There is just the work. Advice from a writer.

Who cares that you don’t have the right credentials?

Or that you break rules. Or that you break them because you didn’t know they were rules in the first place.

Or that you’re afraid.

Who cares that you stay up late, or get up early because you’re not happy with something you wrote and you need to fix it?

Who cares that it’s the wrong word and the right one won’t come?

Or that you hate semicolons as much as I do?

You’re the one behind the curtain.

You are in the magic business, friend. And only you knows how to push that idea along.

There is no license for writers. You chose this.

No one is ever going to give you permission to do this.

And you’re often going to find more reasons to stop than to go on.

No one cares if it’s luck or talent that saves you.

No one ever says “I used to be a writer” and means it. You’re in this for life.

The readers and the money are rewards. And good ones at that.

But there is only one thing keeping score in this business of stringing together letters and words.

There’s just the work itself.