head, about far away lands to normal ordinary drama, and when I was in High School I was reading books like mad, and realized 'Hey, this is what I want to be'. And, as they say, the rest is history.
 

maestrowork

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I first felt I was a writer in college, even though I had been published before in high school. It wasn't until college that I really knew I could write, and possibly get paid doing it. I was validated when I did finally get paid for my writing.
 

ChaosTitan

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I've always been a storyteller. My sister and I used to create complex stories for our dolls and action figures, and amuse ourselves for hours. I've always needed a creative outlet for my energy, and for a while, I turned to crafts: sewing, beading, painting, jewelry making. I dabbled with writing in middle school, and again in high school.

In my mind, I wasn't "a writer" until five and a half years ago, when a produced screenwriter read my spec script and said I had the stuff to make it in the business. So me being me, I took that encouragement and....started writing novels.
 

DeniseK

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I think the getting paid thing was what finally did it.
 

BottomlessCup

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I think there's two ways to answer this question.

If someone asked 'what I do', I wouldn't say I'm a writer. For me, that comes when writing pays the rent.

But, in a grander sense, I consider myself a writer and have since the second grade. It's my A-number-one definition for myself. It's my world-view. My bottom line.

Being a writer steers the direction of my life. Virtually every major decision I've ever made has been because I'm a writer.

I skipped college because I want to write write. I work this job because it lets me travel (= stories and "writerly knowledge") and because it pays enough money to sock away cash to make my stand in LA. I live out on the road, 1800 miles from my girl and my friends and my family because I feel more inspired in a rotgut motel on the outskirts of Cheyenne than I do in my living room. I deliberately make terrible, ridiculous choices because I'll get a story out of it.

Being a writer is who I am, what I am, and why I am.

Maybe I don't put "writer" in the box marked "occupation", but anybody who thinks being a writer involves cashing a check is missing the point.
 

TeddyG

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My first foray into the serious world of writing, began in University, where I was chosen as contributing editor to the Yeshiva University Newspaper. During my year as contributing editor, I wrote a series of seven editorials on University Life. I made a startling discovery that year. You can actually have an effect on people with words, and affect things that go on in your life with the right mix of humor and seriousness.

The year was 1977 and one of my contributions was actually a long piece of prose in memory of those who fell during the Yom Kippur war in Israel.

Those articles marked the beginning of my career as a writer and made a lasting impression upon me. When that edition of that paper came out with the prose, it was my second piece of seven, (I didn't even know it had been published) I was interrupted during the middle of class and told that I must report to the assistant deans office immediately. Of course I went there trying to figure out just what trouble I had managed to get myself into now. The secretary told me to go straight in, though her face was impossible to read. The woman who was the assistant dean at the time immediately asked me to close the door behind me, a strange request, but one I was not going to argue with. Only then, after closing the door did I realize that she had been crying. She took a few moments to gain some composure then explained that while at lunch she picked up a copy of the University paper and made the mistake of reading my poem while eating. Since then, she said, she had been crying and she had called me to her office to let me know just what an effect it had on her.

I spent years with that story hidden deep inside of me. It was one of those times in life when something so mundane happens which is also so incredibly spectacular that only a long time later do you realize just how it changed you. Until that point in time I was writing just to show that I could do it, and better than most people. I never suffered, then at least, from doubts in my ability (now I suffer them almost every minute). I knew my articles were read and made people laugh and even snicker at the absurdity of University life. But I never imagined, never entertained the thought that with words I can make people FEEL. And once one has held that magic elixir in their hands, the moment that key has been used - only once - to open someone's' heart, it is addictive. The rest of one's life no matter how successful or how many times one fails in other endeavors, becomes a quest to use that key yet again.

At that moment I knew I was a writer.
Once bitten with the writing bug, that was that. Everything I did in life, on every roller-coaster that fate has taken me, I have always sought a way to write about and share those experiences. In non-fiction and in fiction. For children and for adults. I have rarely been successful. Most other times I have failed, sometimes dismally. But I am a writer.
 

aadams73

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The day I got a request for a full manuscript from an agent. That's when I knew I was capable of writing something interesting enough that others might want to read it.
 

JustinThorne

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I consider myself to be a writer, as I invest a lot of my time writing and I have been published. However, I don't consider myself to be a successful writer and I certainly wouldn't introduce myself and say "Hi, my name is Justin and I am a writer."

In order to put 'writer' on my passport application form, writing would need to account for the majority of my income, rather than simply taking up the majority of my leisure time.
 

Kate Thornton

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I felt like a writer when I sold my first short story, signed the contract, cashed the check and saw my name in print.

It was glorious.

"Just Like in the Movies" sold to David Firks, editor of Blue Murder Magazine, 1997. Nominated for a Derringer the following year.

I still have the beautiful fountain pen I bought with that first check. I haven't stopped writing since, although I do a lot of other things too. I define myself as a writer, but also as an engineer, retired Army officer, woman with a colorful past, mid-century modern homeowner, etc. We all have many facets. Writer is one of them.
 

Freckles

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That's a toughy. Well, I suppose it was when I got my first published clip in my college's newspaper. And now that I have my own column in my local newspaper, I'm FINALLY starting to feel like I've really made it.
 

Susan Flemming

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From the moment I received my first acceptance letter I've felt like a real writer, but it really hit home when I got the copy of the magazine with my story and my by-line. It's a thrill that has never worn off.
 
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