I often hear people say that they want to become a writer but don’t know how to start a story. When they sit down to write, nothing comes up. They just stare at a blank sheet or screen for a while and eventually give up, thinking they are not good at writing. However there are solutions to tackle this problem. One important lesson I learned, when becoming a writer, is the power of bad writing.
Often your writing skills are not the main problem in the beginning. The problem is that you don’t want to fail. You want to deliver something good. Now I can’t guarantee your story will be good. Talent does play a role and not everyone can eventually deliver a high quality story. But I am convinced that everyone can write a story. However, it is important that you don’t fear failure.
I can guarantee you that no writer, even if it is Stephen King or Dan Brown will write an perfect story instantly. Writers revise over and over again, and they use proof readers or editors to make their works better. There is no instant perfect story. Get rid of that thought when you want to write. First you have to do bad writing and build a frame, to get the ball rolling.
Look at other art forms when you want to start bad writing. For example think about the sculptor and his rock. When he starts sculpting he first has this big ugly and rough looking rock. He starts working on cutting the rough pieces. Slowly his rough rock transforms into an elegant sculpture and eventually he can begin to work on the details.
Consider this ugly rock as you first version oft he story. Then you gradually start picking and making little details, and eventually you start seeing results and beauty. It is all about starting, once you have the frame you can ad pieces and start shaving and picking.
As an aspiring or experienced writer you must be familiar with the feeling of sitting in front of a white paper or a white screen. In your mind you are trying to come up with a story. However, time passes and nothing interesting pops up. If you are an aspiring writer who writes for fun then this is annoying, but for professional writers it might be a bigger problem.
Often the faster you write, the more you can earn. For example If you write for low earning sites like textbroker.com, creating articles fast is essential to make enough money for a living. You can not wast time by trying to form the article in your head. You need to start putting those words out on a screen or paper.
I wrote a short story to give you guys an example of how bad writing can help you build a frame in a very short period. The time limit for this story was five minutes. I wrote it without thinking and just started rambling, with the sole purpose of building a frame for my future story. I did not make any revisions and did not stop to think about what I wrote.
There once was a man who sat in a tree he was thinking why do i sit in this tree. I should be somewhere else right now, but where should I go. I could go to the river maybe, he thought, or I could go to the beach. But why should I visit a place with water. Maybe its much more nice to go to a place where there are plants and trees. I could go to the park or the forest. Maybe I even find a nice animal or some other people with the same thoughts as me. I can talk with them about trees and plants and beaches or rivers. O gosh the man thought there are the beaches and rivers again. I love water he thought. Then maybe I do should go to some place where there is water and maybe enjoy a nice swim. The man made a decision and started to climb down the tree. Slowly. It took him a long time it was an old tree. An old and big tree with large branches and a marvelous large beard of green leaves. The man often sat in this tree to think about his live and to talk with the birds in the tree. When the tree was in the mood then he also talked to the three. It was an Oak. The man liked to listen to the oak. It was a wise tree with a lot of live experience. It had seen the years come and go and had survived many seasons in its long live. Its roots where deep and its branches where high. The tree was connect to the earth the water and the sky. The man found this very fascinating and often fantasized about how it would be like to be a tree. It would be a good live maybe. Of course he would not know for sure.
When I wrote this story I did not stop for a minute to think that my story did not make sense. That feeling can pop up easily. When building your frame you just have to ignore it and keep writing. Soon you find out how easy it is to come up with a story, when you just start rambling. Remember that having a bad story is already much better then having nothing at all.
After creating that short bad writing example, I got motivated to start forming it into complete story. Now I am curious to see what will happen next. Let yourself be surprised when writing. Don’t immediately start thinking about what will happen in the rest of the story. Just let it resolve while you are working on it. It will make it easier for you to start a story and you will have more fun.
Remember to ramble at first when you start writing, worry about details or corrections later.
Bad writing can also help you overcome your writers blog.
Once you have your frame then gradually start making revisions.
Did you ever try to write something but then failed to come up with something? How did you deal with this problem?
I read your post and it really gave me some good ideas. I’m always so scared to put my writings our there, because I know that I’m not all that good of a writer. I’m hoping to improve in that.
I’ll definitely try the framing -tip to help me get started with my post. Sometimes I spend about 12 hours writing my post, from the very beginning of thinking what to write and how to actually finishing my text. Needless to say, it’s taking too much time 😀 Thanks!
I am glad to read that my post gave you some good ideas. Don’t be scared about your writings. You are doing well. I read some of your posts and they are clear and informative. Although i do have to say I had a problem with commenting on your page as well. For some reason it was not possible for me to type my comment.
No problem. I hope you are able to fix the issue.