Everyone has fancied themselves a writer at one time or another. We've had that moment where we finish putting pen to paper/words to screen and we lean back, look at it, and feel like we've really made something. The problem is with that is that it paves the way for disappointment later on, when we find ourselves unable to recapture that magic. The key to never giving up is not giving up. Like any other hobby, you need to keep practicing. A great way to keep your writing in top form is write articles. They have a tight structure and a clean focus. Here are some tips on how to keep the ink in your veins flowing.
1. It's All Subjective
The start of writing an article is finding a subject. You need a subject that justifies your length. A 500 word article won't sum up the latest U.N. Resolution with any kind of clarity. Likewise, you can't really write 1000 words on a fresh celebrity arrest in your town. In addition to the brass tacks of needing a subject, it's incredibly helpful if you pick a subject you're interested in. If you can't do that, then find an approach to the subject that you can take an interest in. There's an infinite number of way to approach what you're writing about, so you can never be board.
2. It's Never What You Say
Compare the way you talk to your parents and the way you talk to your friends. A key difference is tone. When speaking to an audience, you need to massage your words to come across the proper way. You could be writing a glowing review of a product, and the maker will hate it if the review is crude and lacking detail. Likewise, trying to appeal to diehard fans of something works better if you just tell them what they want to hear. Not everyone wants reasonable discourse. By knowing how you want to say something, it makes it so much easier to arrange your words.
3. Better Than Nothing
Self doubt and self censorship will quickly destroy your writing career. The key is to get something written down at all. How many people do you know who are totally gonna write that screenplay, man, because they have all the ideas? They don't matter. All that matters is you get something written down. As long as you've got that done, the hard part is over. After that, just let the words flow. You can worry about structure, pacing, all of that later. Editing is there to clean something up. You need the raw material of an idea in order to do anything.
4. Human Hat Rack
No idea is a bad idea. Just have confidence that your skill and tenacity will elevate it to something great. If what you're doing turns out to be going sour, take the approach of a great B-Movie director and run with it. Make the weak parts the strongest aspect. People remember the good and the bad far more than the mediocre. You never know what you're going to be good at until you try some of everything. Michael Bolton was a heavy metal singer for a while. Harrison Ford was a carpenter. Try out what you can do and surprise yourself.
5. Eye on the Prize
If you find yourself enjoying writing articles, keep at it. The modern media of the internet runs on articles. Some people won't pay you a lot. Some people will scoff at your efforts. Ignore them and keep going. You will eventually succeed based on the law of probability alone. Even if it's never your main means of support, doing it as a side project expands your mind and cn be a secondary source of income. It gives you something to brag about at parties and talk about on dates. Most of all, it'll serve as something fulfilling to you. You're the creator!
No comments:
Post a Comment