Why are you making yourself write if you don't enjoy it? Of course, there is a certain level of labor involved in writing -- or anything -- done well. But no one HAS to write.

bravo, marys. various mentors and teachers have nagged me for years about the need to 'just sit down and write' every single day, even if only for fifteen minutes.

it doesn't work that way for me. i am a writer and there is no state more sublime than when the creative juice is flowing, but i write when moved to. period. sometimes days will go by; perhaps i'm distracted by the demands of work or busy socially or maybe the well has just run dry for a bit.

but when the writing wire is alive and white-hot, i write. to the exclusion of all else. and i trust that what i produce in that state, whether good or not so, has come from the truest place, the creative core.

this philosophy flies in the face of practically held wisdom about the need for routine and discipline in writing. but it's an approach that works best for me.

I agree with Mary. Writing is not a punishment for having an idea but rather an empty canvas singing like the siren of Atlantis that entices you to fill it. It is words that have formed inside you and require release to give you respite from pain, not a chore, like spring cleaning, to be done mindlessly and only with the knowledge that the reward is you won't have to do it again until the next year.

Writers each have their own way to approach writing. It is a labor of love in any case. Writing is giving birth to something that has never seen the light of day and may be stillborn but no matter is worth all the pushing to get it out.

I don't write because I have to. Even when I was writing additional chapters to my first textbook at the behest of the editor, I found that her suggestions pulled out ideas that needed expressing and in my urgency to get it finished, I had overlooked. She was reading my mind, not forcing me to accept what was in hers.

A book or story or article or essay or greeting card or poem is called a labor of love for good reason. It is a task wrapped in the very juices of your soul but the finished product doesn't come out of the oven ready for the table. Like giving birth to a child - it is the next eighteen years of effort that help create a finished product - writing has stages. The first stage - creativity - is an explosion from the nether world within you. The second stage - editing and polishing - is a conscious task like parenting. You can't just give birth to it and send it off to he world. You have a lot of polishing to do. I wrote a 100,000 word book in six weeks - after work. I took the next six months polishing every word to perfection. I agonized a full week over the opening paragraph which became four words by the time I sent it to an editor. Those four words in a brief query, sold the project without his first seeing another word from the text.

The trick in writing is to make it look like it slid out whole. All the work is to make it look natural.

Writers write at different times. My early writing was nocturnal, in part because I worked as a psychotherapist/administrator/college professor/supervisor/student advisor 80+ hours a week. I wrote all night. I took Sundays off to sleep.

When I wrote a weekly column for three years, I always wrote it at the last minute. The rest of the time, I was forming it in my head. One of the columns was the basis for a self-help book I later wrote.

Now, I write when I feel strong and sharp, whenever that may be. I do not have a time table. If I had to force myself to write, I would instead buy a pet turtle and take it out for walks - I can't keep up with a frisky dog any longer. JUST KIDDING! I could beat a team of greyhounds to a Dove Bar!

My advice. Forget all the nonsense you were told in all the books written about writing. It doesn't matter when Michael Crichton, Erica Jung or even Danielle Steele write. Whatever works for you, use it without all the mental prestidigitation. Just write.

When you say, "..a few hours a day," it sounds like you do enjoy writing, perhaps too much. Maybe if you find the root cause of what makes it "tedious" it will help everything.

Some writers write for an hour, for others, finishing a chapter is the goal. Set a time, discipline yourself and don't wait for inspiration but lunge for it by brainstorming.

Since I have no writing deadlines, a regular basis is not a requirement. However, sometimes I just feel bad that I have been "neglecting" my desk, for too long, and in the absence of an idea, set exercises for myself - just a character study, a scene running around in my head or an evocative dream - and just merrily scribble away without any particular goal. I'm often surprised at where this takes me. It can turn out to be creative. It can be a long run. If not, it's "good exercise" all the same.

Money helps quite a lot. But even knowing that my work will bring in dollars isn't always sufficient motivation. I'm an on and off writer. I can go for weeks without setting down a word, and then write two or three articles and blog posts a day. I'm completely disorganized, and not gimmick has ever helped. I love ideas and words, but the labor of actually refining it all and getting it down in physical form is too much like work.

Discipline? No such thing. I write when I write, and I don't write when I don't write.