Why do we write?

People find new perspectives on why they write every day, and it’s impossible to list every reason without forgetting someone or something. It’s a question that gets asked by critics, academia, and people who find themselves in front of a piece of paper. However, we continue the intimate path of art and knowledge through literature. Through writers like you.

We’ve gathered many ideas, reasons, and opinions on why people write and have attempted to boil them down into three main reasons.

Reason One: Necessity

People are forced to write every day, and it’s a system that’s taught from childhood. Children go to school and are required to write for a rank of letters and grades that they feel satisfied with as long as they meet expectations. They’re given tasks and criteria that mark whether or not they successfully wrote a worthy piece, regardless of how they felt during the process. Children without the proper direction of consciousness or attention begin to look only at the ends rather than the means.

This process slowly pursues the idea of writing as something we have to do or a task we should do (especially if we’re receiving a gift afterward). There’s no better example of this than the profession of adulthood.

Young adults today are trained to write under the blanket of security without ever catching a glimpse of intrinsic value, with flashes of checks, résumés, and end-of-the-work briefs that offer a comfort zone.

Reason Two: Expression

• Sanity
• Pleasure
• Comprehension

Writing’s a known act that brings clarity and peace of mind, especially through times of great stress. It presents an opportunity to sort out the knots of our thoughts and emotions that lie deep within. Suppressed or not, it helps us in the process of connecting with other people as well as with ourselves. To share such an experience means that we’re opening up to the world and saying ‘yes’ to anyone who wishes to view our internal self. Both sane and insane.

The edges of this pleasurable blade are of great consequence to how we look at life and its perspectives. It’s an art that we use to entertain our minds through a craft of language and grammar. However, it cuts deep into the grains of our beliefs and persona with no care of how it affects us. For there is always a pleasure even with suffering.

To write is to play a dangerous game that invites an urge to question whatever a person expresses. It thrives on intention and encourages reflection, all in the name of comprehension. People enjoy a challenge and that’s offered when a person chooses to write for the reason of trying to understand.

“The problems of the human heart in conflict with itself… alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat.” 

William Faulkner

Reason Three: Improvement

The ability to improve through literature is something that we’re gifted with as human beings. It can be professional(building a personal platform), creative(stretching of the mind), intellectual(understanding a personal philosophy), or any other imaginable way. There’s limitless potential, so long as the person believes it. It’s a powerful force that anyone can sharpen, which starts with a pen (or keyboard).

The desire to improve lies in being genuine rather than feeling like it’s a necessity or something you have to do.

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