Did you write something? Congratulations, you’re a writer.
On many levels, I know it’s not really that simple. But honestly, you don’t need anyone’s permission to be a writer. Or to call yourself a writer. If you put pen to paper, or sit down at a keyboard, and you create using words, that makes you a writer. Those words can be stories, poetry poems, scripts – even journal entries.
You definitely don’t have to have published to consider yourself a writer. You write, therefor you are a writer. Once you publish your writing, you are also an author. As in the author of a particular work. I, for instance, am the author of The Bean to Bar Mysteries and the Chocoverse Space Opera Trilogy. There’s a lot more that comes with that than just writing. Being an author means doing marketing and shilling books, doing interviews and having a presence. Being a writer means quietly, behind the scenes, continuing to do the work of writing that got you published in the first place.
Cherish that time before you are published (if that is even your goal), because it is time when you can explore your own voice, and play with words without limits or deadlines.
Of course, when people think about getting started as a writer, it isn’t those early heady moments of the first pages of a first project that they’re talking about. It’s taking on writing as a regular hobby or as a business. There is no one way to do that. Some writers study and get MFA’s. Some writers are entirely self-taught and pick up skills on the fly. However you do it, the goal is to improve your skill at putting words on paper, to consistently become a better writer. To do that you have to write consistently – which makes writer part of your identity.
Likewise, there is no one way to actually write. Some outline. Some make it up as they go. Some write quiet, emotional pieces. Others write expansive universes littered with action scenes. Follow your own path. Make art. Everyone is unique.
Also, make your own measure for success. So much writing advice assumes that your goal is the bestseller list. For many, that is true. But for some of the students I’ve worked with, that assumption places a lot of pressure on them to publish, when sharing their work publicly isn’t something they are comfortable with.
Do you want to be a professional writer?
Are you writing as a legacy for family or a group?
Are you writing for personal fulfillment?
Any one or a combination of those are legitimate reasons to write. If you are writing a memoir as a legacy piece for your family, and they are able to use it to see more about their own history, then you have succeeded as a writer.
If you are interested in publication, what success means can still be personal. Some writers get good reviews and connect with readers, but never win awards. Some writers win awards, but don’t make much money. What do you actually want to achieve?
Benefit of Being a Writer
Writing helps with cognition and critical thinking skills. It also helps reduce stress, since putting things down on paper helps get them out of your head, and even writing fiction helps you process trauma and stress from your real life. Obviously, writing exercises and develops your creativity and ability to problem solve.
But perhaps the most important benefit of being a writer is increased empathy. Every time you create a new character, you have to see the world through someone else’s eyes. When those characters are put in difficult situations, you empathize with them from the inside out. Robert Frost said, ““No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader.” If you aren’t feeling emotions along with your characters as you write – or empathizing with the subjects of your nonfiction works – then the work isn’t going to move or persuade readers. This level of empathy can’t help but carry on into your everyday life.
Develop a Writing Practice
If you want to be an effective writer, you have to work at it. This means showing up on a regular basis to strengthen your literary muscles. (I’ve also heard writing compared to a yoga practice, if that makes more sense to you.)
Like an exercise practice, you actually have to do it for it to be effective. Which means you have to enjoy it. If you choose a type of exercise you hate, or a crushing schedule that leaves to inevitable failure and guilt, you’re going to start avoiding exercise. It’s no different with writing. Choose projects you are passionate about – and actually finish them. Find a schedule that works for you.
You start to feel a sense of accomplishment as a writer once you type THE END on a project. Especially if you are working on a book or full-length script, you will have learned so much about how the moving parts inside a writing project work, you will feel you have leveled up. There is a real temptation to abandon a project once it gets hard, or to feel like having written an outline, you’ve done the creative work. Don’t give in. Starting a series of projects and never completing them is more daunting than hunkering down and working our way through a sagging act 2.
It can be tempting to wait for inspiration each time you want to have a writing session. Professional writers don’t have that luxury. If you want to finish projects, neither do you. One thing professional writers have is deadlines. These are perhaps the most effective motivation you can have. Giving yourself a manufactured deadline allows you to evaluate how much time you need to spend on your project to complete it. Do you want to complete a short story in a month? A novel of full-length script in a year? Setting a goal with a timeframe makes it much more likely that you will complete the project.
Taking Time to Edit
Editing is a part of writing. This needs to be done on two levels.
First, look at the big picture of your story. Does the plot hold together? Fix any plot holes, where you have been inconsistent in the rules of your world. Do your characters feel real? If not, fill in their backstories and make sure they have a consistent psychology. Is everything in the right order? Are certain elements confusing? Fix anything that feels off.
Then, look at the work on a sentence level. Check spelling and grammar. Invest in a good style guide so you have a reference for how things are commonly written. Read the dialogue out loud to see if it sounds like a real person said it.
Remember, just because you wrote something down that doesn’t make it canon. You can change elements of your story at any time (or, right up until it is published) if you have a better idea for how a character should have reacted, or for a plot event. You have to detach yourself from the work to see it objectively enough to see when it needs to be re-worked.
Don’t rate yourself on your first draft. A lot of writers start from crummy first drafts, then through the work of editing and polishing said draft, create enduring works.
Your Personal Writing
Sometimes you need to write things about a story world or nonfiction topic that have no business in the manuscript. You need a space outside that Word or Scrivner file for personal writing, about the topic of your manuscript – and also for general observations.
Consider keeping a journal. Regular journaling allows you to touch base with yourself, and often provides fodder for future writing projects. It gets you used to writing descriptive details, and evaluating what is important enough to write down.
Do a little free-writing. If you are stuck on what you should write about, or stuck about what should happen in a certain part of your manuscript, free write about it. Set a timer, write a one-sentence prompt, then write about the prompt, without stopping until the time runs out. Don’t stop to edit or delete. You will probably come out with at least some useful material.
Do pre-writing exercises. If you aren’t sure where to go with a particular writing project, do exercises such as character interviews to get to know the characters before you start writing about them. Maybe you need to outline the plot or make a map of the world. If it’s nonfiction, maybe you need to conduct interviews, or visit the place you are writing about and record initial impressions. The more time you spend pre-writing, the less time you will likely spend revising.
Playing with Language
When you write fiction, your purpose is generally to move people, so that they feel catharsis. They’ve laughed and cried with your characters, and now they are emotionally cleansed.
Poetry likewise aims to touch the reader’s emotions, albeit in a less direct manner.
Nonfiction can have a number of different purposes, be it to explain or persuade, but usually there is a call to action that involves an emotional appeal for the reader to do something or change their way of thinking about something.
And we writers do all this with 26 letters on scraps of wood or ephemeral computer screens. In short, we make art by playing with the possibilities of language. A story catches our attention when it is something we haven’t seen done before. Sometimes it is the character, or the premise. Sometimes it is the skillful or inventive use of language.
Using traditional structures, such as the hero’s journey or the three act structure, to express your vision gives you enough similarities to what readers have experienced before – while allowing you the freedom to focus on the specifics you are inventing. Don’t feel like you have to reinvent everything. There are only so many basic plots. The genius is in how you use them.
Find Your Voice
Your voice is how you express yourself in writing. It’s the unique thing you bring to the table. Think about the difference between reading a Jane Austen novel and one written by Earnest Hemmingway. Their use of words and sentence structure couldn’t be more different. And if you read a random paragraph from their work, you would likely have no trouble distinguishing which one wrote it.
This come from syntax, word choice and level of formality. Developing your own voice may take time, and comes with practice. You need to get comfortable with writing in order to show up as yourself on the page.
Experience the World
A lot of the skill a writer needs comes from observation. What do things really look like? How do they really work? These observations are obviously important for nonfiction writers, but fiction writers can benefit as well.
Fiction writers also need to be students of human nature. Learning psychology, either through study or by observing people, can help you create characters that feel like real people who breathe and move and have a life beyond the section recorded on the page.
Nonfiction writers often look to the world around them for inspiration on what to write. What interesting things are going on in your neighborhood? Why does your cat behave like that? Where can you buy the best doughnuts? These could all make good stories.
Aspiring Professional Writers
If you decide to become a processional writer, you need to focus your writing, so that it is marketable. This can include changing the length of your manuscripts, looking at you point of view choices or determining if your story matches genre conventions.
If you are writing nonfiction, you need to how your expertise in potential subject areas to readers – and to editors, if you choose traditional publishing. Fiction or nonfiction, there’s a lot more to consider than just the book at hand. Today, authors are expected to handle the bulk of marketing, and to strategize on what future projects feed into their specific author brand.
