How writing can help you, how to get started and keep going ✍🏼
Kia Ora Friend,
Writing can be superbly useful. But writing can also be a challenge.
By reading this, you will discover why writing is beneficial. You will also find out how to make writing easy and how to keep it going.
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Why Write?
Writing benefits the writer. It does this in two ways:
Understanding others. When you write, you have an audience to tailor to. That means you must understand your audience. You must write something they can easily read and find engaging.
Organising your thoughts. Writing benefits other areas in your life, especially how you form thoughts in your head and communicate this to others.
Create the Intention
The next stage is creating the intention to write regularly. A personal blog or newsletter can be useful for this.
Being personal, you have the freedom to write about anything you want. But you have to stay accountable at the same time.
Have you ever heard: "I think I'll start tomorrow". Do you know the problems with this?
It's because tomorrow never comes.
You have the best intentions, but you need to set a self-imposed deadline.
Say to yourself: "I will produce a newsletter/post once a week/fortnight/month".
Make time to write and only write, free from distraction.
Using a newsletter or a blog gives you an audience to cater for as well.
Where ever you go, your Ideas will follow
Your ideas will come to you anytime and anywhere. This is why I encourage you to carry a notebook wherever I go.
Your memory will be as reliable as the car from the dodgy dealer. Don't expect to remember your ideas when it comes time to sit down and write.
When its safe, immediately capture your ideas in your notebook.
Have Never-ending Ideas with the Kanban board
It is difficult to write when you have no ideas. The Kanban method ensures you have plenty of ideas to turn into writing.
Imagine you have five columns:
Ideas. Your notebook will contain ideas you have captured throughout the day. All of this is transferred to the 'Ideas' column.
Drafts. When it comes to sitting down and writing. You can select an idea move it to this column and start drafting it up. For me, I usually focus on one idea a week, which aligns with my self-imposed deadline.
Editing. Once a draft is complete. It is time to start picking it a part and making it reasonably good.
Ready. When the editing is done, it is time to get it ready to present for your readers.
Published. Finally, metamorphosis! The idea has grown wings and is now a happy blog post or newsletter, out exploring the world.
Unblock your Writing
You have an abundance of ideas and you know the process of turning it to a written piece. But when it comes to sitting down and writing, nothing comes out.
Think Fast Bad wRong (FBR). I can thank Ali Abdaal for this. Get your thoughts onto paper no matter how bad.
You can edit it later on when is comes to moving from the 'Drafts' column to 'Editing'.
Make you Writing Reasonable Good
Draft's done but it sounds horrible?
Don't worry, now we can make it sound better.
To summarise, Shaini Raja's excellent course on writing, ensure it follows:
Simplicity. Are the sentences easily read? Complex sentences can turn readers off in a flash.
Clarity. Is what I am trying to say obvious to the reader?
Elegance and Evocativeness. Not only is my writing simple and clear? But is it engaging and not a boring read.
Your writing will never be perfect. As long as you get your writing out and do it regularly, then you will improve with time.
I'm hoping by reading this you are inspired to start writing. I'm also hoping that the tips here will help you get started and keep going. I cannot wait to see what you have to say to the world. I wish you all the best!
Did you find this useful? If you did, please forward this on to family and friends so they can find it useful too.
Thanks for reading and all the best for the week ahead.
Mā te wā,
Shivan :)
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