I will concede, there's a lot for writers to complain about. There's the sedentary lifestyle that will make you fat. The carpal tunnel syndrome that is waiting for you if it hasn't struck already. There's the damned slowness of the writing process; no matter how fast you type, every project can seem an endless hustle into a dark, often dreary wilderness. There's the knowledge that even the projects you complete will, in your mind, never quite be done. And, obviously, there's the fact that you'll likely never, ever, ever make any real money. That, statistically speaking, even if you get published your book or your story will net you a few grand, if you're incredibly lucky, and then will fall away into total obscurity. With a little more luck, you may perhaps be discussed posthumously in college seminars.

Then there is "writer's block." I've talked to people who fancy themselves writers who complain endlessly of writer's block. Who go on and on about how passionate they are about writing, but they're "blocked," they sit down to write and "nothing comes."

I am here to tell anyone who will listen: writer's block is not, I repeat, not a legitimate complaint. It is not a legitimate problem. It's not even a real thing. What writer's block is, is an inability to discipline oneself. The most uncharitable description of writer's block would be laziness, plain and simple. More charitably, it could be described as paralyzing perfectionism—a writer cannot mentally compose his or her content in such a way that it lives up to his or her own exacting standards, therefor he or she never physically composes those words. But I would argue even that comes down to laziness; if you're not willing to slog through all the awful, horrible shit you have to write to get to what is good, never mind what is perfect, then you're lazy. Or at the very least, you're working with some artificially high standards in order to spare yourself some hard work. All the while still calling yourself "writer."

I haven't written a blog post in forever. I'd been telling myself it was because I didn't have any good ideas for blog posts (which anyone who's ever read a blog post can tell you, is hardly a prerequisite for writing a blog post). But the fact of the matter is, it's my damn blog, like, four people read it, and I can write about whatever I want. So a lack of ideas is not a viable excuse. That is not writer's block. That is me being a lazy shit. The fact that my latest novel project has stopped dead at 100 pages isn't because I have "writer's block." It's because I haven't gotten off my ass to sort out the plot's trajectory for the next 100 pages. I have no clue what's going to happen next, but that's not writer's block. That's me not having given it some real, organized thought yet. The words "writer's block" are an attempt to legitimize that laziness, that immobility, to make it seem like you're just an artistic soul trapped under the crushing weight of your own creativity. But the fact of the matter is, if you sit down to write, creativity is often beside the point. You need to get your ass in the chair and do the work.

Writing is the quintessential labor of love. We writers write because we are driven to do so. We can't not write, because if we don't, we feel like useless, empty sacks of air who are contributing nothing to varied tapestry of the human race. Writing is not a choice for writers. It is a compulsion, a tic. It's also a necessity. It's as necessary as air or food. Not writing will kill writers more slowly than starving or drowning them, but it'll kill them dead all the same—if something else doesn't do it first. (See: David Foster Wallace, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jack Kerouac, Ernest Hemingway, Sylvia Plath, Virginia Woolf, et al.)

This applies to both good and bad writers. Successful and unsuccessful writers. Prolific writers and those whose body of work is precisely one book. This applies to poets, essayists, novelists, short story writers. (It may or may not apply to tech writers. I hope for their sake that it does not.)

The point being: if you're a writer you write. You don't complain that you "can't" write. You find a way to do the work, because, essentially, you have no choice. Writing is not some precious, delicate thing. Writing is a constant battle with your own mediocrity that you have no choice but to win.

Writing is hard, people. Don't ever think it's not.