How to Finally Feel Like a Real Writer (Without Writing 2,000 Words a Day)
What if becoming a Real Writer wasn’t about writing every day, cranking out a thousand words before breakfast, or mastering someone else’s outlining technique or process?
What if the only thing standing between you and that identity was…
Your own belief.
Most writers I work with aren’t just trying to finish a novel. They want to feel like real writers. Before they reach The End. Before they ever publish anything. They want to trust their ideas, feel that urge to write all the time, and stop second-guessing themselves at every twist and turn.
They want to find joy in their writing practice.
They want creative freedom.
They want conviction. To stand by their story idea and know what it is and what it is not, so when someone tells them what they should do or write, they have the inner power to disregard it.
You don’t become a Real Writer by checking boxes or hitting some magical productivity benchmark.
You become a Real Writer the moment you believe you are one, and the moment you put pen to paper, fingers to keyboard, chisel and hammer to stone tablet!
When you let go of the myth that there’s a magical secret-something out there that’ll make you feel like a Real Writer?
You stop writing for the sake of hitting a word count, and start experiencing it like those immersive art experiences that blow my mind (have you ever been to Meow Wolf? Like 🤯).
You stop chasing structure and start finding your own process and way, even if it’s convoluted and only makes sense to you. 🙋♀️
Your characters come alive, not because you filled out a thousand character dossiers, but because you formed a bond with them. One that forces you to write their story because you can’t not write it.
Your story shows up for you, even when you’re not writing, like the living thing it is.
And the belief that you already are a writer is what fuels your momentum.
Not pressure. Not perfectionism. Not hitting an arbitrary word count goal or forcing yourself to write rain or shine, in sickness and in health, ‘til death do you part… um… yeah… 👰👰🤵🤵👰🤵
What makes a writer a Real Writer?
You care about your writing. You want to be good at it. And like most writers, you’ve been listening very carefully to the voices around you trying to define what it means to “make it.”
The problem?
Most of the loudest voices in the writing world paint a very narrow picture of what a “Real Writer” looks like.
Bestselling authors, rapid-release gurus, productivity-focused courses (yeah… I actually created one of those in my early days… 🫣), even many writing books all push the same story:
- “Write [some word count that’ll make your fingers bleed] words a day.”
- “Don’t break your streak.” (back in my “Toucan Days” even I used to say this 😳🫣)
- “Finish a book every 90 days.” (or even less! Like once per month!)
- “Just do what I do, and you’ll make it.” (but what they do doesn’t work for your brain, body, energy, cycle, rhythm, you name it)
We idolize them, or at least follow them and try out their methods.
BUT (big but 🍑), We don’t know what their day to day lives look like.
Do they have a day job? Do they have children and/or pets to wrangle, chauffeur, walk, feed, and get to soccer practice on time? Parents or grandparents who are at 100% full health and living on their own who don’t care if they come to visit or not?
Are they neurodivergent? Do they have a chronic health situation? Do they have unlimited buckets of energy on tap?
I don’t know about you, but I’m juggling a full time day job, my writing career, my coaching business, neurodivergence, a marriage I love and spend time nurturing (16 years strong this year), my beloved pittie mix Kira to walk, feed, and cuddle with, plus just the day-to-day rollercoaster of being a human being (or at least passing for one 👽).
Writing some massive word count every day just isn’t realistic. Not even for me, a “seasoned professional!” (look at me putting that in quotes 🤦🏼♀️).
And yet, when we don’t meet our obscenely large word count quotas, or finish a 90K novel in 30 days, or write every single day?
We don’t hate the game, we hate the player.
Or, more clearly, lol: You don’t blame the obnoxiously unattainable goals. You blame yourself.
The problem is absolutely not you.
It’s what you’ve been taught to believe.
Because when you believe there’s a magic bullet to writerly success, or only one “right” way to write a novel, or a certain set of requirements to meet to become a Real Writer, you start measuring everything you do against impossible standards.
You might tell yourself you’ll write 2,000 words a day. You miss it once, then twice. The next day, you double the goal to “make up for it,” but fall short again. Suddenly you’re behind, buried under shame, and the pressure becomes unbearable!
So you give up for a time.
Maybe it feels good at first.
You might even feel relieved, free.
But writing lives in your blood. Your story still wants to be told.
Each time you come back, though, is haunted by the ghosts of false starts, half-drafts, and expectations you think you “should” have met by now.
That little baby writer inside of you no longer has the full box of 120 colors. All she has is the black one and it’s broken in half and dull and the pieces are too short to fit into the in-box sharpener.
I’ve seen it again and again in my clients:
- Writers lit up by a new idea… until they tried to cram it into a structure that didn’t fit (I helped them release it into the wild to become the story it’s meant to be!)
- Writers who thought they lacked discipline, when really, their goals were never sustainable to begin with (I helped them realize simple goals to set them up for immediate success).
- Writers who thought they’d lost their creativity, when they’d just never been taught to *trust* it (I helped them feel safe to reconnect with their baby writer and discover the joy of writing again).
And I’ve been there, too. We’ve all been there. It might even be a right of passage!
As a writer and coach, I know creative flow doesn’t thrive under rigid rules. It thrives when you work with yourself, not against.
That’s why I don’t push word counts. I don’t hand out formulas.
I help writers find their way. Not the way.
Because the real transformation doesn’t come from hitting a goal.
It comes from how you feel while you’re writing.
Flipping the script on what makes a writer a Real Writer
Once you let go of the idea that being a Real Writer means following rigid rules or hitting impossible targets or publishing every fortnight, you may start to feel some pressure falling away.
It might be in a huge expulsion, like a full body sigh of relief, or it could be on a smaller scale. Incremental like a skeptical squirrel reaching for a Cheez-It in a child’s outstretched hand.
(take the Cheez-It)
The spaces that used to be occupied by that burdensome idea will be filled with a new one. One that feels lighter and full of new possibilities.
But, how do you learn to believe you actually are a Real Writer? Don’t you worry my little pal, I have five super simple steps to get you started on your way to feeling that glorious Real Writer feeling.
1. Reboot your creativity by connecting with that little baby writer within
This one’s a two-parter, so buckle up!
Connect with your baby writer
When I first work with a new client, I ask them about their writing journey. When did they first start writing? What did they love about it? What do they still love?
Because when you reconnect with that younger version of yourself, the one who didn’t care about the “right” way, who just dove in, you’ll start to remember what it felt like to write from spark, not unrealistic expectation.
This is the first step! Reboot your creativity. Sit in some stillness for five minutes and ponder, “Why do I write?”
Better yet, get out some crayons and construction paper and journal on it! 😉 Or, you know, your favorite journaling journal and a magical pen you got from the front desk at a hotel you stayed at (why do those pens always write so well?)
Reconnecting to that emotional root deep inside, also known as your reason, is what keeps you grounded when motivation dips or resistance creeps in.
Write something fun
Follow up your connection to your baby writer by writing something purely and simplistically fun. Something with zero stakes.
Write a story to a prompt card you pull from your favorite story prompt card deck (mine is the Storymatic).
Read some good poetry to inspire some really bad poetry (the badder the better, baby!) or, if you are a poet, something really good! You never know what’ll come out of this.
Write something weird that makes no sense, like that party game where each person adds one line to the story. Or something a five year old would come up with. You know the kind of story, everything’s great in the mansion haunted by ghost kittens until a ballerina dinosaur shows up, amiright?
Let it be fun and free and full of creative energy. Let it be like the way you wrote once upon a time before the rules banished that little chaos monkey from your being.
Write with creative abandon(™ pending, hehe!)
2. Define what success means to you—then shrink it.
One of the first things writers tend to do, myself included, is visualize some form of success that is so far in the future that you can’t even see it on the map you’re holding in your hand.
In other words, if success to you right now is getting on the NY Times best seller list and you haven’t even written the first sentence of your future bestseller?
Reign it in a touch.
Don’t get me wrong. You’re TOTALLY allowed to dream! (my smartphone calls me Bestselling Author Claire L. Fishback).
How about… success looks like finishing your first draft within the next year? Then reign it in some more. What’s something you can do this quarter? This month? This week? Today?
Define success in stages. Always have something to accomplish to keep your dopamine levels bangin’ and your motivation high.
Maybe you write one sentence this hour. Start there. You can always build from it.
But always start by winning.
3. Set goals that reflect your reality, not someone else’s highlight reel.
Just like you staged out your success, do the same with your goals to get to The End.
In my coaching, we use level goals:
- Level one: An easy win.
- Level two: Make it a little stretchy. You gotta work for it.
- Level three: An ultimate writing day.
This approach builds trust, not pressure. You learn what’s actually possible for you, without shame. And when you do hit those higher goals? It feels like a celebration, not a desperate scramble to “catch up.”
Usually level goals are created around word or page count, but it can also be how many days you show up (3, 5, 7 days per week). How many minutes you write (yes, minutes, not hours: 20, 30, 40). It can be how long you sat in your chair without getting up because your neurodivergent brain remembered you went to the kitchen an hour ago for something but forgot what it was, but now you remember! (🙋🏼♀️hi, it’s me).
Life will life. Energy will dip. Brain fog will roll in. Your writing rhythm should support your humanity, not punish it. Creating level goals builds in flexibility and starts you off with positive energy around your writing practice. Plus, even on low-energy days, you get to say, “I did it.”
4. Look to the future. Plan accordingly.
Before you begin your new or freshly refurbished writing practice, look ahead at your calendar. If you plan to begin the week before a vacation, but you plan to bring your writing implements with you because you can get so much done during your down time, don’t count on it.
I’m not being a Nebbie Naysayer here. I’m being a realist (for once in my life). We all have the best intentions when we feel like we’ll have spare time.
I always say I’ll write on the plane. My husband and I are world travelers. How many times do you think I’ve ever actually written on an airplane?
ZERO. Even those 8 hour flights to Europe (my life sounds extravagant, but we both work full time soul-sucking corporate jobs… give and take, eh?)
Anyway, get back into writing when you have at least two weeks to dedicate to creating your new habit. Four would be even better. The more time you can spend being consistent, the better.
5. Start with connection, not structure.
We started you off on this adventure with a creative reboot to connect with your inner baby writer and her crayons. Now it’s time to connect with your story.
Let your idea breathe. Remember how your idea came to you. Explore why you want to write it. What excites you about it.
Why do you want to write this story? Why now? What does it mean to you? What makes you the best person to tell it (this is based on your lived experience; there’s always a little piece of us in each story).
This is where the magic happens. Suddenly your story’s everywhere. It’s in your head on a walk. It’s whispering while you wash dishes. It’s glowing in your chest. People will ask you how your skin looks so luminous!
“It’s my story idea,” you whisper back. “Everyone should feel like this.”
Okay, maybe your skin won’t be glowing because of it, but your heart will be singing. Your writerly soul will rejoice!
Your story will grow a heartbeat, a soul.
That’s the power of connection. When you stop forcing it and start trusting it, everything changes.
You don’t need to write every day or hit 1,000 words before breakfast to be a real writer
If you write, you’re a writer.
Even if you write three days a week.
Even if today’s writing session was just ten words.
Even if the only thing you did today was think about your main character while a tree branch snagged your hair and you thought, “That would totally happen to her.”
What matters most isn’t how fast you write or how perfectly you plan.
It’s how deeply you’re connected to your story and to your little baby writer.
When you stop trying to earn your identity and start trusting it, writing becomes something you get to do again.
Your story stops feeling like pressure and starts feeling like possibility.
You find momentum firmly rooted in meaning.
You create from joy.
You keep showing up, not because you have to, but because you want to.
Being a Real Writer isn’t about how many words you write or how often you write them.
It’s about coming back.
It’s about believing in your story, and in yourself.
So if you’ve been chasing the title of “Real Writer”… take a breath. Come back to the story that chose you. Let that connection lead the way.
And if you want help finding your way back to your inner baby writer and her crayons, to the spark of a story idea that first lit you up, to the deep level reason this story is yours, that deep creative pull that never left you?
That’s what I do. 💛