Joan Didion on Why I Write

...it took me some years to discover what I was.

Which was a writer.

By which I mean not a ‘good’ writer or a ‘bad’ writer but simply a writer, a person whose most absorbed and passionate hours are spent arranging words on pieces of paper.

Joan Didion

Thanks to Brain Pickings for reminding me of this quote. It's such a delicious quote about a topic I care deeply about. I too am a writer, compelled to pick up pencil and put to paper or to furiously type on a keyboard daily. Since I was a kid I've enjoyed many hours enamored with words on paper. While I've held a number of titles throughout my life--project manager, executive coach, CMO-for-Hire, buying assistant--being a writer is something that I am everyday regardless of my title. It's just a part of my genetic makeup. I simply can't help myself.

I have this notion that each of us have something that is so endemic to who we are that we are compelled to do it; a compulsion that comes within the deepest part of who you are. For me arranging words on paper is my compulsion. It helps me process my thoughts and to understand the world around me. When I am in my deepest despair you'll often find me curled into a corner of a library or bookstore. Once I've sorted through my thoughts I feel much more at ease. I suddenly know how to approach a problem or take a creative approach to a project. If I don't write for a day I just don't quite feel like myself.

Writing? It's just a part of who I am.

What is your compulsion? And what compels you to do it?