Who Are You Without Writing?

On the hidden dialogue between self and sentence, and defining success on your own terms.

There’s a quiet truth I keep returning to lately: the work we feel most called to isn’t just something we do—it’s part of who we are, how we see ourselves, and the mark we want to leave on the world. It’s an expression of identity.

I see this reflected deeply in writing and literary communities. Writers are often plagued by imposter syndrome. By perfectionism. By the gnawing sense that we’re not real writers unless we’re published, or paid, or publicly validated. That inner critic—sharp, skeptical—asks again and again: Am I enough? and Is this worth it?

These doubts can be brutal. They echo in silent writing sessions, hover after you hit “send,” and roar through rejection emails. They don’t just poke at your process. They shake your sense of self.

Because writing isn’t just something we do, but also part of who we are, setbacks can feel like a personal failure, like an attack on our very person. A struggle to find the right wording can feel like a character flaw. A moment of stuckness can feel like a flaw in you.

Over time, I’ve come to believe that the relationship between self and writing is reciprocal. Who you are shapes what and how you write. And the act of writing shapes who you are—and who you’re becoming.

Every sentence is a mirror. Every revision is a reckoning.

And that’s why writing feels so vulnerable. It’s not just our ideas on the page. It’s us.

Recently, I read a Note from

Laurel Holden

, librarian by day, cartoonist by night. She wrote, “Art might not make a living, but it makes a life.” I’ve been thinking about that ever since. (I really encourage you to read the full story in her Note.)

I have a full-time non-creative job, and I’m also a freelance ghostwriter of non-fiction books. One of my long-term goals is to publish my own fiction book. It’s something I’ve been slowly working on for years. And I often look at traditionally published and indie authors with a kind of aching admiration. I want what they have.

A huge part of me craves the hard, messy, deeply human work that goes into publishing. But another part—smaller, quieter, more protective—worries that in chasing the business of writing, I’ll lose the magic of it. That the delight, the freedom, the rebellion I feel when I write for myself might dissolve under the weight of expectations (especially my own).

For me, reading Laurel Holden’s insight felt like exhaling. Like freedom. Like permission—not to quit or scale back, but to let go of the pressure to monetize every word. To reflect, more honestly, on what I want or need writing to be in my life, and who I want to be in relation to it.

Because whether or not writing pays all the bills, writing will always be who I am.

It sets the foundation. It connects us to ourselves, and to others. It helps us process, reflect, rage, grieve, imagine, escape, return. It connects us to others—and brings us back to ourselves. It helps us become.

You don’t have to make a living from your writing. If you want to—if you’re chasing that dream—hell, yes. Keep going, you absolute badass. But if you’re not, that’s more than okay. Your identity as a writer is not conditional on full-time paycheques or public recognition.

If you’ve internalized the message that “real” writers earn their income through words alone, here’s a challenge worth taking up: define success for yourself. And maybe that means letting go of “either/or,” and instead embracing “both/and.” As integration. As harmony.

Someone in my life who I’ve been learning from holds that the goal shouldn’t be work-life balance. It should be work-life harmony. Like Laurel’s insight, that shift from balance to harmony unlocked something for me.

Harmony means making space for the practical and the poetic. For earning a living and living your truth. It means honoring the part of you that needs stability—while also nurturing the part that needs to create.

If you're doubting yourself today, let this be your reminder: You already are a writer. Not because of your resume. But because of your relationship to the page.

Writing isn’t just what you do. It’s how you live. It’s how you come home to yourself. It’s who you are.

So keep writing.

Because who on earth would we be without it?