W
riting is an art and today everyone around you is a writer. Don't you think? I mean whether you write book, blog posts, text messages, Instagram captions or tweet - no matter what's your preferred medium - you are a writer. But what makes you a better writer? Its pretty difficult to teach someone how to write better in one blog post as there are number of ways that would improve your writing. So here are some of the fundamental tips on how to write better.
Pause. Is. Pace | A proper punctuation is quite necessary because it gives a velocity and cadence to your writing. So play around with various punctuations like commas, periods, hyphens, semi-colons and colons.
Words are weapons | Enhance your vocabulary to make your writing a bit more clear and precise. There's no need to use a 'fancy' word when an ordinary word will suffice, but expanding the vocabulary will allow you to choose the right word. For instance, the women I met yesterday wasn't incredibly pretty - she was beautiful; the temperature at the beach wasn't sweltering - it was very hot. Learn a new word everyday and use it as many times as you can in your daily conversations and writing and eventually your vocabulary will expand over time.
Daily consistency | Write everyday. EVERYDAY. Its like a muscle: if you don't use it, you loose it. Start small. There is no need to write thousands of words. Just start. How much you do or how much you make mistakes, it doesn't matter. For me, the best way to keep up the pace of writing was to start a blog. Consistency is the another name of improvement.
Embrace simplicity | There's a strength in simplicity and no one can make things simple with a complex mind. Simplicity is the true reflection of wisdom and intelligence. It adds clarity, elegance and most importantly, its adds a quality to your writing. To attain the lucidity in your writing, a good knowledge of grammar is necessary, but also practice.
Don't clutter | Your content or article should be simple and beautiful in terms of its appearance. How your article appears to the reader is what makes the first impression in the mind. A bigger and continous paragraphs makes the story tedious. Break down the bigger paras into smaller ones and make sure to maintain a uniform gap between them. Use images if necessary, otherwise don't.
Don't waste reader's time | A reader's most priceless resource is his time. It would be absurd to force a reader to spend 15 or 20 minutes reading something if you could've - and should've - communicated in less than a minute. If you truly want to earn the trust of your readers, never ever waste their time.
Compose less, edit more | Take your time to curate your work as much as possible. Spend a few more hours on editing and shaping your work to make it more interesting and meaningful - more powerful.
Don't loose readers attention | Attention is what makes your content enjoyable and readable to the reader. Once it's lost, the reader may skip your entire article at once. Remember, your first sentence must make the reader to read the second one. Third sentence must propel to read the fourth one and so on, until the very end.
Review you content | Once you're done with writing your content; its time to do a thorough evaluation. Read your prose a couple of times to spot if there's an error (typos, punctuations, grammar or tense) to quick fix it. Its a crucial part before making your content available to your readers.
Narrative tone | People love stories and especially those which talks to them. So frame your sentences as if you are actually talking to the reader. If the sentence doesn't serve the purpose - or if it doesn't move forward like a face-to-face conversation - then it makes your work less enjoyable, no matter how precious or urgent your work seems.
Read more to write more | You know, there's always a room for improvement. Read whatever you get from other people and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice but studies the master. READ EVERYTHING. The more you read, the more you absorb and the more you'll write. If it's good, you will find out and if it isn't, relax for a while and start again.
Of course, there are many other considerations which are still remaining but the above eleven tips are the foundation of an effective writing. As I said at the beginning, writing is an art and mastering it requires practice, patience and time. If you truly want to be writer; start reading and write everyday because its never too late to learn something new. There's a saying that says: you cannot eat the fruit the same day you plant a seed. EVERYTHING takes TIME.
"If you wish to be a writer, write".
~ Epictetus
Tagged : Self Improvement • Better Habits