Don't Drop the Dream

From early childhood I wanted to be an author when I grew up and majored in English in college. My first semester at UC Berkeley a professor asked me what I wanted to do after graduation. When I replied, "Be a writer," he told me, "You'll never make it. You have no creativity."

Since he was a brilliant university professor I believed him and gave up the idea of ever getting published though, of course, I continued to write. About twenty-five years later I remembered that conversation and realized I'd been trying to write everything in his class according to the thesis sentence outline required to pass the college entrance exam. I'd been trying to be as uncreative as possible. I wrote down a story I'd been telling my kids, sent it off, and it was accepted right away. I even got paid for it. And that was just the beginning of my writing career.

So if you have a dream of becoming a writer, don't give up. If it's what you're called to do and you keep on trying, your dream may come true.