This is officially my first ever blog entry on my website. And as such, of course I spent over an hour trying to decide what to write about…and then another half an hour trying to actually write it.

Some of you may be new and have the simple question of, how do people do it? How do they actually write? And some of you guys might already be writers, and want to know how to sustain the writing habit – you want to know how to get your butt in the chair and actually write.

The easy (and most obvious) answer?

Sit down, and write.

Yep. Butt in chair, fingers on keyboard (or poised over a notebook). The only way you’re going to write is to actually do it. You must put aside any doubts you have, and just write. I bet you’re thinking, doubts?! I don’t have doubts. But I bet you do. Every writer does. I challenge you to cite a writer who hasn’t thought the worst of themselves and their ability to write anything anyone else would consider good. We all have doubts. And most likely, schedule and time concerns aside, that is the main thing keeping you from writing.

I’ll never be as good as Stephen King.

I write complete garbage.

What’s the point if I’m not even good?

I’ll never get an agent, let alone published.

We all think these things about ourselves, sometimes multiple times a day. But we press on. Why? Because we are good. And guess what? We’re only getting better with each page we write. You’ve heard the line, practice makes perfect, right? Well it’s true. You are a good writer. But you will get better with practice. And practice means writing, writing, writing!

Your brain wants the path least resistant. It’s doing its best to push you back down from what it perceives to be hard work. That means skipping that brainstorming session on that huge plot hole you opened up in your young adult fantasy/romance manuscript the other day and instead, sitting on the couch binge watching Seinfeld (been there, done that).

You need to fight that urge to throw in the towel and crash the bench.

You need to sit down, and write.