Authentic Writing

Who should you write for? Is it editors, readers, critics, or someone else? Writers are often bombarded with advice about who they should target their writing for. Not often are they told to write for themselves, but this may be the sagest advice of all. Like any artist, you must love what you do in order to succeed at it. Having passion for an art means there is intrinsic joy in it for you. If you didn't enjoy it, you wouldn't keep doing it and you wouldn't be very good at it. The joy comes, however, not from trying to please others but from trying to please yourself. The love for art springs from that intense desire to do things in a way that makes you feel most fulfilled. And if you're good enough and you can take others on the journey with you, then that makes it all the better. But true artists will do their art even if no one else is on board with them, just for the sheer pleasure of doing it. So you should write for yourself first and foremost, because if you don't thoroughly enjoy what you're writing, no one else will either. The writing has to be authentically you and it has to be from your heart before it will resonate with others. Don't be afraid to write for yourself. It's the mark of genuine craftsmanship.

Angle Your Writing

Angle is everything. Your particular spin on an idea is what makes your writing unique and interesting to readers. Unique ideas are certainly important too, but you can put a unique angle on a timeworn subject and wow readers as much as if you had a completely new idea. The depths of your reservoir as a writer depend on your ability to rework ideas into your own perspective, your world view. Your sense of the world is what readers want from you, not your ability to come up with wild, untested ideas. If you are able to write in an interesting way about very ordinary things by putting a spin on it that is both uniquely yours and universally relevant, you have a winner and readers will love it. Think of the countless scenarios that repeat themselves in fiction and nonfiction; and yet, each time they're done, they're done from a writer's unique perspective that allows readers to look at familiar things through unfamiliar lenses and have a genuine "aha" moment. Readers not only expect this from you as a writer, they crave it. They want to make sense of the world around them and they look to writers to provide that guidance. So, work on your angle with everything you write and the results of your efforts will amaze you.

Think Positive

Writers are often plagued with too many negative voices in their heads. These voices send messages that discourage them, telling them they're no good, they don't measure up, and they are foolish for even trying to write. If the voices have their way, very little writing gets done and some writing careers end before they've even had a chance to get started. Those voices, however, can be conquered. It requires a little rewiring and approaching your writing projects from a different perspective. You may be daunted by the challenge of writing an article or essay you've been assigned, for example, telling yourself before you even start that it will be no good. The key is to shut off that voice, back up, and look at the project as a collection of smaller parts instead of a huge, overwhelming whole. Then begin to focus on the parts of it you can do well. Maybe you're good at topic selection or outlining or creating titles. Whatever it is, do those parts. Don't worry about the whole project or the end result. Just focus on those small parts of the whole that you can successfully piece together one by one. As you do this, you will build confidence in your abilities and begin to see other areas where you can succeed. And most importantly, you will build momentum that will prevent you from becoming blocked by your fears and doubts. Focusing on what you can do rather than what you can't do will help you get the work done and become a better writer in the process.

Learn Too Much

My beginning writing students often approach a writing project with scarcity and sketchiness in mind. Their thinking is that just a little will do. In other words, they will learn just enough about a subject to put together something passable. What happens as a result is that their writing often has large gaps in it that leave readers missing the point, wanting more explanation, and unable to follow the discussion. The information is just too scant. The lesson here is that, rather than approaching research from a paucity perspective, it's more effective to approach it from an excess perspective. In other words, learn more than you need to know. You won't be putting everything you've learned into writing, but having an overabundance of knowledge about your subject will fill in the gaps that readers need to make sense of what you're writing. Knowing more than you need to know will allow you to write competently and clearly about your subject. You will be able to discern what information to offer readers and what information to leave out because you have a thorough understanding of your subject matter. Approaching your research in this manner will make your writing richer, more interesting and more readable. And from a reader's perspective, your writing will be vastly more credible. To write well, you can never learn too much.

Focus on Ideas

Sometimes writers get blocked on a writing project because they're focused too much on their ability to write it. While writing ability is certainly important, it may take refocusing away from that ability to free up your creative drive. The best way to do that is to focus on the topic you're writing about and work to develop that topic into something unique. Think about what kind of knowledge or special insight you can bring to that topic. Is there a unique slant you can offer? Is there an unusual solution to a problem or issue? This refocusing of attention on the content of your writing project can allow you to free up some creative energy that you may have been spending on worrying about style. Fears about style and technique can freeze you in your tracks. Instead, just work on the idea itself, making it as developed and compelling and special as you can, and write the piece in its entirety from that perspective. When you read back what you've written, you'll likely find that this energy and passion you've focused into the quality of your idea has translated into good writing. The issues of style and technique will most likely have come naturally because you weren't obsessing about them. Focusing on your ideas first and your writing skills second will help you be a more productive writer and ultimately a more satisfied one.

Breaking Writing Down

Taking on a writing project in its entirety can be a daunting task for any writer, whether beginner or advanced. It's overwhelming to begin writing when you're already envisioning the whole piece. One way to alleviate this stress is to break down the writing project into its component parts and then work on one part at a time. For example, you may just want to work on a theme or storyline first and just focus on that without trying to also figure out how it will be executed or how it will progress. Just getting that much done can boost your sense of confidence and propel you on to the next step. The next step could be an introduction. It could be an outline. It could be a title. Whatever it is, just pick that one thing to work on and focus on nothing else until you have it worked out to your satisfaction. Then go on to the next step and so on. The trick in doing a writing project step by step is to shut out the voices that urge you to plunge ahead, to think about the ending before you've even constructed the beginning. Shutting out that distraction and focusing on the task at hand will help you be more productive and more effective than trying to take on the whole project at one time. Learning to break your writing down into smaller steps you can successfully handle will embolden your writing and keep you producing.

Using Criticism Wisely

Taking criticism of your work is one of the toughest things you will have to deal with. When you put everything you have into a piece of writing and send it out into the world for feedback, it's like giving birth. Negative feedback is akin to being told your child is ugly or just doesn't measure up. Criticism can hurt, and if you let it, can block your creativity. There is another angle on criticism to consider, however. What someone else thinks of your work, whether it's an editor, friend or fellow writer, should be viewed as just food for thought rather than a condemnation of your efforts. It's one more perspective on your work that deserves to at least be considered. It's another lens focusing in a different way on the same image. When looked at in this way, it becomes less discouraging and more challenging. The feedback is an opportunity for you to take another look at your work, perhaps consider an angle you hadn't thought of before. You can decide to either utilize the feedback or, if it's not particularly helpful, discard it. The key is you don't have to internalize it. See it for what it is - just another opinion - and keep it in its proper place without becoming emotionally invested in it. Simply use it as one of many tools in your writing practice. Learning to view criticism in this way will help you develop a clearer perspective on your writing and will help you stay motivated to keep working on your skills and believing in your talent.

Writing Habits

It is a common problem for writers to develop repetitive habits in their writing style. It could be a habit of using a certain word or turn of phrase frequently. It could be a habit of starting sentences a certain way, such as with an adverb (Suddenly, she turned). It could be a sentence structure habit such as fragmenting (Because he wanted to.) or reverse ordering (On the table is the book). Whatever the habit, it becomes annoying to readers because it becomes repetitive. It will begin to stick out and announce itself to readers, even though you may be oblivious to it. After awhile, it will turn readers off completely. Developing an ear for your own repetitive habits is something you can cultivate. It requires really listening to your writing when you read it back to yourself. When you come across an expression you know you've heard before or use frequently in your speech, scan your text for repetitive use of it. Pay attention to how you structure your sentences. Do you have a good variety of the four basic types of sentences: simple, complex, compound and complex-compound? Do you repetitively fragment or reverse order or do you use these techniques judiciously for special effect? Read your work out loud and you will be able to hear your patterns and habits more clearly. Ask someone else to read your work and point out any annoying habits in your writing. Getting a handle on these habits will not only improve your writing skill, it will also improve your reader approval.

Caring About Writing

If you find yourself dragging through a writing project or having trouble even getting started on it, it may be because you don't care enough about it. It may be a subject that you find boring or a form or genre of writing that you find uninspiring. Whatever the reason is, your heart isn't in it. The driver of creativity is passion. To create, you must care. So if you're faced with something you've either assigned to yourself or something that has been assigned to you, and it's something you don't care about, you'll feel like your creative pants are full of cement and you can't move. That's when you have to find a way to either change what you're doing or find a way to make it inspiring. When you're missing that juice that fires your writing neurons, you can't produce, much less produce good writing. If a writing project is stalling, ask yourself if that's where your creative energy is best spent. Think about why the project is hard for you. Is it because it doesn't play to your strengths and interests? If it doesn't, then why are you spinning your wheels trying to make it work? Find something that will light a fire under you and make your writing time fly. Life is short and our creative lives are even shorter. Spend this time wisely by writing what you love.

Original Writing

Writers are flooded with advice about how to conform to the trends and standards of the day. This advice is rife with tips for writing what publishers want and readers want. But it is clear that what publishers and readers really want is not conformity to standard, but rather commitment to boldness, honesty and originality. If your particular gift as a writer happens also to conform with traditional standards, then so be it. But if your uniqueness is off those standard charts, even quirky, and it produces great writing, then standards don't matter. Excellent writing does matter. To produce excellent writing, you must be true to your own voice. What makes your writing original is the totality of your experiences, your sensitivities, your worldview, and your manners of expression. These are the qualities that infuse richness and breathe life into your writing. Don't ever sacrifice that to conformity to standards. You must first and foremost be you on the written page. Write like you think, like you talk, like you arrange the bits and pieces of your world. But make it meaningful to others. That's the caveat. Be original, but be relevant. Doing this will make your writing more exciting for you and more memorable for readers.