Writing is a fun thing to do and definitely an excellent way to express ourselves. Those of us who can write well are indeed blessed with a talent they should make good use of.
But what about those who often pick up their pens to write but end up writing nothing? And those of us who do not feel confident about their writing or those who do not write merely because of the fears and doubts that hold them back?
Do not worry! This article is to guide and equip you with techniques that will prove helpful for you as a fresh writer. These helped me gain confidence in writing over the years and I am sure you will find these beneficial too. Let’s get started!
Positive thoughts
One of the main obstacles that prevent us from becoming confident writers are our negative thoughts. Many of us are caught up inside the trap of our own negative thoughts.
First of all, we need to erase these thoughts completely from our minds. The most common of these thoughts are:
• I will never be able to write.
• It’s too difficult.
• I can never write as good as so-and-so person.
• Writing is for talented people, not for someone like me.
Replace these unhealthy thoughts with positive ones like these:
• Of course, I can write. What’s the big deal?
• It’s not very easy, but neither is it too hard.
• Everybody might not like what I write, but that is none of my concern.
• Anyone can write.
Once these positive thoughts replace the negative ones, you start to gain the energy and momentum to write, and that is where it all starts!
Let it flow
Now what happens when you pick up a pen and paper and have absolutely no clue from where to start? What you simply need to do is to let your ideas flow!
Yes, it’s as easy as that. Don’t worry about the structure of your sentences, don’t worry about the order or the spellings and grammar. The important thing is to let all your ideas flow on to the paper as soon as they come to you.
It doesn’t matter if you write fragmented or grammatically incorrect sentences; you can always edit your work afterwards and there’s plenty of time to do that. But once your ideas vanish, they are gone and your paper will remain blank forever if you have no ideas! For this purpose, I encourage you to make a rough draft before beginning to write anything so as to gather all your ideas in one place.
Avoid perfection
This is one huge trap many fresh writers fall into: trying to perfect everything. We try to perfect our spellings and grammar, we try to use smart vocabulary and big words so that our work looks good, we over emphasise the structure of our sentences and, as a result, end up achieving nothing meaningful. If we fail at this, many of us get frustrated and decide to quit.
Remember, when you are a fresh writer who does not have much experience in writing, you cannot expect to write like J.K. Rowling in your first few attempts. So even if you succeed at writing one page after an hour’s effort, be it in very plain language, it is a huge accomplishment itself. Step-by-step you become better at anything you do, not all of a sudden. So remember this rule: the simpler, the better.