When Can You Call Yourself a Writer?

Let’s face it, we have all asked ourselves the same question: when can we call ourselves a “writer”? After all, when we tell our friends and family that we are writers, some of the first questions that we get back are things like, “Oh, what have you written?” and “Where can I read your stuff?”

Sure, some of us can proudly reply with, “You can buy my book on Amazon!” or “Just check out my site!” or “I’ll get you a copy of my latest book right away!” Not all of us have been published—either traditionally or self-published—though. For a lot of us, the extent of our publication has been in magazines or—more likely—just through Vocal. Does that mean that we cannot call ourselves “writers” yet?

I say we can—and should—call ourselves writers regardless.

Why?

Because we write.

Writers are not people who have been published. That is an entirely different category of people called “published writers”, and they should be proud of their accomplishments. However, to be a “writer”, you only need to write. Not just that, but you need to have the need to write. It needs to be a part of who you are, how you express yourself, and how you interact with the world.

Being a writer is not just a job or a career, like being a grocery store clerk or a secretary. Heck, it might not even be your job or career. It is who you are at your core, something that you do because it keeps you sane, even if other people think it makes you insane. It is more like being an artist, something that you do to express yourself more than you do to make money or to garner attention.

Yes, it would be nice to make money off of it. It would be nice to become the next J.K. Rowling (money-wise, do not get me started on some of her backwards political and moral standings) and make millions from our writing. In reality, though, we are all going to be more like Edgar Allan Poe, who spent most of his days writing things that he looked down upon because they helped him scrape by rather than writing what he truly wanted to pursue.

Did that make him any less of a “writer”, though? No. In fact, we consider him one of the greatest writers of his time, even though he did not make a lot of money from his writing during his own time. Why? Because he wrote. He wrote all the time because he had to write, for his own sanity. It was his talent, his greatest strength, and his way of connecting with the world. He was a writer.

Does that mean that just anyone who picks up a pen/pencil or who sits at a computer is a “writer”? No. Just because you wrote an essay for high school or college does not make you a writer. It goes much deeper than that. It goes straight to your heart, your mind, and resonates with your very soul. You are your words; your words are you.

So, when can you call yourself a “writer”? If you have written and know that writing is a part of you, then you can do so right now. It does not matter if you have not been published anywhere but Vocal. It does not matter if you have not even been published on Vocal yet. It does not matter that you do not make any money from writing or that your main job is, say, editing audits for a medlegal company. You are a writer, right now. Claim it.