3 Actionable Tips For The Beginning Writer Looking To Improve Their Skills

In this issue of Make Mondays Great Again, I'm going to give you three actionable tips any beginning writer can use to instantly improve their skills.

These tips will change the way you write and make sure you're never staring at that blank page again. You'll learn how to get inspiration, and how to structure your writing before you even start. At the end of this, you'll hopefully want to remove this email from your screen and start writing.

Some experienced writers choose to ignore these tips I'm about to give you, and you'll also have to decide for yourself what kind of writer you want to be.

Architects and Gardeners

The legendary fantasy writer and the father of the universe that is Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin has many times spoken on the idea that in every writer there's either an Architect or a Gardener.

Architects are outliners and designers of stories, and like to plan everything––many times before writing a single sentence. Gardeners on the other hand start writing on the basis of an idea, and you can consider them explorers of their own stories. It doesn't matter which category you fall into—and you might even be a bit of both.

What I'm about to teach you will be helpful for anybody who's starting to write.

Perhaps even for skilled writers needing a bit of a touch up.

Here are my steps to quickly improve your writing:

Step 1: Write Every Day

I know, this a piece of advice as old as time––practice makes perfect.

Practice might not make perfect, but it will make your better. Start out small: write 250 words a day somewhere, could be a journal either physical or digital. If this is too strong a commitment, I used to have a one sentence journal, where I would write just one sentence a day.

Writing everyday you'll quickly see improvements.

Step 2: Structure Yourself Before You Wreck Yourself

Don't fall into the trap of starring at the blank page––it will cripple you.

Many people think that in order to be creative you need to be able to start from nothing and invent everything from word one. This is simply not necessary and has certainly kept me from writing many times. Instead, prep your page by writing an outline that could start with a headline of what you're going to write about and then insert bullets beneath with the points or story points you'll be touching.

Prepping the page has helped me more than anything else in terms of maintaining an active writing habit.

Step 3: Show Don't Tell

Writing is about planting images in the readers brain, so that they forget the words.

In the early days of my school career, I had a teacher that told us that we should picture a movie screen in our heads as we read, and have everything that happened in the story happen on that screen. In the same way should you write so clearly that the reader is able to follow this process. One example is to use vivid imagery like this:

Weekly Resource - Brandon Sanderson on Planners & Pantsers

Weekly Highligts

Free Resources

• Build An Email Newsletter (An Ultimate Guide)

• The Content Creation List (Template)

• Newsletter Template

• Medium Article (Template)

Until Next Time

Use these tips to get yourself started.

The most important part in writing is the one thing no one can teach you:

To write.

By writing you’ll learn more than what anyone can tell you. You’ll learn what you like and what you dislike.

You’ll also get to know a lot about yourself.