I was recently asked if I write for myself or for others.

“Easy,” I exclaimed. “I write for myself.”

After 20 years of full-time writing, it means the world that my sentences, articles, and books have reached millions of people. Affirmation is my biggest love language.

But I never write for a single soul other than myself. I do this for two reasons.

First, if I’m not interested in what I’m writing, why should anyone else be?

Second, my “me first” policy ensures I always follow my heart, which leads to more interesting writing.

That doesn’t mean I love everything I write. I don’t. But I do like everything I write, and I always try my hardest to find the subject matter, angle, and approach that excite me most.

To successfully do this, however, you must be a good reader. If you’re poorly read, it doesn’t matter if you like your own writing or not, because you’ll never be a good judge of what compelling writing looks like.

So the first step to great writing is to be a great reader. That’s why I read a lot. Why I study what makes one sentence work better than another. To do this, I listen to the rhythms, symmetry, and phonetics of every headline, sentence, hook, setup, kicker, and paragraph.

But you don’t have to be this geeky to discern good writing. You just have to read and write a lot. That’s how every writer finds their voice.

As you write this year, I hope you do it for no one but yourself. If you do that, plus read a lot, I promise you’ll find a wide audience that respects and shares your story.

Thanks for reading.