Some Characteristics shared by Writers

I read a blog post last night detailing the seven personality traits all writers should have. What I found fascinating was the implication that people lacking these qualities were not writers and could not become writers. 
After reading this post, it became apparent these characteristics were true not only for writers but for policemen, fire rescue personnel, bartenders, middle-level managers, even for CEOs and CFO’s. At some level, these characteristics could be applied to professional assassins and Mafia Dons as well. The stated personality traits had very little to do with defining the class of people known as writers.
Four traits are crucial for writers. Can you write without them? Yes, but probably not very well.
1) If you want to write well, you must be an avid reader.
I think it is the norm to read more than to write. I don’t write for relaxation or pleasure. I write because I want to be read. I see writing as a vocation, reading as an avocation. I read for pleasure. I enjoy well-written novels and stories. I enjoy seeing some really well-done movies and intuitively knowing what if any book drove the film. I devour classics. My favorite books are War and Peace by Tolstoy, The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky, and Heart of Darkness by Conrad.
2) Writers must love to manipulate words. You should want to take a paragraph you’ve written and make it stand out. You want to grab your readers attention. You want to rivet the reader to your words. For a perfect example of grabbing your reader, read the opening paragraph of Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery. This short story is recognized as perhaps the best written short story in American Literature.
3) Writers must be able to view their first draft through jaundiced eyes.
You may be most accepting when you review the works of a fellow writer, but you cannot be so accepting of your own work. Your first draft gets something on paper. Even if you have Steinbeck's soul, your first draft stinks. You have spelling errors, errors in grammar and tense abound. Consider yourself a great surgeon and the life of your manuscript is in your hands. Make it whole, and when you have done that, do what not even a surgeon can do. Make it better. When you have accomplished that, your work is ready to be seen.
4) Writers must write.
Now that’s an obvious characteristic, right? No, it’s not. The number of writers who are working on chapter two of their first novel, which will be a fifty-three chapter work of absolute brilliance abound. They’ve been writing it for seventy-three months, but they are experiencing a slight block in creativity. They don't write. They brag about their work in progress and do nothing else. We know writing is hard work. We know we stumble. We suffer from self-doubt. We are plagued by insecurity. If you don’t make the time to write and you don’t use that time to write you will never be a writer. Bragging rights are free, writing is hard.

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