On Writing

I’m an aspiring writer. I write blogs, I’ve written two chapters in a book and I hope to write books in the future. Its like any other craft that you want to get better at. You put time in, and you get better. The more you write, the better you get.

Here are some of the things I’ve learned and have been practicing as I write,

Write in simple words. Write like you speak.

If you don’t use fancy words when you speak, don’t use fancy words when you write. After you write, read it out loud. If it does not flow, and sounds awkwardly put together, thats what it will feel like to the reader as well.

Write like yourself.

Be yourself when you write. Your voice is uniquely yours and will get diluted, and valueless if you try to sound like someone else. Write about things you care about. Write about things you know about, and have strong opinions about. If you don’t care or know enough about something, don’t write about it, unless you think of writing as a way to learn. It’s ok to take a stand. It’s ok to be different. You don’t have to be but it’s ok if you are.

Advice from the book ’On Writing Well’: Simplify, simplify, simplify.

Put brackets around every component in a piece of writing that is not doing useful work. Then cut them. Avoid clutter. I was going to say, Avoid clutter like the plague and then after reading this paragraph, I heard the hypocrisy.

Clarify your thoughts.

Take time to clarify your thoughts. Once your thinking is clear, your writing will become clear. Don’t expect to sit down and crank out 40 pages of clear writing on day one. It’s going to take time and draft after draft, before you get there. And that’s ok.

Stay consistent.

Stay in a consistent voice all through your writing. That does not mean speaking in a monotone. If you started in a tense, stay in that tense all through. If you started writing informally, stay that way instead of going back and forth. If you start writing in the first person, about your experience, stay that way till the end of the work. Sure, there can be surprises and twists in the plot, but keep your voice consistent.

Show your work.

Write and share your work with folks. Get feedback from a few trusted folks first. Make changes based on their feedback, and then put it out again. If you are writing technically, pick a couple of technical reviewers so they can point out missing details, factual errors, irrelevant tangents etc etc. If possible get a couple of non technical reviewers as well. Someone that is not in the weeds, or not as close to your work or your domain but might be closer to your target user. They can give you feedback on voice, do some editing for you, show you were your dots don’t connect etc.

Grammar and Spelling.

I care about grammar and spelling. Its not because I’m a purist about language or because I’m a rule follower. I just think that spelling mistakes or grammar mistakes are distracting. People notice them, and they lose track of what they are reading each time they notice an error. At some point, if there are too many errors, it paints a picture of a hastily put together piece of work where the Author and Editor both have low standards. I try to use a spell checker, or Grammarly to help with this.