NASHVILLE (WordNews.org) Oct. 11, 2012 – Christian singer/songwriter Chris August said songwriting can be work, requires discipline and needs to be treated like a job.

“If a writer just waited for inspiration to kick in, a lot of the greatest work in the history of writing probably wouldn’t be written,” August told WordNews.org.

August broke on to the Christian music scene two years ago with his song Starry Night rocketing to the top of Billboard Christian Songs.

He read recently “The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles,” by Steven Pressfield that supports his argument.
Pressfield “talks about how it’s easy for us to make that excuse – Well, I’m trying to write something inspirational so I’m waiting to be inspired and it’s not coming to me. We’ve all had writers block,” August said.

But writing isn’t passive, he said.

“At the end of the day, [Pressfield] says you have to sit down and make yourself do it. It’s a job. You sit down and do it because you never know what’s going to come out when you make yourself sit down and work.”

August, now on tour with tobyMac and Jamie Grace, says he has to catch free time to write while on the tour bus, in the dressing room or on the plane.

“Maybe in the eight hours that you site there you write nothing but the worst stuff you’ve ever written,” August said. “Or maybe one time when you do that you write the best thing you’ve ever written—and I’ve seen that to be true. Some of my favorite songs that I have ever written have been in those moments when I’ve said, ‘All right, I’m making myself sit down and I’m just going to see what happens. I’m just going to write.”

But then, there’s the other side of writing – when the medley or lyrics just flow.
“Sometimes there’s stuff you’re going through, or maybe you heard a story or read a book,” he said. “Inspiration—it comes from a lot of places.”

Starry Night was one of those songs.

Come back tomorrow to read more.