General Advice for Struggling Beginning Writers

There tends to be a lot to the process of writing anything that is not known, unless you are a writer. As a matter of fact, a lot of it is known to many writers, as they struggle to find a purpose, a tone to what they write. Some attempt to write for years with nothing clicking and sadly many with potential give up. Writing as a profession is not for the impatient, whether it be a full time one or a part time one. Even those who merely just do so for a hobby will be frustrating.

General Advice for the Struggling Beginning Writer.

Here are some ideas on the actual writing process to hopefully clear up some things mentally.

Forget Every Single Thing You Learned in School About Actually Writing

While there can be some valuable knowledge learned through the educational process, writing is one area where it is sorely lacked. Students are shoved in a box that does not allow any room for creativity and they have to do so in a certain style or they’ll be flunked. There are rules for writing from a mechanical standpoint, such as spelling and grammar, but even those rules are up for a lot of interpretation.

Every single thing I learned about writing that was useful was most certainly not learned in school. Which brings me to my next point.

Learn By Doing

To really write, you need to practice by writing. Even those who are naturals at writing are going to have some growing pains. The greatest authors in the world at one time were not too much far removed with your average teenager with a blog. They all kept writing, learning their craft, kept tweaking it, a little bit at a time, and eventually they got it.

Practice makes perfect or at the very least, competence.

Don’t Be Afraid to Throw Out Entire Articles

There are many times where I spent time writing an article and hated every single word I wrote. Sometimes it is just easier to write that article from scratch all over again, then try to edit it. Or perhaps never allow it to see the light of day at all. You might not publish it but you still obviously learned something from writing and had a better idea of what did not really work.

Trial and Error

Blunders are obviously a part of the writing process. Yet don’t be afraid to dip your toe into treacherous waters. You might get it bitten off by a shark or you might strike gold. But you never truly know. I think that writers tend to go with a pat hand for way too long. Granted you do have to write what you know but every now and then, challenge yourself just a little bit. If nothing else, it will get creative juices flowing.

There is an audience for everything

Just remember that. No matter how obscure or lame a topic might seem, there is an audience out there, somewhere. You’d be surprised what people tend to look up on the Internet. Of course a lot of it is most likely something that you might not want to get involved with writing for reasons of legality or morality, but still the point remains, there is nothing too obscure.

Don’t believe your own hype

Naturally we are going to be our own worst critics, where we grow to hate every single thing we have, are, and ever will be writing. The moment you start believing your own hype as being good however, is the moment where you tend to go right into an uncreative funk.

Popularity Isn’t All That It is Cracked Up To Be

If your writing ever gets any level of fame, there will be more eyeballs and not all of those eyeballs will be too pleased with your success. There are some individuals who have some very legitimate criticisms for sure, but there are others who are jealous that someone who they perceive of lesser quality getting more attention they them. That kind of ties into the previous point in a number of ways, as there are people who believe just a bit of hype and obviously elevate themselves to a higher level.

Never Give Up

There will be many potholes on your road as a writer and many frustrating days. There will be days where you’d rather jump off a building then write. And there will be times where nothing will be flowing creatively. The most important thing is the ultimate failure is giving up. You will be plagued by what might have been.