5 Steps to Becoming the Writer You Know You Are
A short guide on writing...
If you’ve ever said…
“I wish I knew how to write.”
“I have a book idea, but…”
“I’m not a good enough writer…”
Or any variation on these statements, this post is for you.
Truth is, no writer is a writer until they start writing. Even me, someone who loves to call himself a writer and couldn’t live without writing, was once not a writer at all.
Not long ago, I was someone who wanted to write. Who liked the idea of writing more than the actual work of it. For me, the change came when I got sick of the fantasy of writing. I became a writer when I stopped letting anything get in the way of putting my ideas on paper.
In today’s age, everyone has to write. Emails, proposals, presentations, social media posts, all require a certain savvy. But this does not automatically qualify as “I’m a writer” writing. What qualifies is the writing you want to do, thereby bringing your project and idea to life.
I wouldn’t call myself a writer if I didn’t write almost every day. If I didn’t try and finish the story I started or this very blog I had an idea for.
I have a list of ideas to help you start writing. They’re in the order that makes the most sense to me and sort of makes a funnel shape: \/
We’re going to start with motivation and big ideas, then get into the nitty-gritty. I won’t say that everyone needs to follow each step, but I will say that each one can be helpful to everyone who wants to write.
Here’s an overview of my five steps:
1. Choose a direction for your writing.
2. Write what you love and know.
3. Choose your writing tools.
4. Join or start a writer’s group.
5. FUCKING WRITE (pardon the french)!
Developing the write ideas…
Word count goals will save you!
This brings us to our first idea:
1. Choose a direction for your writing
Novels? Short stories? Genre fiction like sci-fi, fantasy, romance? Historical fiction? Non-fiction? Essays for publication? Poetry? This list could go on forever, which is exactly how it should be. Everyone, everywhere, should be able to write what they want.
I believe in the power of words, in the act of writing, and the ability of words to change us and create new realities. I love reading and getting caught up in an amazing story, getting carried away to new worlds and ideas. There’s nothing like it. I’ve read books that made me depressed when they were over.
Very few things in life have that same power. That’s the power of writing. To create worlds, to change minds, to take disparate ideas and combine them into something new.
So, ask yourself, what do you want to create?
You don’t have to answer this question clearly to know where to begin. Sometimes you have to start writing to figure it out.
And maybe my next step can help you…
2. Write what you love and know.
Think about your passions, your interests, your ideas. When you read, are you drawn to mysteries or political theory? Do you enjoy biographies or current events? The truth is, you can write whatever you want, so start with what you like. That’s what I did. I loved sci-fi and fantasy stories that ended in tragedy, so that’s where I started.
What do you love? What can’t you get enough of? Think of those things.
The beauty of writing what you love and know is that it can inform your other writing! For example, I love architecture. I use this passion for architecture to describe buildings in beautiful and more precise ways. I can visualize my characters in a creepy renaissance mausoleum or a post-modern plywood cabin. In this way, I can take all the subjects I love and know about and incorporate them into my writing. All ideas inform new ideas!
That’s why it’s important to read, listen, watch all kinds of things. You never know how your brain will recycle seemingly useless information into a golden egg. To write what you love, consume more of what you love. You will be so full of ideas your mind might explode into the next great American novel.
So, write something similar to what you’re most passionate about. Do fan-fiction. Start a beer blog. Whatever it is—write it down. This brings us to the next step:
3. Choose your writing tools and methods.
(These are the nitty-gritty tips that may or may not be right for you.)
When you sit down to your daily word count, turn off your computer’s wifi. It’s the easiest way to block distractions.
Write in a place that’s comfortable but not distractible to you. My favorite places to write (if they’re open) are coffee shops. There’s people around, but I don’t have to talk to them. There’s coffee and snacks, but no dishes, laundry, or TV to hijack my brain.
Okay, okay, but how should you write? As in, what’s the best tool, application, or website? I wouldn’t spend too much time on this aspect of writing, as it will definitely lead to procrastination.
Right now, I use Scrivener. It’s like Microsoft Word on steroids and works the best for me. It offers formatting for whatever kind of writing you want to do. Journal-submitted papers, short stories, poetry, essays, you name it. I recommend Scrivener over everything else. It’s only $49 for a one-time purchase!
The usual writing suspects:
Microsoft Word is great. It’s the original.
Google Docs is also great. Especially for collaboration and sharing.
Pages (for Apple users) is my least favorite. It’s clunky and doesn’t play well with the other word processors. It’s the only child of the bunch.
4. Join or start a writer’s group.
No writer should exist in a vacuum unless you plan to write stuff and bury it in your computer’s folders. If this is you, skip this section.
Every writer that plans on having people read their work needs feedback. The best way to get this feedback, I’ve found, is in a critique group. For your group to work properly, it should have a few characteristics:
- 3 to 8 people (any less than three and there’s not enough diversity of thought, any more than 8 and it gets hard to read everyone’s stuff)
- Meets at least once a month
- Everyone reads each other’s work, offers grammar corrections, thinks up questions, and offers ideas
- At each meeting, the writer is silent while critiques are delivered
These groups can make someone’s decent writing great. They can save a piece from the garbage bin and help the writer get out of a rut. God knows how many times my writing group has pushed me on when I felt like giving up. With the right mix of people, you’ll find other writers who encourage you, challenge your work, and make it better.
Where do you find the people?
Meetups and Facebook can help you find local groups, but I recommend creating your own group. If you announce that you’re starting a writer’s group at work or among friends, you’ll no doubt discover other people who want to write. They, too, might know people that want to write. This process can easily produce enough people for one group of eight, which is perfect.
The problem with joining an existing group is that you don’t know if you’ll jive well with them. It’s a bit like dating. You have to find the right blend of personalities who have similar writing goals to you, otherwise you won’t feel compatible. If you commit to a group that doesn’t suit your goals and interests, then you might find yourself in an unhealthy relationship. This will stifle your writing, fill your soul with resentment, and inevitably lead to a bad breakup.
Do yourself a favor and don’t settle for a writing group (or a relationship for that matter).
My group has consistently met for over a year. We set aside three hours, once a month to go over our work. The week before the meeting, we upload our pieces to Google Docs so everyone has a chance to read them and critique them. Our word count limit is three thousand. Three-thousand words times each person is plenty to read, edit, and make comments on.
And last, but most important…
5. Fucking WRITE!
Pardon the french, but you can’t skip this step. This is the thing that will turn you into a writer [cue fireworks and cocktails]. This is usually the step people stop at. I’m here to help you get over this hump. I will save you or write trying.
I hear so many people say they get bogged down by thinking about their whole idea for their book/story/blog/etc. They imagine writing the entire book, having the blog developed, or their completed essay, and then get overwhelmed. I used to do the same thing and empty the steam out of me before I really got going.
Here’s what I do now: I put the idea down and do some “proof of concept” writing before I ever tell a soul.
That’s right. Nobody.
Developing the write ideas…
As soon as I get an idea I really like, I write as much as I can to get it out of my head. Whether I get down a hundred or a thousand words doesn’t matter. The first draft of whatever I write is bound to change. What’s most important, to me, is to finish a first draft as fast as possible.
This first draft tells me a lot about my idea. I can usually feel out if I like the concept still, or if it’s worth spending more time on. For a short story, I might spend one or two days writing the bulk of the text, then let it sit. If I’m still drawn to it a week (or many weeks) later, then I’ll come back to it with a passion.
Be flexible with your writing, patient with yourself, and let things go if you need to. When I can’t figure out how to make a piece of writing work, I move on to the next idea. Forcing something to work will leave the story starved for freedom.
Word count goals will save you!
Word count goals have pushed me onward when motivation lacked, when I felt lazy, when I didn’t get enough sleep the night before. That infuriating little number is what keeps me focused, gives me persistence.
In martial arts, there’s a drill called Strong First Move. The idea is to nail the first move in a form or technique so the muscle memory kicks in. Practicing the first move helps the mind connect it to the next move and so on. If you hit your daily word count, this becomes the strong first move that your writing needs. As you write more and more, you will become more proficient at writing. Every time you sit at your computer to bust out another chunk, your muscle memory will activate.
I recommend starting your writing project, whatever it is, with a small, achievable daily word count. Five hundred words for stories, blogs, and book ideas. One poem a day for poetry writers. Get yourself to stick to this goal every day for a week. When you’re done, you could have a few solid blog posts, five poems, a complete short story, a first book chapter. It’s a significant and powerful first step.
You will become comfortable sitting and writing for however long it takes to reach your word count goal. It took me three months of writing 1000 words a day (I didn’t have a day job at the time) before I could write 1500 words a day. Three months after that, I could do 2000. Three months after that, 3000. This all started one day when I decided to get down a few hundred words of an idea. You can do the same. But don’t wait…FUCKING WRITE!
And thus, the end…
To summarize (in a different order):
Answer this question for yourself: What do you want to write?
Set a word count, pick a word processor, and find a group.
FUCKING WRITE (can’t say this enough)!
Questions? Caveats? Reactions?