HABITS THAT UNLEASH YOUR WRITING

Have you ever considered yourself a writer?

Have you ever considered yourself a writer? Did you ever think one day you would write a book? Have you tried your hand at a casual write-up that people found fascinating after they read it? Do you always aspire to one day be a full-time writer? Chances are, you are a potential writer. Perhaps your mind is full of ideas and opinions you would like to express on the pages of a book, on a blog, or in a magazine. If you have always found it difficult to kick-start your writing career, here are habits that could help if you create time to develop them:

1. The habit of reading. Some time ago, a friend of mine who at the time of our discussion was a law undergraduate student said, “Reading makes your mind broad”. This is another way of saying you cannot run out of ideas if you become an avid reader. I have never come across a great writer who is not a great reader. In elementary schools, children are first taught how to read and recognize letters of the alphabet before they learn how to write them. In the same way, if you could develop the habit of reading extensively and intensively, you might find it easier to unlock your writing potential. This becomes easier if you have already picked a writing niche. For instance, your writing niche is leadership; you can read up on the works of great authors on leadership. By reading the works of successful authors in your chosen niche, you can get help for your writing by asking the following questions:

• What is their writing style, and how can you imitate them without necessarily copying them?
• Who is their audience? For example, the audience of a writer on leadership will largely be CEOs, managers, team leads, instructors, coaches, etc.
• On what platforms do they publish their works that make them famous?
• Do they write about practicable and realistic ideas on solving everyday problems that are peculiar to people?

2. The habit of intentional thinking and meditation. Thinking through the idea you want to write about will help you develop content for such an idea. And you have to be intentional about your thinking process. Thinking to develop content for your chosen topic does not have to be spontaneous. When you are intentional about your thinking process, you are taking your time to come up with words and sentences to write. By thinking and meditating before the actual writing begins, you are putting the power of your mind to use. Your mind is like a tablet on which your writing ideas and content are first crafted before you hit your keyboard. Learn how to put your head to use through thinking and meditation before your hand does the writing. If you already know what you want to write about, you will write faster than you can imagine. A word of advice, your thinking should have an appropriate environment. My opinion is that you should do your thinking and meditation in solitude. But you have the right to use an environment that works best for you. The purpose is just to keep away unnecessary distractions. You don’t have to be hasty about it. Slow and steady wins the race, remember. I’m sure you don’t want to produce poor quality writing in order not to repel people from your works. It is better as a beginner to write at your own pace and produce good writing that readers will find interesting and helpful, than to be too fast and end up releasing wishy-washy articles or a book.

3. The habit of continual learning. Learning is life-giving. Learning is one of those reasons you are living. Quite several aspiring writers are fascinated by the glamour, fame, and six-figure income of successful writers they have either come across or read about. They want all of these and just start writing without first learning the curves. No, not so fast. Engage yourself in learning from those successful writers whose works you cherish. How do you do that?

• Read their published works regularly by visiting their websites (blogs, podcasts, archives, profiles, etc). You can subscribe with your email address on their sites to receive newsletters regularly from them. This will keep you updated about their new releases: books, blog posts, webinars, and seminar dates.
• Buy their books or subscribe to their magazines. You can find the published works of your favorite authors on the Amazon bookstore online and some other online bookstores. Just do your reach. The internet is there to help you.
• Attend their seminars or webinars (online version of the seminar). Attending the seminar of an author or writer you want to learn from affords you the opportunity of seeing them face-to-face to ask those questions that might have been bugging your mind. Webinars are great for aspiring writers who want to learn from writers they respect, but are living in a different time zone or country from the writer.

4. The habit of writing regularly. To master the art of writing, you need to develop the habit of writing regularly. Now, the regularity of your writing might be every day, once every week, once every three days, as the case may be. But in my opinion, aspiring writers should write every day. Why do you need to write every day as a beginner?

• Writing every day helps you master the art of writing 3 times faster than those beginners who write once in a while. Remember, you are still learning.
• Writing every day helps you to overcome procrastination. Procrastination is an enemy of progressive writing, and the only way you can crush it is to just write every day. You might choose to write 500 – 1000 words per day. I know writers who write 2000 words per hour, but to get to that level, you really need to stop procrastinating by writing every day.

In conclusion, your goal should not be to become a very fast writer initially. At the beginning of your writing career, your goal should be to become a prolific writer who publishes high-quality works. You need to understand that “we master habits, and then habits master us”. Note that these habits are not the only habits you can develop as a beginner, and understand that developing them takes time. The time it takes to develop them varies with different people. The earlier you start, the better.