Lauren Deacon

June 2, 2021

*In a fancy actor voice* "What's my motivation?"

What got you started? What keeps you writing?

This was the question for day one of this challenge. It's not really an easy question.... well, the answer isn't easy, anyway.

I started writing for two reasons. The first is that I needed a creative outlet. I have always been very imaginative, but my imagination, if not kept in check, tends to run away with me, and becomes nightmares. Over time, I recognised a pattern. The more I taxed my mind, the less likely I was to have bad dreams. I think this is why, in fandom, I'm something of a 'multishipper' (which is where you're agnostic as to the characters you're willing to write in relation to each other). If it's hard to imagine, it's better for my brain - I suppose it's my version of doing sudoku before bed or something.

The second reason was to have something that was just mine, I think. Although I do share my writing, and I like the rewards I get from it, I didn't start off in the hopes that I'd become well known or rich or anything like that (bit of a fools errand anyway). I write mostly for me - most of the writers I know are like that too, in a variety of different ways.

Keeping up with writing is pretty cyclical for me. I'm very critical of myself, and do tend to get bored with things quite quickly... but I haven't gotten bored of writing yet. It's never-endingly interesting to me, and that's a pretty rare thing. It's enough to keep me going.