What I’ve Learned About Writing in the Last 2 Years
By: Julia Rose
Tags: Writing Life, Writers On Writing, Self Reflection, Writing, Writing Tips

In February 2018 — over 2 years ago — I published my first story on this platform.

It wasn’t the first time I’d written personal essays online.

In fact, I’ve had several blogs over the years. One about traveling and living abroad (it was called seeinglemonde because I’m bilingual :-)), the other was called mythingamajob (it’s still active, in case you wanna dive down a rabbit hole?) where I gave career advice to young job seekers like moi.

But the thing about those blogs was that they felt safe. They felt hidden.

Publishing on Medium felt raw and exposed (spoiler alert: it still does).

There’s a lot of readers here (over 100 million monthly active readers to be exact), And yes, while most won’t see my stories because this girl ain’t “Medium famous”, there was something about publishing here that felt high stakes.

It was scary. Even scarier because I had just been fired from a brand-new shiny tech job in downtown Toronto two weeks prior. My ego was shot, it was the middle of a Canadian winter, and I was living in a basement apartment wondering how long it would take for my unemployment money to arrive.

Despite all those limiting factors, I decided it was the ideal time to say “fuck it”, and take control of my narrative and my art.

So here I am, over two years later with some lessons about writing.

What I’ve Learned About Writing

1: Write like it’s a conversation

Forcing something is not the way to go.

One main reason I love writing is because I love having a conversation with you. Whenever I sit down to write with an agenda to “sound a certain way”, I know the experience for both of us is going to suck.

I’m here to be me. It takes a lot of the pressure off to imagine I’m talking to a close friend over a coffee.

When you’re just you, you can let go of the idea that writing has to be perfect (cause you’re not, right?). You can let go that it has to have a beautiful ending sentence, takeaway, message, or whatever. It might sometimes. It might not sometimes. Talking to a friend outloud is often how we make sense of our ideas or thoughts. It’s how a lot of us process. I come to the page with the same intention, not with perfect answers, but with a conversation.

2: Socialize your ideas

Talking to people about what you plan to write about, helps.

Part of my writing process includes a lot of thinking long before I sit down to type words out. Like, a lot of thinking.

I spend time in my head exploring something. Then, I make sure to bring it up in conversations I’m having with friends or colleagues or even strangers. I’m ‘testing’ the idea, or what I like to call ‘socializing it’. I see if and how people respond to what I say. I make a point to say out loud: “I might write about this”, to see whether people say “oh yeah, do it!”. I find that, most often, people do encourage me to write about things.

For example, I recently started a conversation on my personal Facebook page about how I don’t desire to get pregnant or be pregnant. My comments section exploded — literally. Over 70 people responded to my post, and a few of them said, “write the thing!”.

Socializing helps me see what resonates with people. Not only what ideas I have that are interesting, but what aspects of the idea are especially interesting.

3: Hierarchy is important

Guide me, please.

I’ve realized this isn’t common knowledge — even among experienced writers. I’m currently teaching a course about writing (insane, right?), and I am working this into the curriculum.

Guide your reader through your thoughts. The first giveaway that someone is new to online writing is to see their text without any bold, headings, subheadings, pull quotes, etc. If it’s just a long word document pasted into Medium, I can tell you’re new to this.

Hierarchy is telling your reader how to experience your thoughts, and in what level of importance. When I choose to make something a heading 1, I’m telling you that I think this idea is important. I’m telling you not just what, but how to read my piece. That matters. It’s how I guide and offer my thoughts to you, and how I create an experience for you to read. Without it, I’m lost. And you’re asking me to do too much work to understand you.

4: Write when you are “in it”

Once the emotion passes, it’s gone.

This has been true for me at least. I have a lot of stories in my drafts folder, and at this point, I know that unless they are near the top, they won’t come out. Why? Because I’m no longer “in” the emotion. I can’t even connect to what I was thinking or feeling when I started the draft. So once it passes, it’s over for me.

That’s why I don’t sit on drafts for too long. I might chip away at a piece for a week at most. Anything longer than that means the thing won’t come out. Knowing this about my writing process means that I can push myself to press publish before I “feel ready”.

5: It will feel clunky

And isn’t that a beautiful relief?

About a month ago I had a conversation with a fellow entrepreneur and writer. I asked her what was blocking her from writing more regularly (she has a coaching business and wants to write more blog content). She said: “I’m waiting for the writing to feel effortless. I think that one day it will just flow out of me and be easier”.

This belief struck me hard.

After 2 years, do I find that writing is a flow state, effortless, and easy? Not really.

I think that’s a great thing. Here’s why: knowing that writing is going to feel clunky allows me to give myself permission to hate it sometimes. If I needed to like it all the time — what happens when I don’t? Would I quit?

Things we care about doing are hard. Parenting, relationships, dance, work, keeping your house clean. If we needed to like them all the time to keep doing them, then shit, we would quit at life!

I’m so glad I had this conversation with her. It allowed me to uncover the belief that I hold — which is that the important things in life are hard and clunky, and still worth doing.

6: You need garbage to get gold

Writing is a muscle you exercise.

With over 40 pieces published on this platform, I’ll be the first to say — not all of them are good.

Writing is a muscle. The more I write, the more I need to write. Sometimes the thing I write is a clearing process. Meaning, I need to get the garbage out of my head to get to the crystals. The thoughts and the sentences that will change my life and become my belief system. If I went back and deleted all the garbage, the good stuff wouldn’t feel as good.

7: It’s okay to take a break

Writing is a journey, not a destination.

Two years ago I read a piece by Kris Gage and the words ring in my head to this day. She said: the #1 prerequisite to being a writer is to write.

I’ll never ever forget this line. If I “fall off the writing horse” so to speak, I just have to get back on it. Again and again. Take this past year for example. I didn’t publish a story from November 2019 to April 2020. The reason? I was in a relationship that was too hard to write about. I was distracted. I was consumed. And that’s okay. What I promise myself about writing is that I’ll keep coming back. Regardless of the length of time I’ve been away.

My advice?

Spend zero percent of your time beating yourself up for the breaks you take. It’s a waste of energy.

Channel that into getting back into writing, instead.

Like anything, if you take a break, it can feel like riding a bike with training wheels for a bit. That’s why it’s a habit, a process, and an exercise we return to.

Taking a break doesn’t mean we’re no longer writers.

On the contrary, it is the act of returning to our habit that makes us worthy of the title of Writer.