The Writer’s Mind

About the book

Writing is one of the hardest things we can choose to do. Yet for many of us, it is less a choice, and more a compulsion.

Writing asks us to edge up to our limits, our doubts, our fears, our need for validation or certainty or perfection, and push through them. And to do that, we must transform. The Writer’s Mind is about transformation.

This book is about our mind. How it produces the resistance that we feel when writing, and how we we can work with our mind rather than against it, so we can become more than we think we are.

Drawing on cognitive science, Eastern philosophy, and thirteen years of working closely with writers—alongside my own extensive research, The Writer’s Mind offers a new framework for understanding the inner life of creative work, and a set of simple daily actions that we can take not just make writing more joyful, but also more sustainable.

It shows how the struggle of writing, far from being a sign of failure, is evidence that something meaningful is happening.

Why I wrote it

As the Founder and CEO of ProWritingAid, a software used by over 3 million writers, I have spent over a decade working closely with writers—helping them hone their craft. I’ve seen firsthand that the biggest difference between writers who thrive and those who don’t isn’t craft, but mindset.

As a writer myself, I know intimately the struggle for motivation, focus, and creative confidence, and I’ve dedicated myself to helping writers overcome these obstacles. This book is the next step on that mission.

Who it's for

The Writer’s Mind is for anyone who wants to produce their best writing. Whether you are an aspiring novelist, a content creator, or screenwriter, every writer struggles with self-doubt, creative blocks, and wavering motivation. Many have tried to fight through this resistance telling themselves that they’ll be happy when they finish the post, book, or screenplay. They are, but only briefly. Then the suffering returns.