Just me and Johnny Depp
A reader asked recently, "When did you know that you wanted to be a professional writer?" and all I could think of was what Johnny Depp had to say. Someone asked him when he knew he wanted to be a professional actor, and he said something like, "I'm not sure I ever have."

Ditto. I like to tell stories. No, I can't live without telling stories. Running gaming campaigns, writing fanfic -- I don't remember a time when I didn't tell stories for my friends. But that's not at all the same thing as being a professional writer. Telling stories, and living a life full of stories, has nothing in the world to do with being paid for them. I've never particularly wanted to be paid. I've never particularly wanted to "be a professional writer" rather than just have an audience for stories.

Talking with the reader, it seemed like she was very enamored with the idea of being a professional writer, with going to cons and with being admired, with seeing her name on the bestseller list and being famous, having people scour the internet for spoilers for her next book like J.K. Rowling. First of all, very very few writers are JKR. Very few are famous. Very few make much money.

What I would have liked to ask, and didn't because it would have seemed impolite, is this: "What do you want to say? What's the story inside you that's so powerful that you have to spend your whole life telling it to anyone who will listen? What's so important that you'll tell it for free, for the pleasure of telling it, for the next fifty years? What would be worth giving your life to, even if you were never paid a cent, even if only twenty people in the world ever read it?" If you don't have a story, I'm not sure what you do have. Skill can be learned. But having something to say in the first place -- I'm not sure what to do about that. You can't learn that.

Take a page out of Johnny Depp's book. Do what you love.