Where Do You Find Your Writing Motivation?

Faculty Voices: Walden Talks Writing Spotlight

Finding motivation to write has always been somewhat allusive for me. While I’m generally a pretty productive person, when it comes to writing, I often find myself procrastinating and waiting until conditions are just right to sit down and put words on the page.  

Getting those conditions “just right” often means that I need to start writing well ahead of my deadline. For me, if I start writing without a deadline breathing down my neck, I can often trick my mind into thinking I’m working ahead of schedule, something my type-A personality really appreciates. This practice feeds my motivation, and I often find that writing comes easier to me when I’m writing working ahead.  

The other component of writing motivation for me is finding the right environment to write in. As a staff member in the Writing Center, I work from home and on my computer five days a week, so I find that I can easily be distracted if I try to write in my home office. Instead, I try to go somewhere else to do my writing: Right now, I’m writing from a quiet coffee shop down the street. There’s something about the ambient noises in a coffee shop that let me focus on my writing. No one particularly minds if I stare out the window as I think, and I feel a sense of kinship with the other people here working on their own writing.  

Recently, the Writing Center asked faculty contributors to our Faculty Voices: Walden Talks Writing project about where they find their writing motivation. Everyone has their own quirks about how or when they write best, and learning from others can help you learn what works for you.  

Watch the video to hear what our faculty contributors had to say, then think about your own writing motivation:  

Where do you find your writing motivation, and how can you cultivate that writing motivation to help you be a productive writer? 

Youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-cF1cKjFZ8&list=PLM7NbPzilFBfs8PSMipc-ezfmsl7S403J&index=3&t=5s 

Beth Nastachowski Associate Director, Office of Writing Instruction.Beth Nastachowski has been with the Writing Center for 10 years and lives in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

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