How Do You Know If You Are Called to Write a Book?—Five Questions Every Artist Should Ask

There are few questions that follow writers around more faithfully than this one: How do I know if I’m truly called to write? Not in the abstract, not as an idea we carry around like a someday-dream, but in the real, lived-out sense—here in the middle of family, work, fear, longing, and limitations. Of course, that question doesn’t apply to writers only—artists and creators of every stripe want to know what they are called to do, to be, to make.

Andy Patton sat down with Will Parker Anderson on the Writers Circle podcast for a two-part conversation about what calling really is—and why so many of us misunderstand it. Together, they explore the difference between cosmic calling and local calling, the quiet ways desire can guide us, and five practical questions any writer can use to discern whether a particular book is theirs to steward.

Listen on Apple Music: Episode 1 & Episode 2.

Five “Necessary but Insufficient” Questions Every Artist Should Ask

1. Am I gifted at writing?

Human ability is unevenly distributed, so talent and gifting will be part of this question. As Stephen King put it:

“I am afraid that there is a certain amount of innate talent involved. I believe that talented writers can get better, and competent writers can become good, but I don’t believe that bad writers can become competent or that good writers can become great.”

Giftedness matters—but it doesn’t settle the question.

But here is the challenging part of answering this question: Talent grows like a seed. It develops over years of practice, failure, reading, and staying in the game long after your early work embarrasses you. What if it takes 20 years of active writing to write a poem you are proud of? What do you do with those two decades? Are they are a waste? No. They’re formation. Your failures today produce tomorrow’s successes. It just takes time.

So: talent is necessary to consider, but insufficient to decide. Being gifted doesn’t guarantee you’re called, and not feeling gifted yet doesn’t mean you aren’t.

2. Do I want to write a book? Why?

Writing a book takes years. It requires stamina, heart, stubbornness, and the capacity to keep going when everything in you wants to quit. Desire matters because when you hit the inevitable wall—when the words dry up or the challenges mount—you’ll need something deeper than enthusiasm to sustain you.

However, desire is messy. Motivations mingle inside us—kingdom impact, identity, recognition, legitimacy, money, praise, belonging. Even in Christian circles, “calling” language can smuggle in the idol of success: the desire to be large, impressive, or admired.

So: desire is necessary, because no one writes a book without wanting to. But it’s insufficient, because mixed motives create confusion. You must sift your motivations gently. Some motivations need pruning; some need repentance; some are simply human. The presence of mixed motives doesn’t mean stop—but it does mean slow down and sort.

3. Do I have the opportunity to write a book?

The question of opportunity is about counting the cost.

Is this the right season? Do you have the time, emotional margin, or knowledge to take on a long project without neglecting the higher callings of your life—your family, your community, your spiritual commitments? The act of creation always means choosing what you won’t do so you can do this.

But the questions of opportunity can be misleading. We’re very good at hacking our own plans and drumming up our own grand designs. Sometimes opportunity appears from the wrong direction. A publisher knocking because you have a platform doesn’t automatically mean God is calling you to write that book at this time.

So: opportunity is necessary to discern, but is not a sufficient deciding factor. Capacity matters. Wisdom must have its say. Not every open door is a calling.

4. Have others confirmed this sense of calling?

Community can save us from ourselves in a host of ways.

The people who know you best—your church, your spouse, your close friends, mentors, editors—can often see your gifts and blind spots more clearly than you can. They can help you triangulate your ambitions with humility and realism.

But even the best community is not omniscient. J. K. Rowling, Van Gogh, Hopkins—all were rejected, dismissed, and misunderstood by their peers. Great art often blooms in the soil of misunderstanding. So while affirmation can be wind in our sails, and caution from wise friends helps, but it can’t be the final word.

So: community is necessary, but insufficient. The people around you are a gift, but they are fallible too.

5. Do I think God wants me to do this? And how would I know?

This is the most important question—and the most mysterious.

God is personal, present, and near. He wants us to walk in His way, and He has given us means of discernment. Some people have dramatic, unmistakable moments of calling. Most do not. For most of us, calling is discovered through prayer, patterns, community, Scripture, desire, slow obedience—and, to be honest, simply trying things and stumbling around.

Yet people mistake God’s voice all the time. Scripture is full of God’s chosen people misunderstanding His call—Jonah running, Moses protesting, Jeremiah despairing, Isaiah undone, the apostles confused. Calling is messy, two-steps-forward-and-three-steps-back work. Discernment happens under the conditions of a fallen world: mixed emotions, faulty reasoning, incomplete self-knowledge.

And even when we discern correctly, we rarely know the outcome. Maybe God is calling you to write a manuscript that will never be published—because the work will shape you into a better parent or friend. Maybe He’s calling you to wait fifteen years. Maybe the “failure” is the formation.

So: seeking God’s will is necessary, but insufficient for certainty. We walk by faith, not by sight. Sometimes the calling is in the attempt, not the result.