Do you consider yourself a writer? And from that do you consider yourself an author? The definition of a writer according to Google:

-a person who has written a particular text

-a person who writes books, stories, or articles as a job or regular occupation

To them the definition of an author is

-a writer of a book, article, or report

-be the author of (a book or piece of writing)

So why do I hear from fellow writers from my meetings, online interactions or at conferences people that they are not writers? I have replied the same way each time that they are writers in every sense and give them examples.

But that tactic doesn’t work it seems for I still hear it. Not from those who have told me in the past for they know my answer but from new people they still do.

Granted when I first started I thought until I was published that I did not consider myself one either. It was people from one writer’s group that drilled it into us, telling us that we were not allowed to say we were not writers in the meeting for we were all considered as such.

So, I get it. I just don’t know how to reply anymore when I hear it now. I guess until they start believing it themselves no one else will be able to change their mine. But worse others will start to believe it as well.