What I have learned about writing

This blog will turn two in May, only a few weeks to go. I have thus far written 215 blog entries. Sometimes short, other times longer entries, every now and then lazy ones.

Along the way I learned much more about writing than I could have hoped for when I started this.

Sometimes the words don’t want to come, even when I specifically sit down to write. Forcing them, I found, is not ideal, but if I only worked when I felt like it, I wouldn’t get much done on any day of the week. I’d never get up to attend my day job in any case.

Occasionally the words come when I least expect them, and then usually at inconvenient times (like in the middle of the night). I have learned that I will need to take them as they come.

Writing is comfort. It helps me to think, sometimes to clear my thoughts. Often (but more in past than present) it helped me to deal and sort through my emotions.

It’s hard work as well, mentally that is, rarely physically. Right now, I find, I don’t want to write. It’s been a long weekend. It was good, but, boy, am I ever tired now.

I decided to write this, because I read a good article two mornings ago, on my phone, on the way to the airport riding the tube. It was about the ten most common writing mistakes. Even bestselling authors make them, though selling well does not equal writing well.

Reading the article I found myself nodding along most of the time. Given that it hadn’t been 7am yet, that was preferable to nodding of.

Much of what I read I already knew. I have learned most of these things in the last few years. Some served as a welcome reminder. No one will ever be harder on my writing than me. But that doesn’t mean I am always as diligent as I ought to be.

There will come a time when I will need to find an editor, someone who knows what they are doing. I’m not sure that I’m looking forward to it, but it is an important step.

Until then I hope to remember those writing rules that nobody knows and few adhere to.

I will continue to learn, study the craft that is the breath of my life. It means reading as much as I can and critically. It means writing as much as I can, seeking solitude in a crowded cafe. It will mean doing other jobs outside of that, so I can work on my other dreams as well.

Because Neil Gaiman (as always) said it best:

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