Rediscovering Myself As A Writer
Photo credit: Thought Catalog
I’ve been writing online for almost 5 years.
Becoming a writer can often feel like hard work, and that’s okay. In the words of Chris Martin (et al.), “Nobody said it was easy, no one ever said it would be this hard.”
This article was inspired by the sixty-something pages of Ann Handley’s “Everybody Writes” that I’ve read and annotated so far. It has provided me with more clarity on writing.
Up until recently, one of the hardest parts about writing was discovering exactly what type of writer I wanted to be; identifying that niche. I knew what the general idea was: non-fiction. I wanted to share my experiences and write about things that are true; either about my life or others around me.
To do this, I wanted to understand and learn more about the writers who contributed to this community. I wanted to learn their stories, and connect with them through their own words, so I started reading- a lot.
I like to think of myself as an avid reader, particularly of articles and non-fiction pieces online. Over the past 6–7 years, I’ve grown to love reading. Back then, I would read at least 100 articles a month. I’m sure I even reached 300 at one point. For someone who didn’t like reading as a child, this was great. Throughout that time, I came across a few fiction books which I liked, but I wasn’t hungry for more.
I wanted more of the articles. I got inspired so I started writing my own.
Note: I had only ever had a few encounters with writing outside of school. I wrote a few songs and short stories, but that was it.
Getting into writing didn’t come without its difficulties.
First, I asked myself: What should I write about?
Then I started to think that if I don’t know what to write about, maybe I’m not supposed to be a writer.
Ha! Who was I kidding?
This didn’t stop me.
I also asked myself other questions to figure out the puzzle.
Here are a few:
Who is going to read what I write?
Do I have to write every day?
Aren’t there many people who already write about everything?
I started by writing about photography since I already had my online portfolio set up. I just need to add the Blog page. I wrote about photography from July 2016 to July 2019. My readers included family, friends, photography peers, and others. I didn’t write very often, but I managed to produce 27 articles in that time period.
Fast forward to August 2019.
I had reflected on the fact that I’d been writing online for over 3 years. I wasn’t the best writer, but I thought about my perseverance. I did not keep a consistent routine to publish every x weeks, but I always returned to post a new article when I had something to share.
This motivated me to continue.
I’ve always been very proud of myself for having created a website and developed and maintained it as I have. It’s one of my best investments to date.
Every few months, I take time to assess my writing and assess my feelings about my writing and my progress. It took years for me to feel like I was writing as I was supposed to, where it felt most rewarding.
Now, in 2021, I’m focusing on creative non-fiction and on poetry.
Here’s why:
Creative Non-Fiction
Non-fiction: This requires me to write about what I know, which is easy to do. It’s like taking notes, but without restrictions.
The “creative” part gave me room to play around with puns, idioms, and other literary tools.
The writing experience in itself is my favourite.
I write with a smile on my face. Sometimes, I wear my focused stare, I put my feet up, and I cover my mouth with the collar of my shirt — all while my eyes follow the words as they appear on my screen or my book.
I never enjoyed writing fiction at school- it always felt like I was being forced to lie and make up stories about what I don’t know or didn’t experience.
“Write a story entitled ‘The village where nobody lives anymore.’”
“Write a story which includes the following words, ‘The phone rang once and stopped. It rang again. This was it now.’”
I’m not saying these are bad for writing fiction, it’s just that they didn’t make me want to write fiction.
Poetry
Back then, writing poetry and free verse worked because I was excited about the emotional experience. I wasn’t focused on perfecting anything at all because I didn’t expect to have written any masterpieces. For me, it was mainly to express myself and have fun with the wordplay.
When I write poems now, they all start in a very fun way. I never stop and say “Okay, I’m going to write a poem about social media use.” It doesn’t work that way for me. The poem that I wrote about social media use began by just playing around with three words, “bite, chew, digest”.
