For years you’ve known you had a way with words.

People often tell you the same, and some of them aren’t even related to you. :)

You’ve long dreamt of being an author.

You’ve imagined a bookcover with your name on it. You can see yourself in a crowded bookstore, meeting adoring readers and signing their copies of your book.

Best of all, you can envision your message reaching a wide audience and changing lives.

The problem is, as fierce a dream as this has been and as determined as you have been to fulfill it some day, decades have passed and time has gotten away from you.

You know you have fewer years left than you’ve lived so far, and you’re convinced you’ve missed your chance.

I get this question several times a month: “Am I too old to write my book?”

Maybe you’ve lived your life for others for so long that you never really had the time—or the courage—to pursue your dream.

I won’t discount your fear, but let me bluntly answer the question:

No. It’s Not Too Late.

You may have told yourself, It sure would have been great to start when I was 25. Who knows what I might have accomplished by now?

Let me stop you there.

Unless you’re on your deathbed, unable to communicate, you’re never too old to become an author.

You know why? Because…

Publishers Don’t Care How Old You Are

All they care about is the quality of your writing and the content of your manuscript. Your age is none of their business anyway.

It’s been my pleasure to see publishers get excited about many previously unknown and unpublished authors. Not once has one looked up from a manuscript and said, “How old is this writer anyway?”

If they love your message and your writing, they will not reject you or your work because of your age.

Need Proof?

Take DiAnn Mills, for example.

In her 60s now, DiAnn says she always dreamed of becoming a writer, “but I didn’t have the courage to take the first step.” Twenty years ago, vowing to write a book some day, she was challenged by her husband to take a year and try it.

Since then, several of her more than three dozen books have become bestsellers and have won countless awards. DiAnn says, “If I can encourage you in whatever life holds for you, don’t give up on your dreams. We have to live a lot of life before we realize what we have to say.”

Bring everything you’ve experienced to your writing and make this the year you finally write your book. Believe it or not, if you apply yourself, you could accomplish this in as few as six months.

Rather than focusing on why you can’t become an author, focus on:

Writing with emotion (Poet Robert Frost said, “No tears in the writer; no tears in the reader.”)
Carving out the time to write every week
Sharing your work with others—like a writer’s group
Finding a mentor who has been where you want to be

In the publishing industry, nobody but you cares about your age. So forget that and get back to chasing your dream.

What has kept you from writing your book? Tell me in the Comments section.

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