photo courtsey of Aaron Burden on unsplash
Hello, and welcome back to Blonde Girl Writing! Today, I’ll be talking about how to grow in your writing without stressing yourself out.
For me, at least, it’s really easy to look at my writing and see everything wrong with it. My characters are bland. I’m using too much description. This plot isn’t working.
But more often than not, this view stresses me out. I’m looking at everything I need to grow in and assuming I have to improve those things all at once. However, focusing on improving step by step, one area at a time, is much easier and much less daunting.
So, here is my seven-step process for growing in your writing step by step.
1: Take a step back from your writing and relax.
It can be super tempting to constantly read, write, and edit your writing in an attempt to get better. But sometimes, what you really need to do is take a step back and do something else.
If there’s a problem that you can’t solve, or if you’re battling writer’s block, the best thing you can do is refill your creative stores by doing something else. Go for a walk. Read a good book. Hang out with your friends or family. Take some quiet time with God. Whatever this looks like, step back from your writing and focus on other things that make you happy.
2: Strive to get better one step at a time.
Another thing that’s easy for writers to do (or at least for me) is to look at my writing and be daunted by how much I need to grow. It’s tempting to point out that the dialogue could be stronger, that you need a better plot, that this character doesn’t have complete motivations, etc.
However, instead of seeing the huge leaps and bounds you need to cover to get better, strive to think about the process one step at a time. Decide here and now to focus on one skill and sharpen it.
3: Identify the area with the most room for improvement.
Now that you’ve taken the time to decide to get better one step at a time, you need to identify the area you want to grow in.
Honestly analyze your writing and look for the biggest thing you think you can grow in. You can even get an unbiased view from a fellow writer, your critique group, or your community. Just make sure that you’re honest with yourself, and that others are being honest, too.
4: Find resources and commit to getting better.
Now that you know where you can improve, it’s time to learn how you can improve.
There are tons of blogs, videos, podcasts, and more that focus on writing. And although this can often be a great thing, it can also be daunting to find the right resources. A few of my favorite blogs/websites include Kingdom Pen and Story Embers. As for my favorite place for videos, that would be Abby Simmons on YouTube. I highly recommend each of these places, and they can be great resources for you to start with.
So find a good source (whether that’s from a blog, podcast, or video) and start reading, listening to, or watching their content for the area you want to grow in. I have also found that taking notes that you can reference later really helps!
5: Make an action plan and stick with it.
Likely the hardest part of this process: take what you have learned and create an action plan. This requires even more honesty with yourself, looking back over your notes, and even re-reading, re-watching, or re-listening to the resources you used earlier.
Once you have a good bit of information on the area you want to grow in, take all your notes and compare them to your writing. Create an action plan based on what you’ve learned. And be specific.
For example, say you want to learn to write better dialogue. You know that in your writing, your dialogue is usually choppy and hard to read and that you tend to overuse dialogue tags. Using this knowledge, maybe you watched a video on how to write flowing dialogue—then you took the tips and created an action plan, such as, “I will study how other humans talk and apply what I find to my writing” or, “I’ll take on a challenge to write using only dialogue to convey a point.” This is what I mean by being specific.
Then, once you have your action plan, stick with it! Review it every time you sit down to write. Even refresh your memory of what you’ve learned by going back over your notes. But make sure that you follow your plan until you see considerable improvement.
6: Count all the small victories.
No matter how hard you work, sadly you will never perfect every area you work on. Although you will improve, there is always room for more growth.
That being said, don’t be afraid to count the small victories! Going back to my dialogue example, if you find that after a month of using your action plan your dialogue has considerably improved, celebrate! That’s a big deal.
The focus of this process is not to be perfect but to become better. Set reasonable goals for yourself, and then strive to meet them without tiring yourself out. (Need help setting realistic goals for yourself? Check out this post from The Grace Haus!)
7: Repeat the process once you’ve seen the growth you wanted.
The point of this process is for you to improve one area at a time. Therefore, once you’ve seen the growth you wanted to see in this area—remember to not be too hard on yourself and celebrate every victory—you can move on to the next area.
Repeating this process can help you improve your writing without being stressed by everything becoming perfect all at once.
I hope this advice has helped you in your writing! Let me know in the comments if you have any tips on improving that you’d like to share!
Best wishes,
Jonah
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