Writing is a personal challenge for me. I labor over every paragraph transition and lead-in sentence. I imagine my cut and paste commands growing weary as I organize and reorganize my thoughts on the screen. In the end, I usually settle on a flow that mirrors a logic proof. Deductive reasoning winning out over creative expression.
So it comes as no surprise that I prefer conveying ideas in lists and tables; direct and to the point. I opt for efficiency and simplicity over expressiveness. I like to think my readers are indeed mind-readers, able to fill in the gaps between items in a list and columns in a table. writing-online-outreach
You may have similar challenges to mine; you may have completely different it support. The first step to overcoming challenges is identifying them. Once you know what they are you can develop a process to overcome them and perhaps even leverage them to create your own personal writing style.
My own process starts by organizing my initial thoughts into a list (yes-I’ve leveraged my love for lists!). For example, I’m working on an article about the Green Building Code movement. My initial thoughts for this article took shape as a series of questions. The questions (listed below) provide a framework, a way to organize my research and begin a narrative about the meaning and importance of the movement.
- What is it and how is it different from current building codes?
- Why the transition–goals and aspirations for the new it support birmingham?
- What are the on-the-ground implications?
- What is the process for getting the new codes in place and how does one get involved?
As I fill in the answers to my initial questions, I may discover new and more interesting ones. The important thing for me is to put words on paper that can later be arranged into a coherent piece of writing.
As I refine the narrative–adding quotes, deleting run-on sentences, and crafting paragraph transitions–I imagine trying to explain the answers to a person I’ve just met at a coffee shop. In this imagined world of mine, the coffee-shop-acquaintance is of course passionate about sustainability and the built environment. Passion only goes so far though, I still have to hold their attention, make the topic relevant, and most importantly, respect their time.
The last piece of my writing process involves patience. I don’t procrastinate. I get the first draft done as early as possible. I spend more time refining the piece, playing with sentence structures and sub-headings than drafting the first version. This is the most difficult part of the process, which is why I reserve so much time for it.
So these are the tricks I use to get through a writing assignment, one that despite its many flaws has proven to be pretty effective. What’s your process like? What challenges have you overcome or leveraged to create a personal writing style?