I honestly lost all motivation to write years ago. But a friend convinced me to try again, so I just recently returned to it and wrote a novel. I doubt what is art anymore, I mean, who's it for? Is it wholly dependent on the audience? Or is it just for the artist? Because honestly no one makes art and then destroys it, art is meant to be shared.
But whatever, I tried it and this time held nothing back, I poured all my thoughts and feelings into this thing and now suddenly I'm promoting it lol. I guess I think my novel might be helpful for other people someday. Whereas before I wrote to entertain, now I just have an honest work pure and simple, exploring the issues that mattered to me.
Artists are like farmers, you just throw out the seeds and kick back and see how it grows, if at all. I feel like now I'm motivated more by the flower I managed to plant that I happen to like and would like to share with people. Who knows if it will grow to be anything bigger than that. If my motivation was just how well my audience liked my work, or how much I enjoyed writing (I don't really, it feels like work), then I would never have picked up writing again.