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Blog • Perfecting your Craft

Posted on Feb 11, 2021

How to Become a Better Writer: 20 Hacks and Tips

Practically speaking, writing is just about putting one word after another. But as anyone who’s struggled with the question of how to become a better writer will tell you, there are sometimes entire worlds of frustration compressed in the seconds between setting each word down. If that sounds familiar, or you’re simply trying to improve your craft without the existential writerly despair, we’ve got 20 essential tips to share with you.

In this post, we’ll be sharing writing advice for everyone, but you can head to our more specific guides on starting from scratch, writing novels, nonfiction, and children’s books if that’s what you’re after:

  • How to Start Creative Writing: 7 Ways to Fast-Track Your Writing
  • How to Write a Novel: Writing an Amazing Book in 15 Steps
  • How to Write a Nonfiction Book in 6 Steps  
  • How to Write a Children's Book in 7 Surprisingly Simple Steps  

1. Start by spending more time writing

How to become a better writer | Malcolm Gladwell quote about practice making you better

  • You’ll get to know your own writing habits better, e.g. the time of day when you’re most productive, or the location where you’re most inspired to write;
  • You’ll develop writerly discipline (an essential skill if you ever hope to write a book or another long form project); 💪
  • You'll work out what you really like to write, whether that's literary fiction or epic fantasy;
  • You’ll stick around long enough for new ideas to occur to you (especially helpful if you’re a pantser, not a plotter ).

2. Practice reading books by other authors

How to become a better writer | Stephen King quote about how important it is for writers to read widely

On the level of vocabulary, sentence structure, and rhythm, the “ease and intimacy” King talks about occurs subliminally, beneath the surface of your consciousness, quietly sharpening your perceptive skills. On the level of plot or structure, you actively discover the creative strategies of other writers. Now aware of what others are doing with their words, you become a native to that “country of the writer”. 

Ultimately, the more wonderful things you feed your brain, the richer the pool of knowledge your creativity will be able to draw from.

📚 If you need recommendations, we’ve compiled reading lists for every taste here:

  • 25 Creative Writing Examples to Inspire You Today
  • The 115 Best Books of All Time
  • The 60 Best Nonfiction Books of the 21st Century
  • The 125 Best Children’s Books of All Time
  • The 30 Best Memoirs of the Last Century
  • The Best Short Stories and Collections Everyone Should Read

3. Pick up writing skills from other texts

Okay, enough with the subconscious magical learning — you also need to put in serious, active effort. That means taking apart passages that impress or move you and dissecting another writer’s methodology. 

This will be most helpful if you focus on texts in your genre or form: read respected newspapers or magazines if you’re hoping to submit to such publications, poetic collections if you long to publish poetry , academic papers by reputable academics if you’re a budding scholar. 

How to Become a Better Writer | Alexander Chee extract, annotated to show how you can learn by analyzing other writing

Read each sentence carefully, asking yourself how you would have gone about writing it. Notice the differences between each version: look closely at how the other writer avoids repetition and regulates sentence length, and become aware of all the words that could’ve gone into the sentence, but were trimmed out. If you remember the lessons you draw from this exercise, you’ll be on your way to becoming a better writer. 

If you struggle to write consistently, sign up for our How to Write a Novel course to finish a novel in just 3 months.  

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4. Study examples of writing theory

Time for some homework: aside from picking up other writers’ tricks by reading their work, you can also study up on basic writing theories . Learning about story structure and the different models that dramatists and fiction writers rely on, like Freytag’s pyramid or the classic three-act structure , is valuable for any aspiring writer. These models are guides to centuries of storytelling tradition: demonstrations of how you might apply a structure onto a story.

How to become a better writer | Freytag's pyramid

When it comes to expressing yourself, brushing up on your literary and rhetorical devices is also helpful. After all, as much as people like to pretend writing is a mystical art, divinely bestowed upon one by magical inspiration, a lot of it comes down to active effort on the writer’s part.

Head to these guides to literary and rhetorical devices if you’re ready for school:

💡 45+ Literary Devices and Terms Every Writer Should Know

💡 30+ Rhetorical Devices Everyone Must Know

FREE RESOURCE

FREE RESOURCE

Literary Devices Cheatsheet

Master these 40+ devices to level up your writing skills.

5. Create your own voice

Some people’s advice for learning how to write is to stick to templates. These can be wonderful if you’re writing something meant to be plain, like a legal document or a freelance proposal . (If this is the case, all you need to do to become a better writer is be accurate, precise, and grammatically correct.) For everything else, by all means inform yourself about things like story structure, but never adhere to templates to the point where your personality is extinguished.

If you’ve got a sense of humor, interests, opinions, or possess literally any other quality unique to human beings (as opposed to bots), you can channel that personality into your writing, and lift mundane subjects up with the buoyancy of your voice.

💡 Need an example? Check out this post on the best reading chairs written by Savannah, one of Reedsy’s writers. You might not have a passion for chairs, but you’ll stay for the engaging tone of her writing voice. 

6. Experiment with your writing style

How to Become a Better Writer | Samwell Tarly from Game of Thrones writing at his desk

Hit a plateau? If you don’t feel like you’re improving, it’s time to switch things up. Try writing something completely different to cleanse your palate with the literary equivalent of pickled ginger in a sushi restaurant. Experimentation seems to be working for George R.R. Martin, who has for decades been writing short stories , novellas and even reference books between instalments of his novel series A Song of Ice and Fire — evidently, switching between different forms has helped this author of epic fantasy stay inspired and motivated. 

We’ve got over 1,000 creative writing prompts you can browse for inspiration, as well as an interactive plot generator if you need someone to establish plot parameters for you. We know writers struggle to set themselves deadlines, so you could even join our weekly writing contest — we’re happy to provide you with some external pressure, and $250 if you manage to win!

7. Outline your book 

K66Km2r4Njw Video Thumb

Openings and endings don’t just matter in fiction. Inherent in all good writing is story: a narrative with a full-fledged arc that must start and end in places that make sense and add value to the entire text.

Writing students commonly struggle with slow or delayed story openings — where the writer takes too long to clear their throat. They can fill two or three paragraphs, several pages, or even an entire chapter before they get to something interesting. 

To sharpen your beginning, try deleting parts of it to get a feel of your work without them. You may find a later passage is more gripping to your reader — you’ll then know you’ve found your true opening.

Endings are similarly crucial. As editor and former publisher Jasmin Kirkbride points out, “Every subplot and all the different strands of your main plot should reach satisfying, clear conclusions. If they are meant to be left ambiguously, ensure your reader knows this, and create something out of that uncertainty.”

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8. Write with a clear vocabulary

As you edit your work , you’ll be thinking of what you intended to say at the time of writing. For that reason, you’ll need to maintain a level of mental alertness that enables you to evaluate whether or not what you ended up writing actually does convey what you wanted to say. This is particularly important if you’re writing nonfiction. 

How to Become a Better Writer | Example of wordy sentence before and after editing

9. Self-edit for errors in your prose

While we’re discussing lazy, unmemorable writing, this is a reminder that fillers are another literary ‘bad habit’ to actively resist. Cluttering up your prose, these short words sneakily crawl into your writing and distract your reader from the essence of your point. 

In her free Reedsy course on self-editing, Lisa Lepki identifies the most common words in the English language as the culprits of literary clutter. Lisa advises writers to avoid “meandering around [their sentences’] meaning”, and offers this sentence as a wordy example:

“Andy went over to the far end of the playground to see if there was a rake that he could use to tidy up all of the leaves that had fallen down in the night.”

Lisa offers this distilled alternative:

“Mountains of leaves had fallen overnight, so Andy checked the playground for a rake. ”

Sign up to take the rest of this free course here:

Free course: How to self-edit like a pro

Rid your manuscript of the most common writing mistakes with this 10-day online course. Get started now.

10. Cut the repetitive sentences

One practical way to become a better writer is by consciously analyzing your writing to identify repetitive patterns. This is hard to do during the drafting process, especially if you write your first draft quickly , but it’s mercifully simple in retrospect. So dig out some past writing samples ( creative nonfiction , poems, short stories — anything will do), grab some coloring pencils or highlighters, and mark every instance of repetitive language.

Study your words on multiple levels:

  • The lexical level, i.e. specific verbs, adverbs or adjectives you might be repeating (are your characters constantly grinning?);
  • The sentence structure level, like if all your examples come in threes;
  • The narrative structure level, like if you unwittingly but consistently lapse into new flashbacks.

The point of this exercise is to identify your personal linguistic reflexes — known in linguistics as your “idiolect”. In terms of language use, it’s your fingerprint, and familiarizing yourself with it can help you identify repetition and edit it out of your writing.

💡 If you want to learn more about idiolects, check out this post by one of Reedsy’s writers.

11. Avoid clichéd language  

Clichés are every writer’s stumbling block, ever an uphill battle — though the battle has its ups and its downs, and what matters most is not the destination, but the friends we made along the way. You get our point, hopefully: clichés are lazy, overly familiar, platitudinous, and often boring. Every time you use a cliché, you’re wasting an opportunity to be original and authentic. 

Primarily, our issue with clichés is no moral qualm about authenticity. It’s the simple fact that they completely drain your writing of its ability to be memorable. Lifeless, it falls to the ground, faceless and forgotten.

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12. Understand the ideas behind your work

You’ve already taken the first step toward seeing the bigger picture by honing your opening and ending. Now it’s time to look at all the extraneous stuff outside your text: in other words, situate your writing within a wider framework of similar work. 

How to Become a Better Writer | Alan Lightman quote, to show the importance of providing context

13. Respect your reader’s attention 

Don’t lose sight of the fact that there’s a person on the other end of the line. Be a compassionate writer by imagining yourself as the reader: is that fourth paragraph detailing the history of a secondary character’s nomadic tribe really necessary? It’s certainly great world-building , but if it puts your reader to sleep, it’s got to go. 

Similarly, do not manipulate your reader. Pointless plot twists or clickbait will erode your readers’ trust, and hollow hot takes will impress no one. Stick to substance, and skip the paratextual circus act.

14. Get feedback from an editor

Nobody writes flawlessly. Most published writing undergoes significant editing both by its author and professional editors. For example, Raymond Carver’s classic short story collection What We Talk About When We Talk About Love is known to have been extensively shaped by Carver’s editor, Gordon Lish. 

No matter what you’re writing, give your work time to cool before stepping back into it with the fresh eyes of an editor. Assess the clarity of your meaning, expressions, overall structure, your tone, and the mood of the piece, and compare these to the vision you had when you were writing.

Any writing intended for publication should also be professionally edited — and lucky for you, you can hire some of the most experienced fiction or nonfiction editors in the publishing world, right here on Reedsy.

become a better writer in 6 minutes

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The best editors are on Reedsy. Sign up for free and meet them.

Learn how Reedsy can help you craft a beautiful book.

15. Be open to constructive criticism

How to become a better writer | Professor Bhaer from Little Women

Becoming a writer means releasing your work into the world, and with that comes both praise and criticism. But neither will help you become a better writer if you shut all feedback out. Though some of the criticism you’ll receive may not be helpful, some of it will be, and you’ll struggle to improve your writing if you refuse to see that. Open your heart up to constructive criticism, and you’ll see your writing flourish.

16. Invest in your career with a writing course

While we’re on the topic of learning: there’s plenty of classes and courses you can take, if you’d rather study in a more structured way. If you’re serious about becoming a better writer, whether that’s an author, journalist, ghostwriter , or freelancer , a class can give you access to the wisdom of more experienced professionals — and a real-life class also means meeting mentors and kindred spirits. 

You can check out writing courses online — we’ve got a bunch of completely free courses you can take:

FREE COURSE

FREE COURSE

Author and ghostwriter Tom Bromley will guide you from page 1 to the finish line.

👩‍🎓 How to Write a Business Book —  taught by business coach Alison Jones

👩‍🎓 The Non-Sexy Business of Non-Fiction — taught by author coach Azul Terronez

Still hungry? Consider pursuing a writing degree. These aren’t just for people looking for creative writing classes — MFAs also focus on nonfiction, so if that’s what you see yourself writing, there are plenty of options. Only you know which program and school would be the best fit for you, and the Internet will be your friend as you work the answer out.

17. Keep company with other writers

Everything’s better with company. Whether your choice is to join a local writing group, critique circle , or an online Facebook group, having friends who are writers means you’ll have someone to bounce ideas off, someone to support you if you feel insecure about your writing, someone to inspire you to work harder, and someone to offer you advice and opinions about your project. All important aspects of improving your skills! ✊

18. Write content consistently

6G3svgnlsq0 Video Thumb

Writing takes a lot of determination and discipline, especially when you’re working on a longer work like a book or a series . Sometimes things won’t work out, and you’ll be frustrated, impatient, demotivated, and temporarily hopeless. All of this is fine, and an entirely normal part of the process. When you get to this stage, be gentle with yourself, but do not give up. 

Writers are often the most stubborn of people: so go ahead and keep writing in spite of yourself, in spite of your insecurities or personal failures, and in spite of what anyone else might think. If that doesn’t earn you the ‘badge’ of a writer, we don’t know what does.

19. Don’t give up on your words

Your ideas will be exciting, but they won’t always be masterpieces. Some you can fix with a zealous edit. Others, not so much. Accept this as a reality and let them float down the river of oblivion. 

We know this sounds contradictory to our last bit of advice, but trust your intuition to decide whether it’s worth persevering with a particular project. For example, there’s no point in trying to resurrect the passion you had for a project you started long ago, if the inspiration has long since left you. There is also little point in pursuing something you began simply because you felt it was what you were supposed to be writing. If it doesn’t speak to you anymore and you see no way to revive the spark, cut your losses and move on. 

20. Embrace failure to become a better writer

Finally, just as you’ll have to handle criticism, you’ll also undoubtedly face rejection and failure. Whether you’re rejected by literary agents , fail to get a publishing deal, or have your stories, pitches, or poems rejected by literary publications, you must remember that failure is an inescapable and inevitable fact of life, and does not determine your worth as a writer. 

How to Become a Better Writer | CV of Failures

Be assured that others fail, too, even if they only fail in private. One of our favorite reminders of how common failure is is the famous CV of failures published by Princeton professor Johannes Haushofer , where he lists every program, award, and position he was rejected from, as a reminder that everyone experiences failure. And if you need a writer-specific example of success despite failure, remember that Douglas Stuart’s novel Shuggie Bain , winner of the 2020 Booker Prize, was rejected 32 times before it received a publisher’s offer.

You don’t need anybody to officially ordain you as a writer — you’re a writer if you believe you’re a writer and write anyway. 

We hope these tips help you figure out how to become a better writer. Your quest is noble, and we believe in you! 

Continue reading

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11 Tips on How To Become a Better Writer [In Less Than 1 Hour]

Isabelle Catoni

Have you ever dreamed of crafting so beautiful and moving sentences that could make even a rusty nail shed a tear? I confess I have, too! But between juggling commitments and that pesky inner voice whispering doubts, who has the time to hone their writing skills truly? Fear not, fellow word warriors! This post is your secret weapon with 11 tips on how to become a better writer under 60 minutes. 

So, grab your favorite beverage, settle in, and prepare to uncover your William Shakespeare within. Even if your current prose resembles a kindergarten finger-painting masterpiece, these easy-to-digest writing tips will take your writing go from ‘meh’ to ‘wow’ . 

Okay, now, without further ado…LETS DIVE RIGHT IN!

11 Simple Tips to Become a Better Writer Under 60 Minutes 

First impressions are EVERYTHING. You don’t want to scare your readers away with giant walls of text that scream high-school history.

How to avoid that red flag?

Air out the words. Let them breathe.

Hit ‘enter’ after every 1-2 sentences. Paragraphs should be no longer than that.

Sort out information using bullet points/lists.

Don’t forget that people are naturally attracted to beauty.

Hit ‘em with Loss!

For some weird reason, the fear of loss hits readers 10X harder than the joy of gaining.

Verify your password to help protect your account.

Verify your password or risk losing all your money from your account.

The first one gets a yawn, “Yeah, sure, after this video, maybe…” 

The last one sets your butt on fire. You rush to do whatever is told.

80% Benefits, 20% Features – Non-negotiable to Become a Better Writer

News flash! No one gives a penny about how great your product is, if there is nothing in it for THEM. So, to keep them from scrolling past, the 80-20 method is a no-brainer.

This shampoo is free from sulfur compounds, artificial coloring, and other harmful additives to protect your hair.

Protect your precious hair from split ends, damaged roots, and falling off to get smooth, shiny, silky hair with our new organic shampoo.

Which one will you scroll past, and which one will you buy? I am sure we are both thinking the same thing. Right?

It’s time to let go of your high school English lessons, where you show off your stack of fancy vocab. Ditch hard-to-digest words to become a better writer. 

This is the new age where clarity troops clever.

Do NOT risk burying your actual message under a pile of complex words and technical jargon.

If your intriguing phrases make your feeble-minded readers with the attention span of a humble goldfish have to squint their eyes and strain their neurons more than their expectations, it is highly plausible they will depart, never to return.

Making your readers’ eyes glaze over is a surefire way to lose them permanently.

See? So cut the fluff and keep it simple and convey better.

Current-Moment Bias

In a world where time is money, you must build up the value of your product/service by emphasizing HOW much they are getting while spending HOW less time, effort, and resources.

It took me 100 days to learn this. Take it away in less than 10 minutes.

(Oh, that’s a great deal! 10 mins? I can spare that ) 

Highlight the contrast, agitate the offer, and sweeten the deal. They will not resist.

Ditch Adverbs, Get Strong Verbs

I mean EXACTLY what I said.

Throw away your sack of adverbs and hire some verbs on steroids. Yeah, not just ANY verbs, the ones with CRUSHING IMPACT.

She closed the door loudly .

She slammed the door.

Read it aloud in your mind. Which one has a stronger impact? The red or green?

Verbs of Achievement

Listen, unless it’s a tragic tale or an eulogy, you want to constantly shift your readers’ mindset towards success, accomplishments, Nutella… good stuff.

You need to create that mood, that clear breeze that seems to blow away all the doubts and fills them with warm confidence.

How? By literally saying they can DO it. (Get it, verbs = action words = do) 

Succeed Achieve Advance Master

The list is much bigger than that.

Just remember, the way to the pocket is through the mind.

Challenge Common Beliefs

“Pollution is amazing.

That is if you fancy living on Mars.”

See, the 1st line makes you think, “Hey, have you lost your mind?” Which makes you automatically read the next lines out of sheer curiosity.

The easiest way to stand out in a crowd of millions, to become a better writer, and to go against convention. Stand against the tide.

It sticks out like a sore thumb.

Stick out a Scarecrow. They are out standing. (OK, sorry. Lets move on)

Simple Language

This one is similar to Point 4 .

TALK with your audience the same way you talk with your best friend for maximum engagement.

Keep things simple, conversational, and easy to understand. Readers WILL be hooked.

Optimize Bullet-Points

You already covered bullet points for aesthetics, right? But this might just backfire if you don’t know how to do it right.

So how do you do it right?

By keeping things as short and concise as possible. Take this for an example.

-make money by writing online

-make money by freelancing

-make money by dancing in public

How to make money by

-writing online

-freelancing

-dancing in public

Avoid repeating the same words at every point, and just say it once to sound like a better writer.

The lighter your bullets, the faster and more effectively they can penetrate minds.

Customer-Centric Copy

Hey, you want to make more sales, right? You want your words to convert casual onlookers into paid customers, right?

Then, target your copy FOR your potential clients. Make them FEEL SPECIAL.

Copywriting can make you rich. 

You can get rich with copywriting.

Put your audience to the forefront. On the subject.

By some miracle, you actually ENJOYED the read. And you actually realize how much value you gained with a simple 5-minute read. And maybe only if you are one of the rarest and most special species are you craving for MORE to become a better writer?

Well, if that was a yes, then CONGRATULATIONS!

You have successfully passed Level 1, where 97% of people fail. So, start implementing the above and stand out as the best writer in your circle. 

Isabelle Catoni

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How to Become a Better Writer: 32 Proven Tips

Whether you’re a beginner or have been at it for decades, writing well is flat hard work.

I’ve written and published nearly 200 books, including 21 New York Times bestsellers, and I still take daily steps to improve my writing.

One doesn’t arrive at good writing. It’s a lifelong pursuit.

Maybe you write daily but feel your writing is still lacking. Or it’s as if you’ve hit a brick wall.

Many struggling writers would’ve given up by now, but you genuinely believe that with help, you could become the writer you want to be and see your message reach the masses.

Let’s see if you’re right.

I can’t turn you into a bestselling author overnight, and I’d caution you to look with suspicion on anyone who says they can.

But I do believe I can help improve your writing immediately.

  • How to Become a Better Writer: My Best Advice

How to Become a Better Writer

1. Don’t aim to write a bestseller.

That’s the last thing I think about when I start a new book .

I have no control over the market, sales, reviews, and all the rest. All I can control is how much of myself I give to a writing project.

To have any chance at success, my writing must come from my passions, the overflow of what drives me.

What’s your passion? Your strength? What drives you ?

Write about that. 

Your passion will keep you at the keyboard and motivate you when the writing gets tough —and if you’re doing it right, it always gets tough.

2. Always think reader-first.

Write Think Reader First on a sticky note and place it on your screen or somewhere you can see it while you’re writing.

Your sole job is to tell a story so compelling , so memorable your reader gets lost in it from the get-go.

Treat your readers the way you want to be treated and write what you would want to read.

That’s the Golden Rule of Writing .

Never let up, never bore. Always put your reader first.

3. Establish a strict writing routine.

Writing a book takes time, and lots of it. If you write only when you feel inspired, you’ll never finish. You need the discipline of a regular habit .

Schedule your writing time in your calendar and make it non-negotiable.

Track your progress: Your words or pages per day, or writing for a certain amount of time.

Set a deadline. Determine the number of words or pages you need to write every day to make your deadline. Just make sure your per-day production goals are realistic so you don’t get discouraged and quit.

Finally, even if you have to occasionally adjust the number of pages you finish per day, keep your deadline sacred at all cost.

4. Eliminate distractions.

Create a dedicated space for writing. It doesn’t have to be perfect — a writer should be able to write anywhere. 

Buy the best chair you can afford. You can’t be productive if you’re uncomfortable.

Keep on hand and close by all the supplies you’ll need.

Ruthlessly protect your writing time. Don’t let meetings, interruptions, household chores, or the Internet get in the way. Turn off your email and social media, block notifications, and hang a Do Not Disturb sign outside your door.

5. Start writing.

Good prep work will help you write with less frustration.

You need at least a basic structure — even if you’re not an outliner — whether writing fiction or nonfiction .

Preparation requires research (see #25), but even that can become a contributor to procrastination . Decide when you have enough information to begin writing, and get to it. 

If you’re writing fiction, study the best ways to start a story .

6. Avoid throat-clearing.

That’s a term we in the writing business use for any writing that stalls a story or chapter by beginning with anything but the good stuff.

Cut the setup, the description, the setting, the philosophizing, and get on with the story.

7. Show, don’t tell.

Telling spoon feeds your reader information rather than allowing her to deduce what’s going on.

Showing triggers the theater of her mind (see #10).

Telling: It was late fall.

Showing: Leaves crunched beneath his feet.

Telling: It was cold.

Showing: He tightened his collar and turned his face from the biting wind.

“Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.” — Anton Chekhov

Click here to read more about this concept .

8. Avoid telling what’s not happening.

“He didn’t respond.”

“She didn’t say anything.”

“The room never got quiet.”

If you don’t say it happened, we won’t assume it did.

9. Introduce your main character early, by name.

The biggest mistake new writers make is introducing their main character too late.

As a rule, he should be the first person on stage and the reader should be able to associate his name with how they see him.

10. Trigger the theater of your reader’s mind.

Ever wonder why the book is usually better than the movie?

Not even Hollywood, with all its creativity and high tech CGI capability, can compete with the theater of our imagination.

My mind conjures images of everything an author implies.

Give your readers just enough information to engage their imagination, making them partners in the experience, not just audience members.

11. Cut dialogue to the bone.

Unless you’re revealing a character as a brainiac or a blowhard, omit unnecessary words from dialogue .

Obviously, you wouldn’t render a conversation the way a court transcript includes repetition and even um, ah, uh, etc.

See how much you can chop while virtually communicating the same point.

“ What do you w Want to do this Sunday? I thought we could go to the amusement park Sunday.”

“I was thinking about renting a rowboat,” Vladimir said. “On one of the lakes.”

“ Oh, Vladimir, that sounds w Wonderful! I’ve never gone rowing before .”

This doesn’t mean your dialogue has to be choppy — just cut the dead wood.

You’ll be surprised by how much power cutting adds.

12. Omit needless words.

Less is more.

Tighten, tighten, tighten.

Again, you’ll find cutting almost always adds power to your prose .

13. Choose the normal word over the fancy one.

By showing off your vocabulary or flowery turns of phrase, you draw attention to the writing itself rather than the content.

That’s the very definition of author intrusion.

Get out of the way of your art.

14. Use active voice vs. passive voice.

The easiest way to spot passive voice is to look for state-of-being verbs and often the word by .

Passive: A good time was had by all.

Active: Everybody had a good time.

Passive: The party was planned by Jill.

Active: Jill planned the party.

Passive: The book was read to the children by the teacher.

Active: The teacher read the book to the children.

Avoiding passive voice will set you apart from much of your competition. Even better, it adds clarity.

15. Avoid mannerisms of attribution.

Have people say things, not wheeze, gasp, laugh, grunt, snort, reply, retort, exclaim, or declare them.

Sometimes people whisper or shout or mumble , but let your choice of words imply whether they are grumbling, etc.

If it’s important that they sigh or laugh, separate the action from the dialogue:

Jim sighed. “I just can’t take it anymore.”

16. Avoid began to …

…laugh, or cry, or shout, or run. People don’t just begin to do these things. They do them.

Just say it: He laughed, she cried, Fred shouted, Traci ran…

17. Eliminate clichés.

And not just words and phrases.

Also, root out situational clichés , like:

  • Starting your story with the main character waking up
  • Having a character describe himself while standing before a mirror
  • Having future love interests literally bump into each other when they first meet
  • Having a shot ring out, only to have the shooter be a surprise third party who kills the one who had the drop on the hero
  • Having the seemingly dead or unconscious or incapacitated villain spring back to life just when we thought the hero had finally saved the day

Avoid the dream cliché .

It’s okay to have people dream, but eliminate the dreadful cliché of spelling out an entire harrowing scene and then surprising the reader by having the character wake up.

That’s been used to death and lets the air out of the balloon of your story.

Also, avoid heart and breathing clichés: pounded, raced, thudded, hammered, gasped, sucked wind, etc . 

If you render the scary situation compellingly enough, you need not tell the reader anything about your character’s heartbeat or breath. The reader should experience those himself.

18. Avoid on-the-nose writing.

A Hollywood term for writing that mirrors real life without advancing the story, on-the-nose writing is the most common mistake I see in otherwise good writing. Click that link and master this, and you’ll be miles ahead of your competition.

19. Use adjectives sparingly.

Good writing is a thing of strong nouns and verbs, not adjectives.

20. Avoid the words up and down —unless they’re really needed.

He rigged [up] the device.

She sat [down] on the couch.

21. Read The Elements of Style by William Strunk Jr. and E.B. White

The Elements of Style

This short paperback is recommended by every writing teacher I know and should be at the top of your list if you want to improve your writing skills .

I’ve read it at least once a year for more than 40 years. Its simple truths cover everything you need to know about style and grammar.

Click here to get the book .

22. Give your readers credit.

They understand more than you think.

Example: “They walked through the open door and sat down across from each other in chairs.”

If they walked in and sat, we can assume the door was open, the direction was down, and — unless told otherwise — there were chairs.

So you can write: “They walked in and sat across from each other.”

23. Use powerful verbs.

Ever wonder why an otherwise grammatically correct sentence lies there like a dead fish?

Your sentence might be full of those adjectives and adverbs your teachers and loved ones so admired in your writing when you were a kid. But the sentence doesn’t work.

Something I learned from The Elements of Style years ago changed the way I write and added verve to my prose:  “Focus on nouns and verbs, not adjectives and adverbs.”

To learn how, read my post 249 Strong Verbs That’ll Instantly Supercharge Your Writing .

A couple of things to watch for:

  • Avoid hedging verbs like: smiled slightly , almost laughed , frowned a bit , etc. Characters either smile, laughs, frown, or they don’t.
  • Avoid state-of-being verbs: is, am, are, was, etc. Not: There was a man standing on the train platform. Rather: A man stood on the train platform.

24. Resist the urge to explain (RUE).

Marian was mad. She pounded the table. “George, you’re going to drive me crazy,” she said , angrily .

“You can do it!” George encouraged .

We need not be told Marian was mad if we see her pound the table. And we know she said what she said in anger.

25. Conduct your research.

Though fiction, by definition, is made up, to succeed it must be believable. Even fantasies must make sense.

Once the reader has accepted your premise, what follows must be logical. Effective research is key to adding the specificity necessary to make this work .

Accurate details add flavor and authenticity. Get details wrong and your reader loses confidence — and interest — in your story.

The essentials:

  • Consult Atlases and World Almanacs to confirm geography and cultural norms and find character names that align with the setting, period, and customs . If your Middle Eastern character flashes someone a thumbs up, be sure that means the same in his culture as it does in yours.
  • Online and hard copy Encyclopedias.
  • YouTube and online search engines can yield tens of thousands of results.
  • A Thesaurus , not to find the most exotic word, but to find that normal word that’s on the tip of your tongue.
  • In-person interviews with experts. People love to talk about their work, and often such conversations lead to more story ideas.

And remember, research detail should be used as seasoning. Don’t make it the main course—that should be your story itself.

26. Become a ferocious self-editor.

Agents and editors can tell within two pages whether a manuscript is worthy of further consideration.

That sounds unfair, and maybe it is. But it’s a reality we writers need to face.

Learn to aggressively self-edit using many of the tools I’ve given you here.

Never submit writing with which you’re not entirely happy.

27. Develop a thick skin.

Every piece of published writing is a duet between editor and writer, not a solo. Learn to take criticism, especially from professionals who are on your side and want you to succeed.

28. Finish your first draft.

Writing is rewriting, and you can’t rewrite a blank page.

If you never finish your first draft, you’ll never publish a book.

Don’t fall prey to the myth of writer’s block . No other profession is allowed such an excuse for not working.

Suffering from writer’s fear? That fear is justified. Writing is tough and competition is fierce. Embrace your fear and channel it into motivation to do your best work every time. 

Procrastinating? Embrace that too. It’s inevitable and can actually be helpful, so schedule it.

Stalling because you’re a perfectionist? Put perfectionism in its proper place — during the editing and revision stage. As Margaret Atwood says, “If I waited for perfection, I would never write a word.”

29. Jump start your creative juices.

Some days you’ll struggle to write even a few sentences and may wonder if you’re a writer at all.

It happens to all of us.

That’s when it’s wise to try a few writing exercises .

30. read your writing aloud., it’s a great way to check your self-edit and see where your story may bog down., 31. vary sentence length..

Sentence structure can dramatically impact your writing. 

Run-on sentences and sentence fragments may get an essay downgraded, but they can enhance your prose if used judiciously.  

32. Become a voracious reader.

Your career as a writer can end before it starts unless you make time to read.

You won’t find the time — you have to carve it out of your busy schedule.

That might seem impossible with your busy life, but how badly do you want to become a published author?

Writers are readers. Good writers are good readers. Great writers are great readers.

  • You Can Improve Your Writing Skills

I’ve dedicated most of my life to coaching writers because I love paying forward all I’ve learned and seeing you succeed.

Practicing these 32 tips won’t turn you into an overnight success — writing is hard, exhausting, time-consuming work. And if it isn’t, you’re probably not doing it right. But all that effort can be worth it.

Dreamers talk about writing. Writers write. So don’t quit.

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How to write better: a quick-start guide for anyone and everyone

Anne Ichikawa

Anne Ichikawa

become a better writer in 6 minutes

Just about everyone knows how to write — but writing well is something different. Great writers are formed through hard work and a passion for learning. But just like you, they all started from the beginning.

Problem is, a lot of “start writing well’ articles focus on the result. But good writing begins before you tippity-tap on that keyboard. Studying everyday practices, learning how to organize your thoughts, and then turning those ideas into effective writing should be your priority.

Whether you’re a blogger , an SEO writer, a marketer, or want to be the next Stephen King, these universal writing tips give you lots of ways to write better.

15 writing tips to help you write better

1. think before you start writing.

One of the best writing tips for beginners is organizing your thoughts in a logical, explainable manner before putting pen on paper. The biggest hurdle is often not knowing how to begin or what to say—everything is a jumble of ideas that probably look like a bunch of paint thrown against a wall (and not in an artistic way). It can be very frustrating.

Note: THIS IS NORMAL. Don’t get discouraged. There’s a reason the phrase “writer’s block” exists. Let yourself think about it for a day or two, especially if you’re doing creative writing. You’ll be surprised at how that paint blob slowly transforms into a recognizable shape.

2. Embrace the writing “brain dump”

In business writing , the “brain dump” signals the beginning of every new project or assignment. It’s the opportunity to get whatever is in your head out on digital paper in a stream of consciousness.

Avoid correcting misspellings, typos, sentence structure, or grammar—just type, type, type until your brain excavates all musings. You can use this creative writing skill for all kinds of work, from personal blogging and copywriting to essays and work emails.

Remember that at this phase of writing: bad ideas don’t exist. Your best creative ideas will come when you’re not held back by perfectionism.

3. Make an outline

Now that you have all your wonderful, messy thoughts on paper, it’s time to get more granular and organized. Some tips on how to edit your brain dump: do a first pass and delete the parts that are definite “nos.” Then go through again and highlight the ideas you like best. Revisit the “maybes” later.

Now, take your favorites and as briefly or as detailed as you like, make an outline that conveys your message. Start top-level with your biggest, overarching ideas, and then get into the details. Fill in missing parts, elaborate on other parts—rinse and repeat until satisfied.

4. Know your audience

This is a straightforward writing tip for beginners, but a lot of people forget it. For example, your voice and elements of style for personal blogging will be much more informal than business writing (i.e writing a proposal for a new client). Being mindful of your audience is key to improving writing skills and creating more impactful work.

5. Keep a journal

Being a better writer means writing more! Keeping a journal should be a very low-pressure thing. It can be as simple as writing a list of things you did that day, playing around with word choice for a LinkedIn headline, or recounting a conversation you had with a friend.

If you don’t want to keep a physical journal, you can start a note on your phone or a document on your computer. The point is—there are no journaling rules. Just start writing whenever you feel like it, because the more you do it, the more naturally it will come to you.

6. Pen a letter instead of texting

Great writers write letters for fun and for practice. Pen a letter (or an email) to a friend who lives in another city. A hundred years ago, people wrote long letters detailing everything from the mundane to faraway travel. Why not now? It’s the perfect way to get your creative writing juices flowing, rather than relying on boring texts.

Remember to check spelling, comma use, sentence structure, typos, etc. Your friends deserve good writing too. Spell-check is a nice starting point, but writing well happens when you use a reputable grammar or punctuation checker tool like  Writer  to support you.

7. Read more to do better writing

One of the best, passive ways of becoming a better writer is to read a book (Stephen King’s work makes for great binge reading). Not into books? Long-form business writing, graphic novels, or short stories do the trick as well.

Reading every day puts you in the fast lane for improving your writing skills. As  Roz Morris , the author of the bestseller book,  Nail Your Novel , puts it: “Reading exposes us to writing that’s better than our own and helps us to improve. Reading—the good and the bad—inspires you.”

By reading more, your brain will naturally pick up on things like good word choice, different writing styles, and good sentence structures. It also improves your reading comprehension and concentration levels (which comes in handy for the procrastinators among us, including me).

8. Keep your writing simple

As the legendary American novelist, Jack Kerouac, once said, “One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.”

One big misconception about writing is that it should be full of beautiful prose and impressive words. Wrong! Sure, I can use the word 'floccinaucinihilipilification,' but most people will just think my cat walked across my keyboard. Click To Tweet

No matter who they are, you should empower readers with your words. Complex writing can leave readers feeling insecure, weary, or both. To simplify your writing:

  • Replace adverbs with more powerful verbs (e.g. she talked quietly > she whispered)
  • Get rid of unnecessary adjectives
  • Opt for simple word choice
  • Delete fluff (e.g. instead of saying “in order to”, say “to”)

Go ahead and make use of a thesaurus, but don’t try to be a Shakespeare or even an Ernest Hemingway—just keep it simple and true to yourself.

9. Tone up your tone in writing

Getting tone right is key to being a good writer. It’s the personality of your writing, influenced by the type of writing you’re doing and who you’re talking to.

Just like we said in “Know Your Audience,” business writing like an email might sound conservative, while a personal social media post can be friendly and casual. Your tone can and should change depending on your needs. An extreme example: don’t start a cover letter with: “Hey, dude! Wassup?”

10. Prioritize your key points

If you want to learn how to write good, sentence structure and word placement is everything. If you have a question to ask, don’t put it in the middle of a paragraph, because it could get skipped over. Similarly, if you have an important piece of information to share, make it into its own paragraph or strategically place it in the introduction or conclusion—the sections readers tend to pay attention to the most.

11. Break up your writing into bite-size bits

Long sentences that are full of fluff are boring to read! Like staring directly at the sun—you just have to look away. Instead of creating a heavy block of text, break down large sections of information into concise, punchy sentences. Bullet points in particular are an amazing tool. They help you:

  • Communicate information effectively and quickly
  • Emphasize important points that are more easily remembered
  • Provide easily digestible information to the reader

(See? They come in handy) AI writing software  like Writer can help you be a better writer by identifying paragraphs that are hard to read.

12. Use active voice

Once you’re comfortable with sentence structure, punctuation and comma use, and word choice, it’s time to look at elements of style. One core element is passive voice vs. active voice.

An active voice is key for effective writing. It makes for a much more engaging read, conveying a strong and clear tone. Whereas passive voice pulls you away from the action, which can create an apathetic experience.

Here’s an example:

  • Active voice: The thief stole one million dollars (subject + verb + object).
  • Passive voice: One million dollars was stolen by the thief (object + past participle + subject).

See how in the first sentence, the subject performs the action? This eliminates extra processing time by getting to the point faster, unlike the passive voice example which puts the subject at the end of the sentence.

13. Edit (then edit again)

Now that you’ve overcome writer’s block and have the first draft, it’s time to move on to the editing process. Chances are, you’re not a professional editor, but that doesn’t matter—you can do a great job on your own. First, don’t edit immediately after writing. You want fresh eyes on that baby. Revisit it the next day and it will be easier to look for:

  • unnecessary words (like adverbs and adjectives)
  • long sentences that can be shortened
  • passive voice use

At this phase, don’t worry about grammatical errors. Right now, you’re editing for clarity of your ideas and thoughts.

14. Proof your writing

Proofreading  is where you check spelling, punctuation (i.e. comma use), run-on sentences, typos … you get the picture. Spell-check is a good starting point, a reputable grammar checker tool like Writer gives you advanced support.

Whenever possible, ask a real human to read your writing. They’ll likely be able to point out any writing mistakes  and even offer suggestions. Over time, the lessons you learn from using these tools will help you become a great writer.

15. Reflect on your main point

We’ve made it to the very end. You’ve taken your idea and found many words to make into numerous sentences that communicate your intended message… or did you?

The last step is to always take an objective look at your writing. Pretend you’re a total stranger. Now ask yourself—does the narration make logical sense? Can you read it once and understand its message? Even better, can you sum it up in a few sentences? If so, you’ve written something you can feel good about.

8 exercises to improve writing skills

Here are fun activities you can do every day to become a better writer.

1. Write every day

This is the best writing tip for beginners. Write like it’s your job. Practicing every day is key to learning how to write good. It helps you stretch those writing muscles and learn from doing. Keeping a journal with you at all times also means you can write whenever inspiration strikes, like when you’re walking your fave four-legged friend.

Write every day, and you’ll turn it into a habit. That doesn’t mean you have to write ten thousand words every day, as the author of the children’s novel,  See You in the Cosmos , Jack Cheng says:

“When mastery is the goal, spending an exorbitant number of hours in one sitting will likely lead to burnout. We don’t go to the gym expecting to put on 20 pounds of muscle in a single, day-long workout. Instead, we do several short workouts a week, spread out over months.”

2. Turn long paragraphs into bullet points

Want to learn how to write better sentences? Sentences that are easy to read and get to the point right away? Practice the art of brevity by chopping up hard-to-read paragraphs into succinct bullets.

This is especially useful for business writing because your readers are likely short on time. They want you to get to the point fast! And they want easy to digest information.

There is a place for long sentences in your work though, especially when it comes to creative writing. Writology has a great guide on this full of ace writing tips for beginners.

3. Change passive voice into active voice

A little recap on passive and active voice: Active voice is when the sentence starts with the subject acting on the verb. Passive voice is when the subject is a recipient of the verb’s action. Active voice is more engaging because it takes less processing time from the reader, and also gives the impression that the action is happening now, not in the past.

Use an AI writing platform like Writer  to spot unengaging instances of passive voice and transform them into the active voice. This will help you draw readers in and make your writing easier to read.

4. Use grammar checker tools like Writer

Use a grammar checker like Writer helps you spot mistakes you may have missed. Mistakes such as misused commas, spelling errors, typos, incorrect use of words (we’re looking at you, thesaurus lovers), etc. Writer is also ideal for business writing. You can submit your company style guide and the app will measure your written work against it to ensure consistent and on-brand content.

5. Proof your friend’s or colleague’s writing

One effective way to improve writing skills:  Proofreading  other people’s content. You can pick up on  common grammar mistakes , different sentence structures, new words, word placement – everything that you might not learn from your own writing. It’s about getting a fresh perspective on all the different ways language is used.

Bonus: you get all the good feelings for helping someone out. And they might even return the favor one day!

6. Write fanfiction

Improve your creative writing skills by writing about stories and characters you love. Why? The more passionate you are about what you’re writing, the more fun and engaging it will be to read. Because you’ll naturally inject your love of the subject into your work. Plus, you can ensure your favorite novels or short stories live on through that amazing imagination of yours! It’s also a great place to start if your idea bank is running on empty, giving you the inspiration and direction needed to write freely.

7. Read out loud

Sometimes you can’t tell if a word or phrase doesn’t work until you read it out loud. Same with spotting mistakes. This is especially true if you’ve read your work over a hundred times (hello fellow perfectionists). Your brain will find it more and more difficult to spot mistakes – reading out loud can fix this!

When you read out loud, it requires you to slow down and focus on every single word that you’re saying, so that it can make its way from your brain to your mouth. When we proofread inwardly, we tend to rush through things and don’t actually read the text properly.

That’s because our brain already has a version of the content embedded and it wants to concentrate on the meaning rather than the words. As psychologist Tom Stafford, who studies typos at the University of Sheffield in the UK, says : “We don’t catch every detail, we’re not like computers or NSA databases Rather, we take in sensory information and combine it with what we expect, and we extract meaning.”

8. Read books on how to write better

These books on how to write better are simple, easy to read, and full of valuable info.

  • Everybody Writes by Ann Handley – for business writing, marketing, and blogging
  • On Writing  by Stephen King – for writing novels and improving your creative writing skills
  • Write Tight  by William Brohaugh – for business and creative writing, with lots of writing tips for beginners
  • The Sense of Style  by Steven Pinker – for writing novels, letters and understanding the sciences of mind when it comes to language
  • You Are a Writer  by Jeff Goins – for business writers with great writing tips for beginners
  • Nail Your Novel  by Roz Morris – for budding novelists who want to polish their first draft or write a book

That’s your next vacation reading list sorted!

Now you can write better

It’s time to unleash your amazing writing skills and creativity! Got a friend who also wants to learn how to write well? Share the tips you’ve learned today. By teaching them, you’ll embed them further into your wonderful brain.

Write with clarity and confidence when using Writer.  Sign up for your free trial .

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Home » Writing » How to become a better writer

become a better writer in 6 minutes

2. Stay focused

Distraction is a persistent and powerful enemy when you are cultivating any creative practice, so you’ve got to train your focus. Once you settle into a writing session, resist the urge to get up for coffee, water the plants, check emails, or scroll through social media. Even a small disruption can take away precious minutes of attention and interrupt your flow. For the best results, remove the biggest temptations before you begin writing (silence your phone and close any open windows on your computer).

3. Read as much as possible

Successful writers have clocked countless hours studying other authors. If you want to become a better writer, you should read more books in a variety of genres, make notes when you find writing you love, and think about what excites you. Also, notice what causes you to lose interest in books: the language, the plot, the characters? Getting familiar with different styles of writing will help you discover new techniques and develop your own voice as a writer.

4. Organize your ideas

Though some writing sessions will be more open-ended, make sure you are writing with a purpose before you get too far along on a project. That could mean creating an outline and following it as you write. Or you may finish a few pages and then review the storyline or main arguments for gaps in logic. The trick is to zoom out from your pages periodically to ensure that you are organizing your ideas in a clear, meaningful way.

Organize your ideas

5. Set goals

Writing goals look different for every author depending on experience, genre, deadlines, and discipline. If you’re serious about becoming a better writer, it’s important to set goals for yourself and stick to them. Maybe it’s reaching a minimum page count or word count each day, or finishing a chapter by the end of the week. Just keep your goals realistic and measurable, so you can build momentum. The more progress you see, the more confident you’ll become.

6. Use strong descriptive language

First off, eliminate clichés ( happy as a clam, nerves of steel, cotton candy clouds , etc.). These overly familiar phrases will quickly bore readers. Second, avoid passive verbs ( he was given an ultimatum , hard work is being done, she was overjoyed ), and replace them with active verbs ( his boss delivered an ultimatum, the chefs worked hard, she squealed with joy ). Always look for ways to reveal a character’s personality by describing their actions rather than explaining emotions ( She meticulously arranged the spices while waiting for the phone call .)

7. Avoid editing as you go

While you definitely want to reserve time for editing and find readers who can provide feedback, the most effective time to make revisions is not mid-sentence. Writing and editing require different mindsets. Use momentum to your advantage, and go with the flow when you’re in the writing zone. Allow yourself to finish the draft before dissecting it.

8. Reward yourself

On days when you have longer writing sessions, be sure to give your mind a rest every few hours so you can recharge. The last thing you want to do is write to the point of total exhaustion and frustration (i.e. burnout). The solution? When you meet a daily, weekly, or monthly goal, take a moment to reward yourself. Go for a walk. Listen to music. Treat yourself to a snack. Building positive reinforcement into your practice will keep you motivated, and in the long run, help you become a better writer.

Take creative risks

9. Stop worrying

Everyone has fears, doubts, and insecurities about how their work will be received—but all that worry will not make you a better writer. If you start spinning out or feeling negative, take deep breaths, pick up a book, go for a jog, and reset. Finding ways to quiet the critical voice in your head will help you make room for more creative and productive thoughts.

10. Embrace challenges and take risks

Many great works of literature exist because the authors took a creative risk or defied expectations. If you’re in a rut, try writing at a new time of day or in a new location. Explore writing in a different style or genre. Increase your daily quota a few days a week. Dedicate one writing session a week to creative writing exercises to keep your language skills fresh. By challenging yourself, you just might discover a new technique or project idea.

11. Ask for feedback

It’s hard to ask for help, and even harder to hear feedback on writing you care about. Learning how to accept constructive criticism may be one of the trickiest parts of growing as a writer, but revision is key, and no one can do it alone. We are all too close to our work to evaluate it thoroughly and objectively. Find a peer, a professional editor, or a writing group to help you revise—and see what a difference it makes.

12. Write what you love

Aspiring writers often ask, How do you become an effective author? It takes time and effort to build new skills and productive habits, but it’s also crucial to write what you love. When you feel strongly about your subject, it shows. So another great question is, Are you excited to see how your story unfolds? If the answer is no, chances are your reader won’t be interested either. If the answer is yes, you’re on the right track! Stay in the moment while you’re writing, and let yourself enjoy the process.

Are you wrapping up a writing project and ready to take the next step? Find a bookmaking tool to fit your project.

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Minutes – Insights from the internet’s brightest minds.

8 Small But Powerful Ways To Become A Better Writer

One of the stories I share on just about every podcast I speak on is how I went from graduating college with a degree in creative writing and no real portfolio, to becoming the #1 writer on Quora and one of the most-read writers on the Internet.

become a better writer in 6 minutes

Becoming a better writer is not a destination.

It’s a journey.

As soon as I graduated college, it became very clear to me that I was never going to become a great writer unless I did two very simple things:

  • Wrote, a lot.
  • Shared my writing in public.

So, those were the two things I did.

I promised myself that for an entire year straight, 365 days, I would try to write one answer on Quora per day. Even if I was tired. Even if I “didn’t feel like it.” The reason I forced myself into such a rigorous writing route was because I’d already seen and experienced the benefits pure practice can bring to a craft. When I was 17 years old, I became one of the highest ranked World of Warcraft players in North America purely because of how many hundreds (more like thousands) of hours I dedicated to playing that game. And then in college, I got into bodybuilding and went from being this scrawny kid weighing 120 pounds to 170 pounds and shredded. All because I force-fed myself chicken and rice, and hit the gym six days a week.

When the realization settled in that becoming a great writer was going to take real work , that’s when I told myself it was time to buckle down and make it happen.

And sure enough, 3.5 years later, I’d accumulated tens of millions of views on my writing.

I’d published my first book, Confessions of a Teenage Gamer .

I became one of Inc Magazine ‘s Top 10 columnists, and I had become one of the most sought after ghostwriters on the Internet—allowing me to quit my job and officially become a “professional writer.” (And 6 months later, I turned what I was doing as a freelancer into a company, called Digital Press .)

So, how can you do the same?

Here are 17 small but powerful ways to become a better writer, right now:

1. Set a writing goal, along with a punishment for yourself if you don’t keep that promise to yourself.

Another story I love sharing whenever I speak at conferences is how, for those 3.5 years after college, I deprived myself of Internet.

That’s right.

I knew that after a long day of working at the office (where I was an entry-level copywriter), I was going to be tired. I was going to want to watch a movie and “relax.”

I also knew that was the only time of the day I had to write.

So, I removed the option entirely. I told myself I was going to write every night before bed, and to make sure I kept that promise to myself, I made it impossible to do anything else. I didn’t have an Internet connection in my apartment for almost four years. I didn’t own a TV, or even a couch. I lived in a studio apartment downtown Chicago with a bed and a desk. And every single day, I would come home from work, go to the gym, cook myself dinner and then write until midnight.

2. Publish something new as often as you can.

I believe there are two types of writing.

There is the writing you really, truly care about. The writing you call “art,” and the material you want to sit with for a long time to make sure you get it right.

Then there is the writing you do to practice. For me, that’s pretty much everything I publish on the Internet. Quora, is practice. Writing here on Minutes , is practice. And I consider this material practice because, while I certainly care about it, I know I have more to gain in publishing things regularly on the Internet than I do withholding material until it’s “perfect.”

The reason is because part of becoming a great writer is getting external feedback on your work.

You won’t always know what it is people want to read from you. You can guess. You can assume. But something *clicks* when you write something, publish it, and for whatever reason it dramatically outperforms anything else you’ve ever written. All of a sudden, you feel like you have insight into which direction to head—which, for a lonely writer slaving away at their desk, is a goldmine.

So, don’t get too married to any one idea. Just write, lightly edit, publish, and learn as you go. You’ll move faster this way.

3. Try to pinpoint what’s going to get you to that “next level,” and set that goal as your next area of focus.

When I first started writing on Quora, my first goal was to break 1,000 views.

Once I achieved that goal, it was 5,000 views.

Then 10,000.

After I started climbing the viewership ladder, and had written pieces with over 100,000 views, I started to really question what that “next thing” was going to be—what was going to get me to that “next level.”

At the time, it was seeing one of my articles land in a major publication. So I set that as my goal.

A few weeks later, I had a piece republished by HuffPost. Then Inc Magazine. Then Business Insider. Eventually, my work had reached over 50 different publications on the Internet.

My relentless focus to figure out how to get republished by some of the Internet’s largest business publications is how I ultimately taught myself how to ghostwrite for C-level executives.

But it’s worth keeping in mind this is only one “type” of writing. You need to figure out what type of writing you enjoy the most, and then pick targets that align with the most relevant path for you.

4. Read a lot, but never read more than you write.

Reading is a crucial component to becoming a better writer.

However, the moment your time spent reading exceeds the amount of time you spend writing, you’re no longer a “writer studying up on the craft.”

What you are is a writer who is procrastinating.

I know a lot of very smart, very well-read people who make for fascinating dinner party guests. But they aren’t writers. And if you asked them to sit down and write something meaningful, they would struggle. However, they could probably pick apart a bad piece of writing for hours—and understanding the difference between those two “skills” is extremely important.

You don’t want to be a well-read aspiring writer.

You want to be an effective writer, who is well read.

5. Pick one “style” of writing, master it, and then (and only then) move on to the next.

The term “writing” is extremely vague.

There are so many different types of writing in the world, and trying to master all of them at once is not only daunting—it’s impossible.

For example: there are sales copywriters, creative copywriters, technical writers, academic writers, creative non-fiction writers, research writers, fiction writers, poetry writers, the list goes on and on. And to think that just because you can write fiction, you can step right in and also write highly effective sales copy, is flawed.

Each “style” of writing has a different set of rules. Which means, you’re better off choosing one and establishing yourself as a proven writer in that domain before moving on.

This is what I did with life advice and entrepreneurship articles on the Internet.

Every time I would write about life lessons, habits, daily routines, mindset shifts, or lessons learned as a young founder, my viewership went through the roof. Data told me that people really enjoyed reading that sort of material from me, so I started to double-down in those two departments.

A year later (this was back in 2015), Inc Magazine was republishing so much of my life advice/entrepreneurship content from Quora that they decided to give me a column of my own. There, I doubled down again and wrote exclusively in those two categories—and I became one of their highest performing columnists.

By the time I had quit my job and gone all-in on being a writer, I had written over 3,000 articles on the Internet in one very clear style: the ~800-word article. And, I knew how to position just about any topic, from any industry, so that it fell into one of those two very broad, very popular categories: life advice and business.

This skill is how I ultimately built an entire company of in-house writers and editors around one very specific style of writing.

6. Surround yourself with other writers, preferably with skill sets different from your own, and trade knowledge.

One of the biggest benefits I’ve found in writing so frequently online is how many different writers I’ve met along the way.

There’s a big difference between reading another writer’s work versus talking to the writer themselves. It makes what they do seem less mysterious, which I’ve always found to be the most difficult part of going from “aspiring” to “professional.” There’s something about hearing it straight from the person that helps you believe you can become a great writer too.

Since there are only so many hours in the day, I now actually have a very personal monthly letter I send out to any writer who wants to learn from my directly—called The Nicolas Cole Letter .

But, a really great example of the power of connecting with other writers to continue your own development is how much I’ve learned from Craig Clemens , one of the most successful sales copywriters in the world with over $1 billion in sales. He was one of the first people I met when I first moved to Los Angeles in 2017 (through a friend), and we immediately hit it off just talking shop. Turns out, a lot of the same fundamental lessons he’d learned writing sales copy, I’d learned writing viral articles on Quora—and vice versa.

Since then, we’ve spent a lot of time together talking through projects, bouncing ideas, and helping each other grow. I now consider Craig a great friend and mentor of mine.

7. In the digital era of writing, volume wins.

This has become my mantra.

Something you have to understand about writing in today’s digital day and age is that any “one” piece of content isn’t going to move the needle. Even if you write the most brilliant, most magnificent article (or even book), the chances of someone even finding it are slim to none. On top of that, even if your work goes massively viral, whatever success you experience will last for a moment and then fade away as if the whole thing had never happened to begin with.

I know, because I experienced it.

Back in 2014, a few months after I made that promise to myself to write one Quora answer per day (no matter what), I experienced my first massive viral hit .

I’ll never forget the day because, of course, this was the day I almost (ALMOST) broke that promise to myself. I’d just spent 10 hours at the office. I was exhausted, and really didn’t feel like writing. I also knew I didn’t have Internet in my apartment, so if I went home before writing my Quora answer for the day then there was no way I was going to publish anything that day.

So, on my way to the train station, I popped into a Starbucks, grabbed a cup of coffee, sat down, and wrote a few quick paragraphs to a Quora question.

By the time I arrived home 45 minutes later, my answer had made its way to the front page of Reddit. Hundreds of people started following me on Quora. My inbox was blowing up with messages. And that article went on to accumulate over 1,000,000 views.

And then, three days later, the Internet acted as if the whole thing had never happened. My next Quora answer got less than 1,000 views—and I was right back to “practicing.”

This is why I preach the importance of long-term volume to writers so much. A viral hit is going to make you feel great for the moment, but it’s going to be your commitment over time that gets people to pay attention to you and your work—and that’s ultimately what you want.

You don’t just want someone to click. You want their loyalty.

8. Always aim for your writing to be both “timely” and “timeless.”

This is something another one of my mentors, Ron Gibori , taught me about creating branding and messaging that lasts.

He was the creative director and one of the managing partners at the advertising agency I worked at right after graduating college. And whenever we would work on a campaign, he’d say, “If it’s timely but not timeless, it’s going to disappear tomorrow. And if it’s timeless but not timely, nobody is going to pay attention to it today. It needs to be both, timely and timeless.”

I took that piece of insight and have applied that to every aspect of my career as a writer.

There are a lot of really great “timely” writers. They’re masters at writing things that get people to perk their ears up right away .

The problem is, most of their work has to be re-done the very next year (or sometimes, the very next month, or week, or even day). For example, I know one writer who is a master of writing about digital growth hacks. His biggest issue though is that what’s relevant in 2019 won’t be relevant in 2020—and so on, and so forth.

On the other hand, there are a lot of really great “timeless” writers. They’re masters at writing things that get people to think deeply, and their work is most likely to stand the test of time.

The problem is, these types of writers are also the ones who have the hardest time getting people to pay attention today . It’s tough figuring out how to give something a sense of urgency, especially when your approach is all about imagining what’s going to be “timeless.”

Which is why the secret to great writing is all about finding that balance between both sides of the spectrum. Your work should aim to speak to the readers of today, while also having enough depth that it lasts for the reader who finds it tomorrow.

This article, to be perfectly honest, is a great example. The title, the way it’s formatted, the writing style, all of these are mechanisms I’ve picked up and honed as a writer in the digital age (“timely”). But the content, the stories I’m choosing to share, the insights themselves are ones that won’t change for quite some time—if ever (“timeless”). Which means, I can keep this article in my library for a very, very long time. I can continue reusing it, republishing it, and sharing it over and over again (for YEARS) without it losing its value.

In everything you do, that should be your goal as a writer.

If you’d like to shorten your own growth curve as a writer, and want to learn some of the secrets behind writing articles with 100,000+ views, start reading my monthly letter.

become a better writer in 6 minutes

Nicolas Cole is the founder of Digital Press, a content marketing agency that turns founders, executives, and entrepreneurs into world-renowned thought leaders. As an author, Cole is a 4x Top Writer on Quora and Top 30 Columnist for Inc Magazine with over 50 million views on his work. His writing has appeared in TIME, Forbes, Fortune, Business Insider, CNBC, The Chicago Tribune, and more.

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The Write Practice

How to Become a Better Writer in One, Simple Step

by Joe Bunting | 181 comments

Want to write better stories, essays, and blog posts? There's one trick that you can do to easily become a better writer.

how to become a better writer

Photo by Neal Sanche. Modified by The Write Practice.

I've read a lot of writing by amateur writers both in my work as a professional editor and as the moderator of this blog, and I've found that there's one, single piece of advice I give most often.

If you master this technique, you will quickly go from a mediocre writer to someone who writes stories that people read and say, “Wow! You wrote this?” So how do you become a better writer?

Be Specific

Five years ago, I spent nearly a year traveling the world, going to countries like Vietnam, Croatia, Uganda, Turkey, and Ireland. Beyond just being the trip of a lifetime, it gave me an amazing opportunity to write.

I wrote about the huge, redbrick cathedral we lived next to in Osijek, Croatia. I wrote about our strong, dark neighbors in the jungles of Thailand who helped us lift the thick beams to build a new house for our host. I wrote about reading Egyptian literature in a café in Dublin.

After reading my writing, my friend Dez began imitating the detail and specificity of my stories on her blog. Soon, she had friends and family emailing her, telling her what a great writer she was, how they felt like they were right there with her in Israel and Romania and Cambodia.

It's easy to write this way, to pack more detail into each sentence, but when you're more specific, it draws your reader in. It allows them to see what your characters see, to hear and smell what they're hearing and smelling. In other words, it allows you to become a better storyteller.

Three Simple Ways to Be More Specific

What does this actually look like? How do you add specificity to your writing? Here are three ways to be more specific:

1. Focus On Detail

show don't tell chekhov quote

“Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.” —Anton Chekhov

“ Show, don't tell ” is one of the most common—and most overused—writing cliches out there. The reality is there are times when it makes sense to “tell.”

However, what I love about the  quote above from Chekhov is that it shows the power of specific detail to open the imagination of your reader.

To summon detail in your writing, focus on your five senses: touch, taste, sight, smell, sound. When you set the scene, challenge yourself to use each of your five senses.

Depending on your scene you might not be able to write using all of them, but by stretching your observation skills, you'll give your reader a much richer experience. Without realizing why, your readers will think, “Wow. This person can really write!”

(For more on the writing rule, “Show, Don't Tell,” check out our post The Secret to Show, Don't Tell .)

2. Focus On Moments

robert mckee quotes

“The mark of a master is to select only a few moments but give us a lifetime.” —Robert McKee

Great storytellers don't try to tell every little detail of a character's life. Instead, they select a few, precious moments and then go so deep into those moments that it's as if we're living those moments with the characters.

Of course, this is more difficult than it sounds because when you're first writing a story , you may not know which moments will be important to a character's life.

This is why the most important, and usually most difficult task of every writer isn't the creation process but the editing process, when you choose those important moments and cut the rest away.

3. Write Dialogue

Dialogue is ultimate form of specificity because you're writing exactly what the characters actually said. However, it always surprises me when I read writing by amateur writers and they describe what the characters are talking about instead of using dialogue. This is so lazy!

Write out the dialogue. Don't describe the conversation.

By the way, remember to be specific in your dialogue, too. Cut out any unimportant small talk and only include dialogue that moves the story forward.

(Want to know one common mistake that will  ruin  your dialogue? Check out our post A Critical DON'T For Writing Dialogue .)

Above All, Don't Be Vague

When your writing is vague, it creates no emotional response in the reader. In fact, vague writing wastes your readers time.

No matter what, don't be vague!

Of course, it can be difficult to tell when your own writing is vague.

This is why it's so important to have a good editor or critique group who can tell you when you need to be more specific. If you're serious about being a better writer, then you need to learn to be more specific. It's not difficult, but it does require you to open your senses to what your characters are experiencing.

Do you struggle with being specific in your writing?

Today, let's practice writing as specifically as possible. Take a look around the room you're in right now. Focus on one detail, like the shadow on a wall caused by a picture frame.

Then, start writing. As you write, remember to use as many of your five senses as you can. Describe the room for fifteen minutes.

When you're finished, post your practice in the comments section. And if you post, please be sure to read a few practices from your fellow writers and comment on whether they were specific enough.

Happy writing!

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Joe Bunting

Joe Bunting is an author and the leader of The Write Practice community. He is also the author of the new book Crowdsourcing Paris , a real life adventure story set in France. It was a #1 New Release on Amazon. Follow him on Instagram (@jhbunting).

Want best-seller coaching? Book Joe here.

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6+ Easy Practical Steps to Becoming a Better Writer in 30 Days or Less

becoming a better writer, writing tips

Becoming a Better Writer in 30 Days or Less

Update Bonus: 21 Shocking Writing Prompts to start writing your next book or short story optimized Quick Pinterest Pin at the bottom of the Page.

Follow these strategies below and you will most assuredly be a better writer than when you started.

Whether you want to become a technical writer, a ghostwriter, a TV writer, a travel writer, or just learn how to write your essays better, these tips should prove helpful.

Becoming a better writer isn’t difficult, but it absolutely takes a solid discipline.

As with most things the more hardcore you go with these strategies, the more you’ll get out of it.

6+ Easy Practical Steps to Becoming a Better Writer in 30 Days or Less:

  • Start a Blog
  • Read about writing every day
  • Write every day
  • Research Storytelling
  • Read about different types of writing
  • Read, read, read
  • Be a Critical Consumer

becoming a better writer, writing tips

1. Become a better writer by starting a blog

If you start a blog you are more likely to start writing than if you don’t.

There are plenty of good sites to start blogging today for free, wordpress.org being one of them and they allow you to use free plugins as well compared to wordpress.com.

Disclaimer: You can always start a “free” blog, but the terms of use for free sites is that they can shut it down for any reason (at ANY TIME). So it’s possible to randomly lose all your hard work on a free blog. Be careful.

So just a fair warning, you can use free blogging, but I haven’t had much success with it personally. I started many free blogs and none of them stuck. This is the only one I’ve paid for and I’m glad I did. And it is the only one that I continue working with.

If you want to start a legitimate blog or if you think you might try to monetize it one day you are eventually going to need a hosting site.

I personally use Bluehost. They made getting my blog started EXTREMELY easy and their ‘one-click’ WordPress.org setup was ridiculously smooth.

Bluehost is one of the top web hosting companies in 2020. You can start your own blog with them for as low as $3.95 a month (on the page you’ll see that they say it is normally $7.99, but I’ve never seen them try to get anyone to start for that.) The $3.95 sale price only comes with their 36-month plan. I use them and that’s what I did and I’m happy about it. ( I did the 36-month plan and so far we are still happy with it 🙂 )

Sign up them and you can also get your domain free if you purchase a 12 month or longer hosting plan (that’s worth $15). As I said, we did the 36-month plan because it was the best deal but you can choose any plan. If you’re not planning on monetizing your blog it might be a good idea to start with a free blog.

I can tell you from personal experience that a free blog won’t motivate you to write as much as paying for a blog, but it’s up to you to decide what works best for your unique situation. If you really love blogging you never know when you might decide to monetize and at that moment you’ll be happy you decided to host with Bluehost and owning your domain.

> For more detailed information check out my post on becoming a blogger that makes money blogging from anywhere. <

Having your own site looks more professional to affiliate programs and readers. You will be able to have a better following, no one can shut you down for no reason (like on a free blog) and at any moment you will be able to monetize through ads and affiliate programs.

Some of my blogging mentors had their blogs going for years before they decided to monetize. You just never know.

At the same time, you can always start a free blog to test things out and buy a domain name and hosting later, but there is no guarantee the price will still be as good and no guarantee that the domain name you love will still be available.

Do what’s best for you and your specific situation 🙂

For me personally, I started with Bluehost and WordPress.org right from the start because I enjoy work from home and being my own boss. As far as online jobs and work, blogging is one way to pay yourself and work when you want.

If you want to reasons why it’s a good idea to start a blog, you can check out this post here: Why Start a Blog

If you are interested in more details on how to make a great blog from scratch you can see this post: H ow to Become a Blogger in 2019

2. Read about writing every day

Good writers all have certain traits in common. One of them is that they read A LOT.

Most of them read every day. Now I won’t say that I’m a good writer that’s up to others to decide, but I do read mostly every day.

You might be thinking “ but you probably grew up reading as a kid and loved it.” Not true! I personally couldn’t stand reading and writing growing up. Hated reading with a passion actually.

It actually wasn’t until I got into college that I really started to read and then probably a couple of years into it that I started to enjoy it .

So you don’t have to be some kind of savant to get started in writing. You just have to have drive and discipline.

But this type of reading isn’t just reading at first. It is specifically looking to read about writing (I know, it sounds boring and it can be tedious but the foundational knowledge will help in the long run). During your becoming a better writer in just 30 days, you will want to be keen to read and learn about writing, especially if you want to do writing online or freelance writing.

Try to read things that help you get to where you want to go. If you want to become a blogger read about blogging tips and tricks. < (I googled it for you)

If you want to become a ghostwriter, read about how to become a ghostwriter. (Pssst! What’s a ghostwriter? A ghostwriter is a writer that gets paid to write something for someone but doesn’t own the project. For example, a person could hire you to write a novel for them, but they get to publish it as the author. They paid for it and own all the rights to it and you are just the ghostwriter.)

It’s just one way to get paid to write.

If you want to be a technical writer, read about the best practices of technical writers. As long as you are willing to read the right things you can learn to write anything 🙂 there really is nothing holding you back.

Look up blogs, articles, look at the library for books on writing. Depending on what type of writing you want to pursue will be very important to the writing that you read about.

As you get a good idea of a foundation for the type of writing you want to do, you can start to branch out studying other types of writing. You will see how understanding the why’s and what’s and styles behind them all can help you in your pursuit of becoming a better writer.

Look on Amazon for great reads on writing. I personally recommend these ones for when you need to think outside the traditional box or when you get bored of reading about writing:

On Writing by Stephen King

The View From the Cheap Seats by Neil Gaiman

Talk Like TED: The 9 Public-Speaking Secrets of the World’s Top Minds

These are non-traditional and will help open up your mind to more strategic possibilities for the potential of writing. Full disclosure: I didn’t read any of these yet. I took Neil Gaiman’s Masterclass , which was amazing and I highly recommend it.

In fact, I recommend Masterclass to anyone who loves learning and thinks it’s neat to learn from celebrities (such as Dan Brown , James Patterson, Samuel Jackson, Christina Agulera, and many more.

@ $15 a month, it is extremely worth it. I’ve been using it for a year and learn so much from professionals that I never would have. And the lessons always feel personal. Sometimes the teachers who are celebs even write back to your comments. Can you imagine Samuel L. Jackson responding to your comment?) about their crafts.

Check out Masterclass Here.

On Writing was recommended to me 2nd hand by a writing mentor of mine. He said that it was good if you need to get outside the traditional learning about writing books and it was interesting if you’re a fan of Stephen King novels too.

I love TED talks, I watch some when I can, so when I saw this book about public speaking from TED talks I knew it would be a winner with powerful knowledge.

If you’re wondering why I would suggest a public speaking book for learning how to be a better writer, it is simple.

When writing has been your profession for years you learn what crafts complement great writing. For instance, IF you want to be a great writer, your secret weapon is research. If you aren’t a personal professional researcher, it will be nigh impossible for you to become a great writer. Public Speaking skills go beyond just speaking and writing.

Those skills bleed into SO many professional avenues that it will not only make you a better writer. It’ll make you a better person in almost everything you do (unless you live in a hole and never interact with other humans in any way, shape, or form.)

Read some of the reviews on each one to see if they look like something you would enjoy. (And DON’T just read the 5-star reviews, read the bad reviews too. I almost always read the bad reviews, most of the time, I read the 1-star reviews first. This actually saves me time when shopping for a new product, especially tech products.)

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3. Write Every Day

Now this one is the kicker. If you do nothing else from this post, do this one thing and you’ll surely become a better writer. Write every day.

Now you can:

Write at a certain time every day

Write a certain amount of words every day

Write a certain amount of time every day

You can mix and match these however suits you best. You try them all out and see if one is easier and sticks better for you.

Me personally, I like writing a certain amount of time and writing at a certain time of the day. This keeps me going and I don’t feel bad if I don’t come up with a certain amount of words.

I tried writing a certain amount of words every day and I couldn’t keep up with it and instead of doing it I’d skip it because I knew it would take “too long.”

You see, you are more likely to develop a habit if you start small and take smaller bites that you can handle.

If you already write every day that’s great and you can choose to write more.

If you don’t write then start small.

Start with 1-10 minutes a day. If you find that easy, do more. If you find that hard, write less. At first, start with what seems easy to you and build on that.

The last thing you want to do is start with a habit that’s too hard to do every day. If you bite off too much you might not swallow it. If you find yourself dreading it, that’s a bad sign. If you find that you easily go a week without doing it, that’s a sign you tried to do more than you should start with.

If you want to do a certain amount of words every day I recommend starting with 100 a day. If that’s easy write more. If that’s too hard write less.

I tried 500 words a day and I couldn’t keep up with it. It just became tedious and therefore unenjoyable. I’m a professional writer, so that’s why I recommend starting with less. I mostly work in email writing, so if I’m on a job I might write more or less on those days, but if I’m not writing for a client, 500 just didn’t seem appetizing.

Blogging has definitely changed that for me, that’s why I recommend Starting a Blog.

I now try to write a certain amount of time every day and usually I find that if I get started, I end up writing longer than the first little amount that I force myself to do anyway. Thus, this strategy works very well for me. I’d start with the easy goal of 1 minute. 60 seconds, if you can’t do something for 60 seconds a day, maybe you don’t really want to do it at all.

You can also benefit from writing at a certain time every day. You will know what time works best for you.

It could be first thing in the morning. Some people find that this is their most creative and profitable time.

Me personally, I don’t do so well in the morning, I prefer to write at other times. Afternoon and evening, not late evening though. If I feel my eyes start to droop, I just know that I’m not gonna get much coherent information on the page. (It can be comical though. I’ll go back and read what I was writing the night before and it can be some of the worst writing! I’ll save myself time and energy if I just get some sleep or caffeine instead of trying to push through.)

You might like to write during your lunch at work, or first thing when you get home after eating something.

It’s always a good time to be able to put something on T.V. and write while relaxing.

So you can take time and figure out when is best for you to write.

If you write even just 10 minutes a day for 30 days you will be a better writer at the end of that short 30 days, and you might find that you have developed a habit you look forward to and fully enjoy 🙂 I know I do.

Update : Since Blogging and traveling more while blogging I find that a certain amount of time a day and a certain time of the day becomes tedious and makes blogging less enjoyable for me personally. Again this may work for you, so don’t hesitate to experiment.

Now, I enjoy writing at some point during the day. I find that it doesn’t have to be strict or a certain number of anything. I sit down to write and I find that I can easily be there for hours or an interruption might come up like a family member or friend wanting to hang and I am able to get up and go without any sort of remorse. I find this to be key to my success as a writer and blogger.

4. Research Storytelling

Storytelling will benefit you no matter what writing niche you go into , except maybe academic writing. Even then I’m sure it could be a little useful.

If you look around, you’ll start to see how stories are everywhere and people love stories. We eat them up. We can’t get enough of stories.

Stories are in the movies. Stories are on the news. On blogs, web pages, profiles, social media, history, we find stories fascinating and that is why they work so well and why we should find ways to incorporate the skill of storytelling into our writing, no matter what niche we are in.

Let me give you an example:

I once knew a guy.

He had a problem.

He was about 30 years old living in America, but he didn’t know how to read or write…

Did you notice something there?

I introduced a character and a problem he had , did you notice how you instantly went into “consuming story mode.” Did all your attention get drawn into the short story that started?

If not, that’s okay. It wasn’t super dynamic, but if you did, take time to think about why that happened. Stories are a powerful tool you need to add to your writing arsenal. Study stories and storytelling to engage your audience and grab their attention when you choose.

Stories are great at helping illustrate a point. Great as an ice breaker and a great way to regain your audience’s attention if you think you are losing them.

And stories work across all mediums. Art, writing, presentation, public speaking, with a group of friends or colleagues. Storytelling is a life skill that anyone would benefit from developing, but especially writers.

5. Read about different types of writing

After you get a good handle for your specific niche of writing, you will really benefit from studying other styles of writing and using different tips and tricks to make your style even better by borrowing from the other types.

Different Types of Writing include but not limited to:

  • Copywriting
  • Non-fiction
  • Email Writing (cold emails, drip campaigns)
  • Article Writing
  • Academic Writing
  • Web Page Writing (About us, Home pages, etc)
  • Landing Pages
  • Sales Pages
  • Video Scripts
  • Sales Funnels

There are probably more. And there used to be a time not long ago where most of these genres didn’t have precedence, but these days knowing how to do any one of these well can mean good freelancing money for you or better your own business. Either way $$$.

And don’t get me wrong, writing isn’t all about money, but it sure is nice to get paid to do something you enjoy doing either way.

Even looking at this list might help you think more about what you want to do or discover for yourself. You may have not been aware that some of these opportunities existed before now, but now you know and can do something about it.

6. Read, Read, Read

It should make sense at this point. One easy way to get better at writing every day is to read every day.

And don’t just read things about writing.

Read blogs, read history, read academic writing, read fiction and non-fiction.

Having a wide array of reading will make you well rounded and increase your understanding and vocabulary.

Writing a lot is necessary but if you don’t expose yourself to all sorts of different voices and writing styles you might find that you don’t have much to write about.

I recommend have light reading along with tough to read stuff simultaneously.

By having light reading you’ll be able to enjoy reading and move along. But having tough to read material will stretch your will power and ability as a reader and writer.

Exposing yourself to writing that is better than your own will help you improve . You will also more readily observe bad writing and notice when you yourself are writing poorly.

Humans have been writing for some time now and many tricks of the trade are out there for you to see, experience, enjoy, and make a part of your own writing repertoire. So don’t skip the reading.

Bonus: Be a Critical Consumer

Being a critical consumer doesn’t mean you make a bunch of critical comments on the stuff you read and watch like your the next reality TV show judge.

Being a critical consumer is the opposite of being a mindless consumer.

We all watch and read a lot of entertainment.

When you are reading or watching your favorite stories or documentaries take mental notes.

Think about how they use dialogue. What is the main theme of the story?

How did they seamlessly carry you through each step of the story while you consumed it?

Did something not sit right with you about the character development?

Were all the important plot questions answered satisfactorily?

Think critically while you enjoy your content.

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I hope this helps! Now go write something!

What do you do to get better at writing?

What did I not mention here?

Do you have a favorite book or reading you recommend to help others improve their skills?

How are you becoming a better writer?

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I’d love to learn from Masterclass someday. By the way, thanks for the tips!

I have been using Masterclass for almost 2 years and I really enjoy it. I highly recommend it when you get a chance. It is really fun especially if you have several passions and enjoy learning for fun. No problem and Thank you! 🙂

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  • Become A Better Writer In 60 Minutes (Masterclass)

Become A Better Writer In 60 Minutes (Masterclass)

Episode 552: Shaan Puri (https://twitter.com/ShaanVP) and Sam Parr ( https://twitter.com/theSamParr ) teach the 3-step writing framework that helped them build +$10M newsletters. 

Get Shaan’s writing course - https://maven.com/generalist/writing

Get Sam’s writing course - https://copythat.com/

Want to see Sam and Shaan’s smiling faces? Head to the MFM YouTube Channel and subscribe - http://tinyurl.com/5n7ftsy5

Show Notes:

(0:00) Intro

(2:50) Why not how - Persuasion at scale

(6:00) To write clearly, you must think clearly

(7:00) Begin with the end in mind

(10:30) Headlines not outlines

(12:30) Warmup with copywork

(15:30) Draft fast, incubate slow

(16:30) Great writing is great editing

(19:00) Build your swipe file

(21:00) Don't bury the lead

(23:30) Create a curiosity gap

(25:00) Write like you talk

(28:00) The voice memo test

(30:30) Lower the reading level

(32:00) How to tell a great story

(34:30) Intention meets obstacle

(38:00) High emotional stakes in a low stakes situation

(39:00) Short sentences

(41:00) Great writing has rhythm

(44:00) Our favorite resources

• Hemingway Editor - https://hemingwayapp.com/

• Neville Medhora on Louis C.K. - https://copywritingcourse.com/louis-ck-direct-video-sales/

• The Hustle Writes about Hint Founder - http://tinyurl.com/2d537k7f

• Hey.com - https://www.hey.com/

• On Writing - http://tinyurl.com/5f334swt

• Theo Von - https://www.theovon.com/

Check Out Sam's Stuff:

• Hampton - https://www.joinhampton.com/

• Ideation Bootcamp - https://www.ideationbootcamp.co/

• Copy That - https://copythat.com

• Hampton Wealth Survey - https://joinhampton.com/wealth

Check Out Shaan's Stuff:

Need to hire? You should use the same service Shaan uses to hire developers, designers, & Virtual Assistants → it’s called Shepherd (tell ‘em Shaan sent you): https://bit.ly/SupportShepherd

Past guests on My First Million include Rob Dyrdek, Hasan Minhaj, Balaji Srinivasan, Jake Paul, Dr. Andrew Huberman, Gary Vee, Lance Armstrong, Sophia Amoruso, Ariel Helwani, Ramit Sethi, Stanley Druckenmiller, Peter Diamandis, Dharmesh Shah, Brian Halligan, Marc Lore, Jason Calacanis, Andrew Wilkinson, Julian Shapiro, Kat Cole, Codie Sanchez, Nader Al-Naji, Steph Smith, Trung Phan, Nick Huber, Anthony Pompliano, Ben Askren, Ramon Van Meer, Brianne Kimmel, Andrew Gazdecki, Scott Belsky, Moiz Ali, Dan Held, Elaine Zelby, Michael Saylor, Ryan Begelman, Jack Butcher, Reed Duchscher, Tai Lopez, Harley Finkelstein, Alexa von Tobel, Noah Kagan, Nick Bare, Greg Isenberg, James Altucher, Randy Hetrick and more.

Other episodes you might enjoy:, • #224 rob dyrdek - how tracking every second of his life took rob drydek from 0 to $405m in exits, • #209 gary vaynerchuk - why nfts are the future, • #178 balaji srinivasan - balaji on how to fix the media, cloud cities & crypto, • #169 - how one man started 5, billion dollar companies, dan gilbert's empire, & talking with warren buffett, • ​​​​ #218 - why you should take a think week like bill gates, • dave portnoy vs the world, extreme body monitoring, the future of apparel retail, "how much is anthony pompliano worth", and more, • how mr beast got 100m views in less than 4 days, the $25m chrome extension, and more, featured episodes.

  • #174 - How to Network with Billionaires, Andrew and Sam's Recent Investments, & A Better Investor Than Buffett
  • #166 - Why a Sudoku Company Sold for $640m, "Opendoor for X" & Franchising Tech Companies
  • #114 with Steph Smith - The Head of Trends Talks Insider Trading and The Gen-Z Mafia
@myfirstmilpod Shaan Puri x MrBeast $10k bet🏀 #jimmydonaldson #mrbeast #shaanpuri #samparr #basketball #myfirstmillionpodcast #mrbeastchallenge ♬ original sound - My First Million
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16 Proven Ways To Become A Better Writer

become a better writer in 6 minutes

When it comes to writing, we envision ourselves typing away at a keyboard, in the zone. We know exactly what to write and how to write it.

Let’s be honest with ourselves. Writing is never like that. It may not even be 50% of that.

Yet we still do it. We sit down and stare at a blank page and hope and pray the words eventually come.

Sadly, hoping and praying only get you so far. And it won’t make this process any easier for you. But becoming a better writer will.

If you’re ready to take that step towards betterment, then you’re in the right place. We’ll show you all the tips, tricks, steps, and habits you need to become a better writer.

Why Should You Become A Better Writer?

Learning how to become a better writer will help you improve your writing process and cut out what doesn’t work. Ultimately, you’ll be happier because you’re more productive.

Plus, being a better writer means that your readers will enjoy your work more. And although having self-validation is important, all writers crave to impress and be praised.

Being better at what you do best will get you the attention you know you deserve.

How To Get Better at Writing

Writing is like every other skill in the sense that you must put effort into progressing it. But it’s also like no other skill because each new story you write feels like you’re reinventing the wheel.

We’re going to show you some tips and practices on how to get better at writing, so reinventing the wheel won’t be as hard as it sounds.

Just write (even when you don’t want to)

Read like it’s your job, consider the reader, get feedback from friends and family, read out loud, join a community, imitation is a form of flattery…and learning, use writing prompts, use a thesaurus, know when to walk away, accept failure.

“You can always edit a bad page. You can’t edit a blank page.”  Jodi Picoult

As an author, you’ve probably heard this before. It sounds so obvious, but it still needs to be said.

Put your pen to the paper, or your cursor to the page and get to writing! Because you won’t get better if you don’t practice.

It may not be your best work, and you may even delete it tomorrow, but exercising your writing muscle every day will make ideas come easier.

The trick is to pick a goal that suits you best. You could set a time limit for 10-15 minutes each day. Or set a word count goal of 500 words.

As you get better at maintaining this daily habit it gets easier to maintain. You can increase the time or word count to challenge yourself.

Don’t just write, plan first!

The problem with just sitting down to write is you’ll be staring at a blank page as the timer runs down. The best way to ensure you use your writing time well is to plan the session first.

Are you going to free-write about your day, writing without concern for how it looks on the page? Or are you going to flesh out the characters and do some world building?

Decide your plan of action and outline what you want to write so that you know where to start once you begin your writing session.

“Writing comes from reading, and reading is the finest teacher of how to write.” Annie Proulx

When figuring out how to become a better writer, you must be a reader first.

But not just any reader. You need to read like you get paid to do it.

Study the writing, break down why you like it, and analyze why certain concepts and techniques worked.

Remember, you’re not limited to reading in your genre. Reading different genres will not only teach you new writing styles, but it will give you ideas as new perspectives fill your mind.

The following are a few more benefits of reading:

  • Reader’s perspective: You’ll learn how readers respond to stories based on your own experiences of reading.
  • Vocabulary: You’ll learn new words and ways of phrasing them.
  • Writing inspiration: Constantly refilling your well of creativity means you will never run out of inspiration.
  • Story decision making: By analyzing story arcs and mechanics in other books, you’ll get better at crafting your own story arcs

To get the most out of reading, make sure to keep a notebook at your side to jot down your thoughts. These are some elements that you could make notes on as you read:

  • Sentence and paragraph structures
  • Character complexity
  • Word choice
  • Information placement
  • Worldbuilding elements
  • Side plot and main plot story arcs

It’s important that you’re happy with your writing, but next in line are the readers.

As much as you want to impress the readers, you want your message and theme to be expressed above all else.

Think about what your readers would like, or rather what they need to read from you. What do you want them to take away from your story?

Having these thoughts in your mind as you write will help you shape your story in a way that will have readers giving you a standing ovation.

Some authors may feel the need to hold their story close to their chest, like Smeagol in Lord of The Rings.

But stories should be shared…even if they’re not ready yet. You don’t become a better writer by keeping your precious all to yourself.

Sometimes you can’t see glaringly obvious flaws and faults because you’ve been staring at them for so long that they’ve gone invisible.

Ask a trusted friend or family member to give your draft a gander and let them give their honest opinion on what’s working and what confuses them.

When revising your work, you could get stuck in a loop and go cross-eyed. There’s so much to go through!

You should read your writing out loud. It will make unnatural sounding sentences come to the surface for you to edit it.

Reading dialogue out loud is a great way to have realistic conversations and discussions between your characters.

Your housemates may think you’re crazy for having an argument with yourself, but the end product will be worth it.

Every writer needs a community of people that understands what they’re going through.

You can learn from those writers or pass on your own wisdom. You could even get connected to other industry professionals who could change your author career for the better.

But if you want to use your author community to learn how to become a better writer, you have to be all in.

That means sharing your writing goals and letting yourself be held accountable for them. And you’ll hold your author friends accountable to their goals too!

If you’re looking to improve as a writer and go into different genres, you should imitate other good writers.

Take characters they’ve created or scenarios they’ve made and write a scene using their tone and structure.

As you try to imitate them, you’re by proxy learning how to write in different styles that you can adapt to your writing.

And it’s a nice little break from thinking as everything besides the story is done for you. This is why fanfiction is a fun way to learn about writing. 

When looking to find a new voice and tone for your writing, you may want to practice without the help of another author’s work.

There is a plethora of resources you can use to find writing prompts that get your brain ticking.

Top Tip: Our blog, 40 Tips for Writing Inspiration (Plus Writing Prompts and Tools) , has writing prompts for different genres that could get your juices flowing, so be sure to check it out!

You’ve learned so many cool words while reading. You swear you did. But why can’t you remember any of them while you’re writing? They’re in your head…somewhere.

Instead of staring off into the distance with the word on the tip of your tongue, whip out the thesaurus.

There’s no shame in it!

A thesaurus is great for finding that word that helps describe the setting or your character’s mood, for example.

But it’s also great for stopping you from using complicated words and phrases that lose the message you’re going for.

Being verbose is like cotton candy. It looks huge, fluffy, and pretty. But once you dissolve it, it’s just flavored sugar that can give you a toothache. 

Get straight to the point so you don’t confuse the reader.

Sometimes becoming a better writer means learning when not to write.

Maybe you’ve lost passion for the story you’re writing, or you can’t channel the character’s voices anymore.

Or you’re not ready for the story you’re dreaming up. You need more time to grow. 

Perhaps the story just isn’t what you want it to be.

If any of this sounds familiar, then it’s time to walk away. Put it down and write something else.

Walking away could also mean that you need to stop editing and adjusting the story because perfection doesn’t exist. Trust your instincts and consider the advice of those who have read your drafts.

Becoming a better writer doesn’t just revolve around writing. It’s all the emotions and activities surrounding it too.

The publishing industry, the fans, the haters.

Whatever happens, it won’t only be a success. You will fail. It’s not only inevitable, it’s destined.

Everyone fails, but when an author fails it hurts in a different way. It hits you personally and professionally all at once.

But accepting it doesn’t mean complacency. It means you get back on the horse to ride again.

How To Develop Writing Habits

You can’t say, “I’ll become a better writer,” and presto, you’re a better writer.

You must build your good writing habits from the ground up and stick to them.

The below writing habits turn good writers into great writers.

Schedule procrastination

Have a routine, understand your process, never stop writing.

Procrastinating is so easy. It’s a click or a daydream away.

It can sound like: “I’ll wait till 13:00 exactly and start.”

13:00 rolls around and you’re still scrolling.

We’ve all been there!

Don’t beat yourself up for procrastinating. Instead, schedule it. Write for 60 minutes then listen to 15 minutes of your favorite music, then write again for another 60-minute session.

Or plan a fun evening of slacking off and not feeling guilty about it. But the next morning you have a word count goal to meet.

“Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” Marthe Troly-Curtin, Phrynette Married

But remember to schedule the right kinds of procrastination. For example, instead of scrolling through TikTok for 30 minutes, put on that TV show you’ve been meaning to catch up on. You could also take a walk and listen to a podcast.

You won’t achieve your writing goals if you don’t have any set. And vague, grand goals won’t cut it.

If you want to finish your first draft in 3 months, plan out how you will do it. What are your daily, weekly, and monthly goals?

Your goals need to be realistic and easy to track. Use a writing journal or a spreadsheet to write your goals and track progress every day against them.

We’d love to think as writers that we’re free spirits who are called to write stories by our whimsical inspiration.

But if you only wrote when that happened, you wouldn’t finish your first draft. You must set out time each day to write.

But take your personal life into account to develop a healthy writing routine that makes it as easy as possible to get your story onto the page.

For example, you write every night after putting the kids to bed and cleaning up.

We all don’t go about writing the same way. You may think your way is wrong or the least productive. But you can’t help who you are, so you should accept yourself and your process as it is.

If you’re a pantser who drifts from project to project, let it happen! Instead of feeling bad and doubting your ability to stick to a story, just write when it comes to you. Move swiftly between the stories and stay motivated!

Or if you’re a plotter, then map out your story to your heart’s content and follow it!

All processes could use improvements, sure, but that doesn’t mean that you should inherently change who you are to fit a process.

Do you want to get better at writing? Then always write.

When you’re washing dishes, folding clothes, stuck in traffic, or brushing your teeth: think about your story. Think about your characters and where they’re heading next.

Your next writing session would have planned itself because you’ve been letting the story ferment in your mind the whole day.

Top Tip: Keep a recorder with you or a notebook and pen to jot down the ideas that excite you.

Books To Read That Will Make You A Better Writer

You’re never too old to learn. Every now and then, read a book that’s just about writing.

It’s great for learning how to become a better writer but also it helps you reconnect with writing and fall in love with it again.

Here are some books that lift writers up:

  • On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King
  • Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury
  • Steering the Craft by Urusla K. LeGuin 
  • Ernest Hemingway on Writing
  • Aristotle’s Art of Rhetoric by Aristotle
  • Several Short Sentences About Writing by Verlyn Klinkenborg
  • Plain Style by Christopher Lasch
  • Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
  • The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
  • Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art by Madeleine L’Engle
  • The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity by Julia Cameron

Secret Tip On How To Be A Better Writer

We have one last tip for you and it’s one no one wants to hear. 

Motivation is overrated!

That’s right! We’ve said it. Motivation is a fool’s game.

Are you motivated to wash the dishes late at night? Are you motivated to sleep when you’d rather binge-watch your favorite show?

Motivation comes and goes, and you should let it push you further. But the secret to becoming a better writer lies with discipline . 

When you don’t feel like doing something, you do it anyway. And you did it again tomorrow, and the day after that. All of a sudden you’re wired to write every day without fail and it’s seamless and exciting.

But publishing a book, as we’ve mentioned, isn’t just writing it. You may not love that you need to have an online presence to make it in the book writing industry, but you will work on it because it will make your life easier. 

And we’re here to make it super simple, with a one-stop shop online that houses everything from your books to your upcoming events. 

Your author website ! We build custom, user-friendly designs that complement authors. Fill in our author website inquiry form and we’ll be happy to help you shine online.

become a better writer in 6 minutes

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Partners in Fire

Partners in Fire

Powerful Tips To Lift Your Writing To the Next Level

Posted: September 23, 2023 | Last updated: September 23, 2023

<p><span>Most of us aren’t lucky enough to land <a href="https://partnersinfire.com/lifestyle/dream-job/" rel="noopener">dream jobs</a> or work in industries that align with our passions. Instead, we take jobs we don’t like and, if lucky, have a little free time to do what we love. </span></p><p><span>While scrolling through my favorite Reddit community, R/Askreddit, I stumbled upon a question seeking to discover why more people don’t follow their dreams. </span></p><p><span>The answers, though unsurprising, showcase some of the problems inherent in our current system. </span></p>

Everyone wants to write the next great American novel until they sit down and discover that writing is hard!

It takes a particular skill and mindset to craft an intriguing story and write in a way others will appreciate. On the plus side, it’s a skill anyone can learn. While scrolling through a fantastic writing community on Reddit, I found a great question asking writing enthusiasts to share the best advice they ever received on how to improve their writing. 

Use some of this advice to practice your craft and become a better writer. 

become a better writer in 6 minutes

Write Often

They say practice makes perfect, and the same is true for writing. The more you write, the better you will become. 

“ Get in the habit of writing as often as you can,” shared one user, adding, “you’ll get nothing done if you wait to be inspired.”

<p>Need more help being productive? <a href="https://partnersinfire.com/lifestyle/books-for-productivity/">Here are 11 of the top books on productivity to help you get more done</a>. </p>

To be a great author, you should learn from the greats (and not so greats.) Devour as many books as possible to taste different genres , writing styles, and techniques. Discover through reading what works and what doesn’t. 

“I got into a big writer’s block with all options and ideas. Reading really dug me out; I understood what I liked, what I didn’t, reminded me why I wanted to write,” admitted one commenter. 

<p><span>Holidays are ideal for learning about our history and culture. Take the opportunity to teach your kids about the pilgrims, natives, and the true story of Thanksgiving.</span></p><p><span>Don’t neglect the negatives as they do in school. Showing the whole story, warts and all, will help your kids understand the mistakes of the past and help them build a better future.</span></p>

Write What You Want to Read

“When I first started in writing, I took any gig I could to make ends meet, and rarely was I writing about something that interested me, and my god, could you tell,” explained one user. 

Although you have to do what you have to do to make ends meet, the best stories will be the ones you’re excited about writing. 

<p><span>Someone volunteered, “My faith in humanity.” Another agreed, “So true. Before, you just had a heavy suspicion that fools surrounded you. Now, you have the depressing certainty. It sucks.” </span></p><p><span>A third confessed, “Some dark corners of the internet make me really hate people. And I’d like to know if the internet ruined people or enabled us to see how terrible people are.”</span></p>

Don’t Judge Your First Draft

First drafts are drafts for a reason. They aren’t going to be good. “It should be really bad!” exclaimed one user, discussing the quality of first drafts. 

The user went on to give a great lesson for all aspiring writers that they heard elsewhere “Every first draft is perfect because the only purpose of a first draft is to exist,” they said, explaining, “if you wrote and finished a first draft, you did it perfectly.”

<p><span>Everyone wants a partner they can trust. Even white lies can spell doom for a budding relationship. </span></p><p><span>If you want a successful partnership, embrace honesty, even when it’s hard. The only things that you should ever lie about are surprises. </span></p>

Character Develop is Vital

Compelling characters are critical to a great story . “Flat characters are way too common these days, even in ‘professionally’ made stuff,” lamented one user. 

Others said you need to make your characters want something and make them change as the story develops. “In the end, make sure they have undergone some change,” advised one Redditor, “even if they didn’t get what they wanted.”

<p><span>There are lots of ways to</span><a href="https://partnersinfire.com/blog/10-awesome-ways-to-save-money-on-groceries/"><span> save money at the grocery store</span></a><span>. You can clip coupons, compare prices per unit, use the store’s loyalty program, and choose </span><a href="https://partnersinfire.com/lifestyle/5-things-to-never-buy-generic/"><span>generic offerings</span></a><span>. Limiting unhealthy snacks and skipping sugar-laden soft drinks will also save you a bundle – and are better for your overall health.</span></p><h3><b>Getting Help</b></h3><p><span>If you’re truly strapped, consider going to a food bank. Numerous charities offer food to households in need. However, please don’t use a <a href="https://partnersinfire.com/lifestyle/relationships/wife-leaves-husband-because-he-gets-groceries-at-the-food-bank/" rel="noopener">food bank if you can afford to buy your own groceries</a>. </span></p>

Understand When Inspiration Happens

One user shared words of wisdom from acclaimed author Madeleine L’Engle “Inspiration usually comes during work rather than before it.”

You need to start. It’s unlikely a random spark of inspiration will hit while you’re twiddling your thumbs, waiting for it. Get started, and you’ll be surprised by how quickly the words flow. 

<p><span>Sometimes it takes a conscious effort to make yourself productive. You must tell yourself what you will do and stop yourself from getting distracted.</span></p> <p><span>Here are ten things that will help you achieve that:</span></p>

How many stories have you started but not finished? “You don’t know what the story really is until you finish it.” shared one user. 

Don’t leave your stories hanging. You may discover a gem of an idea hidden in your initial story’s ending. 

<p><span>What’s a warning that everyone should heed? For example, don’t eat yellow snow. It’s basic. It’s stupid, but it’s accurate. After polling the internet, here are the top-voted warnings.</span></p>

Stop Caring About Politeness

One user shared a gem they picked up from Stephen King’s best-selling resource On Writing . 

“If you expect to succeed as a writer, rudeness should be the second-to-least of your concerns. The least of all should be polite society and what it expects. If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered, anyway,” King said in the book. 

When writing, you need to be truthful. You need to dig deep into the vast darkness of humanity and showcase what you’ve found, flaws and all. If you avoid the truth to appease the pearl cultures, you’ll never be successful as a writer. 

<p><span>Some writers try to mimic the popular stories of their time. How many aspiring writers attempted to emulate the success of works like </span><i><span>Harry Potter</span></i><span>, </span><i><span>Twilight</span></i><span>, and the </span><i><span>Hunger Games</span></i><span> to disappointing results?</span></p><p><span>“You’ll never make a splash by just doing what everyone else is doing,” advised one user, adding, “If you’re not passionate about something, then it usually shows in the writing.”</span></p><p><span>Write the story you want to write, regardless of current trends. Your passion for your story will shine through. </span></p>

Don’t Worry About What’s “Hot”

Some writers try to mimic the popular stories of their time. How many aspiring writers attempted to emulate the success of works like Harry Potter , Twilight , and the Hunger Games to disappointing results?

“You’ll never make a splash by just doing what everyone else is doing,” advised one user, adding, “If you’re not passionate about something, then it usually shows in the writing.”

Write the story you want to write, regardless of current trends. Your passion for your story will shine through. 

<p><span>Getting things perfect seems like a standard to strive for, but perfection has a downside. Some folks get so obsessed with perfection that they never finish anything. </span></p><p><span>Perfection is really the enemy of progress. </span></p>

Perfection is the Enemy of Progress

“Stop trying to make it perfect and just write!” exclaimed one user. 

Your writing will never be perfect. Nothing we do in life will be perfect. Perfect is an unachievable goal that gives people an excuse not to accomplish anything. 

Instead, just write. Write horribly at first. It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that you’re doing it. The more you do it, the better you will get at it. If writing is worth doing to you, it should be worth doing poorly . 

become a better writer in 6 minutes

Show, Don’t Tell

Show, don’t tell is one of the biggest rules of literature. One aspiring writer in the thread said it prevents them from writing a boring story and helps them expand their vocabulary. 

You don’t need to explain everything in a book. Show the reader what’s happening through action and dialogue, don’t describe it. 

<p><span>Homer wrote the Greek epics </span><i><span>The Odyssey</span></i><span> and the </span><i><span>Illiad</span></i><span>, while Sun Tzu authored </span><i><span>The Art of War</span></i><span>. </span></p><p><span>But is that true?</span></p><p><span>Reddit users claim there’s no historical record of either author outside these books, and most were compiled centuries after they supposedly lived. The works are likely compilations from various authors accredited to a single source. </span></p>

Use Flourish

Great authors use literary devices to enhance their writing and story telling. Try incorporating some of t hese 25 literary devices into your story . 

<p><span>Creative writing allows you to explore the world of your imagination. Put pen to paper and let the characters running around in your head come to life.</span></p> <p><span>Creative writing allows you to build worlds or make a statement about modern society. It lets you dig deep into your subconscious and unleash your inner dreams and desires.</span></p> <p><span>The best part about picking up creative writing as an artistic hobby is a cost. All you need is a pen and paper. If you need help developing ideas, you can use a <a href="https://partnersinfire.com/passion-fire-2/creative-writing-prompts/" rel="noopener">creative writing prompt</a> to get your juices flowing.</span></p>

Creative Writing Prompts

If you’re struggling to come up with a great tale, use a prompt to help. Creative writing prompts can spark your creativity . 

<p><span>Sometimes, we are so overwhelmed with everything in our heads that we can’t focus on the most critical task. We might need help to determine what that task is!</span></p> <p><span>A</span><a href="https://partnersinfire.com/lifestyle/brain-dump/"> <span>brain dump</span></a><span> can help. It’s a system of getting everything floating in your head out on paper. Getting your thoughts on paper will help you organize them and stay focused on what is essential. </span></p>

Write an Epic Rising Action Sequence

Rising action is the most important part of your plot. Here’s how to write it . 

<p>Literary elements are the building blocks to every story. <a href="https://partnersinfire.com/passion-fire-2/art/literary-elements/">Here’s how to excel at the basics</a>. </p>

Know the Basic Literary Elements

Literary elements are the building blocks to every story. Here’s how to excel at the basics . 

become a better writer in 6 minutes

The Most Compelling Characters in Fiction

Consider popular character archeotypes when writing your tale. Dungeons & Dragons chaotic neutral alignment makes great characters . 

<p><span>The internet is a fantastic source of knowledge and entertainment. It’s filled with resources to help you learn, create, and relax. </span></p> <p><span>The vastness of the internet has one shocking limitation: with so much content, it’s hard to find valuable resources online. Therefore, I was delighted to see a thread in my favorite Reddit sub, R/Askreddit, asking users to share their favorite fun, free internet resources. </span></p> <p><span>You may be shocked at how many cool things you could have gotten for free online!</span></p>

Writing is Tough, But Practice Makes Perfect

You can be a great writer. The Reddit thread is filled with advice to help you on your journey, but the most important thing you can do is start. 

Write that first chapter. Develop engaging characters. Revisit your story and revise your drafts. Before you know it, you will have a fantastic tale you’ll be proud to share.

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  1. 10 Steps to Becoming a Better Writer [Free Poster]

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  4. How To Become A Better Writer

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  6. How to be A Better Writer at Work

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COMMENTS

  1. How to Become a Better Writer: 20 Hacks and Tips

    1. Start by spending more time writing. In Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell famously claims that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to achieve greatness in any skill. Even if you only put in two hours more per week than usual, any increase in the time you spend writing will accelerate your improvement.

  2. 11 Tips on How To Become a Better Writer [In Less Than 1 Hour]

    Even if your current prose resembles a kindergarten finger-painting masterpiece, these easy-to-digest writing tips will take your writing go from 'meh' to 'wow'. Okay, now, without further ado…LETS DIVE RIGHT IN! 11 Simple Tips to Become a Better Writer Under 60 Minutes Aesthetics. First impressions are EVERYTHING.

  3. How to Become a Better Writer: 32 Tips from a Bestseller

    If you don't say it happened, we won't assume it did. 9. Introduce your main character early, by name. The biggest mistake new writers make is introducing their main character too late. As a rule, he should be the first person on stage and the reader should be able to associate his name with how they see him. 10.

  4. 100 Writing Practice Lessons & Exercises

    Writing practice is a method of becoming a better writer that usually involves reading lessons about the writing process, using writing prompts, doing creative writing exercises, or finishing writing pieces, like essays, short stories, novels, or books. The best writing practice is deliberate, timed, and involves feedback.

  5. How to Become a Better Writer (Beginner's Guide)

    First, plug in the keyword and head over to the Matching terms report. Then group "By terms" and "Show as list.". The sidebar shows matching terms you can write about: "best things to do in london". "free things to do in london". "fun things to do in london". "things to do in london with kids".

  6. How to Become a Better Writer: 14 Expert Tips

    TABLE OF CONTENTS. Improve your writing skills with these tips. 1. Read More. Reading other writers' work is one way to nurture your own writer's brain. Read often, and read different types of content. Making a habit of reading will expose you to different styles of writing and ways of structuring your content, which will benefit your own ...

  7. How To Become a Better Writer: 11 Steps for Success

    2. Use simple and concise language. Becoming a better writer often means learning to make your messages more concise and easier to understand for the reader. Simple, concise language can deliver even complex messages in a way that's easier for readers of all levels to understand. Whether you're a creative or technical writer, learning to ...

  8. How to write better: a quick-start guide for anyone and everyone

    Spell-check is a nice starting point, but writing well happens when you use a reputable grammar or punctuation checker tool like Writer to support you. 7. Read more to do better writing. One of the best, passive ways of becoming a better writer is to read a book (Stephen King's work makes for great binge reading).

  9. How to Become a Better Writer: 15 Steps for Improving Your Skills

    Learn to command tone, rhythm, and diction before trying to improve other elements of your writing. 2. Write daily. Writing is a skill that improves with constant practice. Schedule time every day to write, even if it's just one paragraph. Just 15 minutes each day can do wonders for your writing skills.

  10. Improve Your Writing: 6 Tips for Becoming a Better Writer

    Practice, practice, practice. Or the "10,000-hour rule", which states that to master any skill, you must practice for 10,000 hours or more. If you want to become a better writer, write more words more often. End of story. 3. Don't Follow the Herd. The herd mentality is alive and well in the writing business.

  11. How to Become a Better Writer

    When you meet a daily, weekly, or monthly goal, take a moment to reward yourself. Go for a walk. Listen to music. Treat yourself to a snack. Building positive reinforcement into your practice will keep you motivated, and in the long run, help you become a better writer. 9.

  12. 8 Small But Powerful Ways To Become A Better Writer

    Here are 17 small but powerful ways to become a better writer, right now: 1. Set a writing goal, along with a punishment for yourself if you don't keep that promise to yourself. ... By the time I arrived home 45 minutes later, my answer had made its way to the front page of Reddit. Hundreds of people started following me on Quora. My inbox ...

  13. How to Become a Better Writer in One, Simple Step

    Take a look around the room you're in right now. Focus on one detail, like the shadow on a wall caused by a picture frame. Then, start writing. As you write, remember to use as many of your five senses as you can. Describe the room for fifteen minutes. When you're finished, post your practice in the comments section.

  14. 6 Easy Practical Steps to Becoming a Better Writer: 30 Days

    Becoming a Better Writer in 30 Days or Less. Update Bonus: 21 Shocking Writing Prompts to start writing your next book or short story optimized Quick Pinterest Pin at the bottom of the Page. 6+ Easy Practical Steps to Becoming a Better Writer in 30 Days or Less. Follow these strategies below and you will most assuredly be a better writer than when you started.

  15. Become A Better Writer In 60 Minutes (Masterclass)

    Become A Better Writer In 60 Minutes (Masterclass) 3 Niche Business Ideas We Thought Would Fail… But Actually Crushed It; My Mom Started a $1M Side Hustle In Her 50's; What Stock Would Warren Buffett Buy If He Started Over In 2024? The Story Behind The $1.5B Pornhub Curse; The Fastest Way To Get Promoted (Career Cheat Codes)

  16. 10 Simple Tips to Help You Be a Better Writer

    Then refer to them as you write to keep yourself on track. 3. Strip it Down. Albert Einstein once said, "If you can't explain it to a six-year-old, you don't understand it yourself.". Imagine that you're writing for an audience of little kids—impatient, easily distracted, with zero tolerance for jargon.

  17. Be a better writer in 15 minutes: 4 TED-Ed lessons on ...

    Be a better writer in 15 minutes: 4 TED-Ed lessons on grammar and word choice. There's no denying it — the English language can be mighty tricky. When writing a paper, a novel or even an e-mail, you might look at a sentence you just wrote and think, "Is that comma supposed to be there?" or "Is that really the best word to use?".

  18. How to Become a Better Writer at Work

    Fitting in strong vocab words is great, but only if you're positive you're using them correctly. It's better to have command of your writing with words you know, rather than throwing in a big one and hoping it'll make you look smart. And if it's a blatant misuse—such as with compunction above—well, that's really bad.

  19. Five Things You Can Do

    They know that reaching their full potential is a lifelong journey of hard work, patience, and dedication. But for those of us who need more immediate gratification, here are five things you can do — this week! — to be a better writer. Monday: Make a promise to write every day this week. Promise to write for at least five minutes in the ...

  20. How I Became A Better Writer in 15 minutes

    This was ironic because I desperately wanted to be a writer. I spent nearly every free minute devouring books, and one day people would read my stories too. However, in 15 minutes I went from awful writer to capable. These were, and still are, the most important 15 minutes of my career. When I entered a four year university I was no where near ...

  21. Here's How To Become A Better Writer

    Writing Tip # 2: Read more. Many acclaimed authors all say it: in order to be a better writer, you must read. The more you read, the more exposure you have to broader vocabulary, ideas, and ...

  22. 37 Proven Ways To Become A Better Writer

    You don't learn how to become a better writer by thinking everything you've come up with is worth keeping. A lot of writing is editing and rewriting. Top Tip #1: When editing, get rid of filler words and phrases like 'very', 'just' and 'really.'. Unless you really need to use it because it gets the tone just right.

  23. How to become a better writer in 30 days

    Step 2: Study writing . If you're trying to become a better writer over the next 30 days, you need to become a student of writing. Think of it like this: Do pro sports players only show up to practice and games, then check out for the rest of the week? Of course not. They and their coaches also watch game films.

  24. PDF Strategies for Essay Writing

    Harvard College Writing Center 6 ... between what is medically necessary and what makes us simply "better than well" (51) is less convincing. This is an arguable analytical claim. To argue for this claim, the essay writer will need to ... more people becoming invested in fighting climate change. She writes, "Researchers

  25. Powerful Tips To Lift Your Writing To the Next Level

    The more you write, the better you will become. " Get in the habit of writing as often as you can," shared one user, adding, "you'll get nothing done if you wait to be inspired."

  26. Become A Better Writer In 60 Minutes (Masterclass)

    Listen to this episode from My First Million on Spotify. Episode 552: Shaan Puri (https://twitter.com/ShaanVP) and Sam Parr (https://twitter.com/theSamParr) teach the ...

  27. 8 Ways To Improve Your Communication So It Doesn't Derail ...

    The hours add up—with people reporting to Grammarly they are spending more than 10 hours a week in meetings and more than 21 hours a week doing writing tasks like developing communication to ...