Don't be a writer. Seriously. It will ruin you.

First of all, you're not going to be rich. The chances of you being the next J.K. Rowling, or even the next Stephanie Meyer or John Green, are slim to none. You'll probably need a day job to be able to actually pay your bills and not end up on the street or in your parents' basement. Making worlds and people and stories come to life isn't considered the steadiest of jobs. j

You also have to read. Constantly. Whether you've taken creative writing classes or listened to advice from the greats, you'll know that any decent writer is constantly reading. You'll quickly learn even the best television shows can't take the place of a Toni Morrison or Ray Bradbury or Charles Dickens novel. You have to read like you're constantly drowning, and reading stories is the only way to breathe.

This results in an overactive imagination. Every scenario is possible because in a story it really is. In reality, you're just making mountains out of molehills and spinning a yarn about every person you see on the street. Every novel, poem, or short story that you've read has seeped into your brain, even if you don't specifically remember it, and changed your outlook on life.

This can have several consequences. One is that you're forever distracted. The stereotype that writers aren't athletes doesn't come from lack of athleticism or muscle as much as a lack of focus. On multiple occasions, you'll be in the middle of a conversation, when someone will say something that sparks an entire book series in your head. You'll go far down that rabbit hole while they're just staring at you, wondering why you've stopped talking.

Another result is that you refuse to have an ordinary life. Not a single aspect of your life can be mediocre. You have spent too much time reading about great champions and writing your own fantastic heroes to not become one of them. Your friends must be prepared for adventure, whatever that is to you. Your job must understand that it is only something to pay the bills, not your life calling. Your family must be supportive of this passion that dictates your life. If you fall in love, it will not be a smooth, easy love that burns steadily. It will be an explosive, earth-shattering love with someone that you would move mountains and cross oceans for. You will not accept anything other than extraordinary.

Writing is not as glamorous as people seem to believe. It is not sitting down in front of a computer and letting the perfect words flow out of you into the next Great American Novel. It is staring at a blank page, the cursor blinking impatiently. It is agonizing over and wrestling with a single sentence, a single word, to make sure it is exactly what you need to say. It is wondering if you're good enough, wracked by self-doubt that no one will want to read anything you write. It is arguing with characters when they become alive enough in your head to backtalk you, and you have to decide who is right. It is being thought a little crazy when you let slip that you talk to your own characters.

Being a writer is not easy. It is not always exciting or even fun. It is not just a job. It is something that consumes you and changes you in your soul. It is who you are. So don't be a writer. Don't put yourself through all that. If you can do anything else with your life, do that. If, however, you have nothing else, if all you can ever see yourself doing is creating entire worlds through ink on a page, if you feel like your soul would shrivel if you did anything else, if characters come bursting into your mind demanding that you tell their stories, well, then, it is too late for you. You are a writer. Best of luck.