[2023-02-22] Compendium of posts: writing

Among the subjects I discussed yesterday with the young woman who had reached out to me was writing. She asked whether my ability to write came from my education and experience. I acknowledged that studying journalism made me a better writer than I might otherwise have been and that working in communications helped as well. But the most significant factor in improving my writing, I told her, was my practice of blogging and journaling.

The young woman shared her own passion for writing, along with her concerns that perhaps it wasn't good. I encouraged her to write, quoting Brenda Ueland, who said: "writing is...just talking on paper." The full quote in Ueland's book If You Want to Write is this:

"Though everybody is talented and original, often it does not break through for a long time. People are too scared, too self-conscious, too proud, too shy. That is because they have been taught that writing is something special and not just talking on paper."

Inspired by yesterday's conversation, I pulled together a compendium of the many posts I've written on the topic of writing—both writing as therapy and writing as a discipline. I will add to the compendium via the writing category on my Categories page.
  • [2020-08-17] Write It Down, Make It Happen - the premise of the book Write It Down, Make It Happen is that we are more likely to achieve the goals we write down than the ones we merely contemplate; for me, that included these goals from 2020: "I will return to health" and "I will be a force for good in the lives of friends, colleagues and strangers"
  • [2020-09-15] Writing to share our honest reflections - writing fosters a tenderness that is not always present when we talk to each other: we might be willing to commit in writing what we are too shy to say in person; writing also allows time for reflection and editing, which enhances the expression of our feelings
  • [2020-10-30] The dignity of speaking the truth - as Natalie Goldberg said in Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within, "Writing can teach us the dignity of speaking the truth"; there is dignity in honestly reflecting what we are thinking and feeling, especially when documenting a story in all its colours
  • [2020-11-28] From the inside out - as Sark says in Juicy Pens Thirsty Paper: "We write for so many reasons. We write and share our stories because it's fun, it's important and because it changes us from the inside out. And others are changed by our offerings."
  • [2020-12-19] Gmorning, Gnight - Lin-Manuel Miranda writes in Gmorning, Gnight that the greetings he shares are often the greetings he wishes for himself; I do the same: if I'm trying to be more empathetic, I write about empathy; if I'm trying not to worry about tomorrow, I write about focusing on today
  • [2021-02-07] Writing as therapy - the benefits of writing, from revealing emotions, to organizing thoughts, to acknowledging fears, to allaying concerns, to expressing gratitude, to connecting with others
  • [2021-03-11] What Jenesis has taught me - lessons from blogging, including that stories put a human face on cancer, blogging supports ongoing communication with loved ones, and writing creates a record that would not otherwise be captured
  • [2021-03-13] Art - writing (indeed, any form of art) has the potential to enlighten, move and inspire—in short, to change others
  • [2021-03-15] Practice - practice is the surest way to get better at something, and when we combine that practice with feedback from an audience, a director or a coach, we can improve all the more quickly
  • [2021-03-16] Put on your shoes - how to overcome the fear of looking foolish, lazy or out of ideas and the fear of making a mistake, disappointing others: just figuratively put on your shoes and get out the door; in other words, as Mark Twain said: "Continuous improvement is better than delayed perfection"
  • [2021-03-21] Poetry - inspiration to keep writing or producing content (such as paintings, photos, music) to express your voice and silence the critics
  • [2021-04-18] Learning, teaching, mastering - the way to learn is to do: the teacher learns more than the student; the speaker learns more than the audience; and the writer learns more than the reader
  • [2021-04-22] Books - one of the most influential books I ever read was The New Diary: How to use a journal for self-guidance and expanded creativity; this posts explores how I used this book and offers questions to spark your own writing
  • [2021-05-18] MACJ writing method - in his book the HBR Guide to Better Business Writing, Bryan Garner recommends breaking the writing process down into smaller tasks: the Madman gathers material and generates ideas; the Architect organizes information by drawing up an outline; the Carpenter puts thoughts into words by laying out sentences and paragraphs; and the Judge polishes the writing
  • [2021-07-22] On being an artist - what we can learn from James Clear, Julia Cameron (author of The Artist's Way), Rembrandt and Maya Angelou about producing art, including writing: you have to work at it
  • [2021-07-31] Preparing for this moment - what we learned in the past and what we're struggling with today might be the basis for something wonderful in the future (an idea illustrated by Canada's women's eight rowing team at the Olympic Games in Tokyo)
  • [2021-11-06] Talker's block - Seth Godin points out that we don't get talker's block because we speak every day; so if we want to cure writer's block, we need to write every day
  • [2021-12-18] 500th post - in praise of writing: "With every sentence you write, you have learned something. It has done you good. It has stretched your understanding." ~ Brenda Ueland, If You Want to Write
  • [2022-05-18] Editing your work - tips for polishing your writing, such as reading it out loud, reviewing your writing in different formats, and asking a friend or colleague to review it
  • [2022-06-07] The story of Café Jen - what I learned from my first blog, including to be comfortable sharing my story and perspective, and—as May Sarton wrote in Journal of a Solitude—to give my "specific fears and desires a chance to be of universal significance"
  • [2022-06-17] Finished crap can be edited - more inspiration for getting on with writing: "Finished crap can be edited. Unfinished greatness languishes forever. The only bad writing is the thing you didn't write!" ~ Margarita Gakis
  • [2022-07-19] Writing emails your recipients will read - 12 tips for writing emails your recipients might actually read
  • [2022-08-11] How to get into the zone of effortless action - 6 suggestions for finding flow, including when you write
  • [2023-01-09] Writing is like a mirror - advice from Dr. Stutz, subject of Jonah Hill's documentary Stutz, on activating your unconscious through writing: "If you start to write, the writing is like a mirror. It reflects what's going on in your unconscious, and things will come out if you write in journal form that you didn't know that you knew."
  • [2023-01-31] Writing through cancer - in a webinar on writing through cancer, Sharon Bray defined expressive writing as "writing about thoughts and feelings related to stressful or traumatic life experiences without concern for style, spelling, punctuation or grammar"
Though I love clear writing, I expressed to the young woman yesterday that it's not how we write—the sentence structure, the grammar, the choice of words—that makes our writing interesting; it's what we write. If we share our truth (our thoughts, ideas, experiences) and if we write honestly, our words will resonate with others, whether our prose is raw or polished. Few of us have the courage to be really honest in our writing, at least when we know we will share that writing with others. But when we do, it can be incredibly powerful—so powerful, in fact, that it changes people's lives, both the writer's and the reader's.

Addendum
  • [2023-01-25] I love having written - a reflection on activities (such as writing) that may be challenging to do, but that result in an end product that brings us joy or pleasure
  • [2023-03-15] Documenting and sharing our stories - a post on why more of us aren't documenting our memories, plus suggestions about how we can make the process of capturing and sharing our stories more efficient
  • [2023-03-22] When one story becomes the only story - inspired by Nigerian-born novelist Chimamanda Adichie who said, "The single story creates stereotypes, and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story."
  • [2023-05-01] Stories give others hope - the power of story to educate, entertain and influence us, both in the moment and whenever we go back to them
  • [2023-06-28] Epistolary writing - a post about epistolary writing, which is communication in the form of letters