Don't Role-Play: Why You'll Be A Better Writer If Your Identity Isn't In Your Writing

Where Do You Find Your Identity?

Why are you writing? Is it because you just love doing it, or is there a deeper reason? Do you feel called to it? Is it because it’s something you’re really good at? What is the thing that drives you to fetch your notebook and pencil, or go to the computer and open up Google Docs?

There’s a motive behind every action. The things we do are decided by what we deeply believe.

Here’s a very frank statement that I believe wholeheartedly: whatever you love most is going to become your identity. What does that mean? If you loved your family more than anything and something happened to all of them, you would be left asking, “who am I without the people I loved most?” If you loved your job more than anything and you were fired, you would be left wondering, “so, who am I now without this amazing job?” And if you loved your writing more than anything else and you lost your ability to write, you’d be left thinking, “who am I apart from my writing?”

Obviously this is wrong. We are commanded to love God with all our heart, mind, and soul. Who we are in Christ is our true identity. You are a sinful human being who has been redeemed and changed by the grace of God, and you have worth through Christ. Not through your family. Not through your job. Not through your writing.

I’m guilty of all of these things. Sometimes I ask myself, “If God told me right now to go to the mission field in Africa and give up these dreams of being a writer, would I go?” I’m not always sure I would. We should all be at God’s beck and call, and sometimes these dreams—these identities—keep us from doing so.

You’ve probably heard of role-playing games before. You invent your own character and pretend to be them for a game. Well, when you make your identity in something other than Christ, you are, in essence, doing the same thing. You are inventing a character for yourself who you are pretending to be instead of being the person God planned for you to be. But life isn’t a game. Don’t pretend to be a made-up character in your life. Don’t role-play.

You’ll Be a Better Writer This Way

When your identity is in something other than in Christ, it’s not only wrong, but it also hinders you in that area you’re finding your identity in. Why? Because your identity is in that thing, you are insecure about it. When people criticize it you feel like they’re criticizing you.

In The Lord of the Rings trilogy Gollum’s identity is in his precious ring that he has lost. Without his “precious” Gollum thinks he is nothing. That he has nothing. In The Two Towers when he travels with Sam and Frodo, you see him start to waver. The Smeagle side of him wants to be friends with the two Hobbits. The Gollum part of him, the part enslaved by the ring, only wants the ring for himself. In the end, Gollum sticks with what his identity has always been in: the ring. And it's his desire for the ring that destroys him.

When you are free from finding your identity in something, you can see it clearly for what it truly is. When people in your critique group point out the flaws in your story, you aren’t left feeling hurt or annoyed. Instead you can be grateful for their input, even if they may have delivered it in an unkind manner.

God gives us the keys to unlock the prison of false identity. The Bible says, “Ask, and it will be given. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be open to you.”

Pray that God will help you find your identity in what He says and what He has done for you. He'll open that door. Just ask him to do so.

So don’t role-play. Don’t find your identity in what you can do. You’ll be a better writer if you separate your writing from your worth.