Why Writing?

I woke up with sad news from a friend. Her oldest son will have a tumor surgery today. The surgery will be held in one of Melacca’s hospital. Then I remembered, I once wrote about why people in my town preferred to go to Melacca for medication. It is strange to know that what we write can happen to someone we know.

Photo by Leah Kelley from Pexels

When I first wrote in my own blog, my friends supported it as my newest hobby. I only wrote my own daily life. It turns out that writing is unstoppable hobby. Once you write, you will write about anything. Your fingers just cannot stop. Questions uniquely came from my friends. Did I waste my time to do all this? They said people should do whatever they do for a purpose. Hobby is a reason, not a purpose. Since I love writing, I ignore what they said. I believe writing will have its own purpose someday.

The moment of truth came out when my friends took information from my blog, one by one. They copied my recipes, followed my tips, quoted my words, and many more. My writings have their own purposes eventually. It was my friends who felt what I had done were not enough. They said a person is not considered as a writer if he/she has not written for a book or any publications. Well, I never said I am a writer, I just love writing. They made me wonder why they never satisfied with me, while I am happy with what I do. Nevertheless, I have to admit, my friends make me learn new knowledge. I find that it is exciting to learn new knowledge. What I will not do is setting a target based on their opinions.

From writing, I got a lot of new young, energetic, smart and supportive friends. As I am not young anymore, I never consider myself know better than them. In fact, I learned from them eagerly. These younger friends lifted me to a new stage; publish not only a collaboration book, but several collaboration books. It was thrilling experiences and it is still going on. This opportunity opens new hope to publish my own book. Then the next questions came from my friends, which I knew finally they would come to this question. Can I make money from writing?

In my friends’ opinion, when I spent so much time writing, I should have made a lot of money. If not, I was considered wasting my time. To me, when I love doing something, I never consider it as wasting time, even if I do not get any money. Satisfaction does not always refer to money, but it can be by getting a “feel good” feeling. All of my books are for charity purposes. One of them is best seller but the money goes to charity.

I do not mean to be arrogant. It will be nice to get paid. The truth is I have sent some of my writings to some publishers, but the responds are not satisfying. Maybe I have to send more. Maybe my writing is not good enough. But it did not make me less happy to write than before.

Another purpose finally came to my writing. A friend taught me how to monetize my blog. Actually he taught me step by step patiently. Unfortunately, I was not smart enough to understand. Then I realized that my ability is only on the writing, not managing blog which need more IT knowledge. It is then proven to be true when another friend offered me to be his content writer. Finally, I get paid. Not as much as real writer, but I am so grateful.

Nevertheless, my ultimate happiness is when my writing can improve others’ life, better than their previous life, better than my own life. It satisfies me more than I get paid. And this is not personal branding.