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Hi friends!
If you're looking to level-up your writing, the next Write of Passage cohort closes for enrollment in four days.
On that theme, here are 31 things I've learned about the writing process:
- Like design, if a writer is doing their job, you never notice the writing. It's frictionless. You just keep reading.
- The best way to differentiate yourself against AI is to write with personality. Show readers your humanity. Tell personal stories, use interesting words, and lean into the off-beat things that keep you singular.
- The things you know the most about are the things you’ll be able to write the best about, but the challenge is that once you know a lot about something, you’ll stop seeing it. Talking to people is the best way to discover what you should write about.
- The world doesn’t reward the people with the best ideas. It rewards the people who are best at communicating ideas.
- Read your work out loud. You’ll be amazed at all the little places that trip you up. Then, use what you’ve learned to make your writing high-signal and smooth as butter.
- The most interesting ideas are right in front of us. We assume that if an idea is important, it’s going to be hard to find. But sometimes, the best ideas come from the things that everybody sees, but nobody takes seriously.
- You can almost always improve your writing by being more specific. Don’t write “I got in my car” when you can write “I got in my ‘65 Mustang.”
- Don’t try to write about too much. This is one of the biggest mistakes that young writers make. Instead, narrow your scope. Trade “A History of Cars” for “Saying Goodbye to Dad’s Beat-Down Mercury Station Wagon.”
- Forget sounding smart. Be useful instead.
- Storytelling 101: Stories are built on suspense, suspense is built on high stakes, high stakes are built on a character having a strong desire and an obstacle in the way of them getting what they want.
- If you want to improve your voice, read outside your sphere of expertise.
- Writer’s block is the tyranny of expectations. Block happens when your attention is on what other people think of your ideas rather than the ideas themselves. There’s a time and place for caring what others think, but it’s definitely not your first draft.
- Read whenever you have a moment to spare — eating breakfast, waiting in line at the grocery store, and right after climbing into bed. Even though you'll forget the vast majority of what you consume, reading will change you profoundly and influence your writing style in strange and mysterious ways.
- The fastest way to improve your stories is to cut the backstory. Jump into the heat of the action.
- Once you embrace the fact that your first draft will be junk, writing gets way easier. And more fun…
- Writing is hard, which means you’ll try to avoid it. To be productive, you have to treat yourself like a child. Disable your texts, turn off the Internet, and ban yourself from email. This reduction in freedom will lead to an increase in productivity.
- Ironically, imitation fosters originality. When you imitate someone’s style, you find your own (The Beatles started as a cover band.)
- Memorizing poetry makes you a better writer. Memorization takes place in the body just as much as the mind, and the words you memorize will become a part of you. There’s a reason we talk about “knowing things by heart.”
- Great writing is the art of compression. All creative work is.
- The simplest way to improve the rhythm of your writing is to vary the length of your sentences (and the words inside of them).
- Removing excess words is good advice, but it ends up driving people to cut all the life from their writing until it becomes overly minimalistic. Don’t suck the life out of your writing in the name of grammar.
- The entire point of knowing the rules is so you know exactly when to break them.
- Many of your friends will be afraid to give you harsh feedback. Remedy that by asking: “What’s the 10% I need to keep, no matter what? A followup question: “What’s the 10% I’ll cut, if I absolutely had to cut?” (Got this from my interview with Tim Ferriss).
- The process of rewriting won't just improve your original ideas. It'll generate new ideas too (most of these maxims are things I hadn’t thought about before I started working on them).
- Concrete writing resonates. Abstract writing puts people to sleep. Bring your words to life by making them vivid and tangible. Use specific examples. Talk about things people can see, touch, taste, smell, and hear.
- If you struggle to write, try speaking out your first drafts, then revising the typed copy. This is exactly how Churchill wrote his speeches. The only difference is that he spoke to a secretary. You can speak to a computer which will automatically transcribe what you say.
- Whenever you can center a story around people, do it. People Magazine is the world’s most popular magazine for a reason: people want to hear about people.
- You don’t have writer’s block. You’re just scared to say what you actually think. As my friend Jeremy Giffon says: “The best writing prompt for when I'm stuck is simply ‘be more honest.”
- When writing non-fiction, bury yourself in a well-written fiction book. The contrast in style and content will keep you focused on your own work, but the beauty will seep into your writing.
- You see the world through whatever topic you’re writing about. Once you start writing, you’ll start seeing the idea everywhere, like when you get a new car and suddenly spot it all over town.
- Lists like this won’t help much if your fingers aren’t hitting the keyboard. So if you’re serious about the craft, stop reading posts like this and start writing.
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Before I leave, I want to share two more things:
First... I spent years as a frustrated writer. I knew I had potential, but didn't know how to write things that people actually wanted to read. I'd watch people share ideas on the Internet and whisper to myself: "Wait, I can do that." But then I'd get stuck whenever I tried to publish.
Sound familiar? If so, Write of Passage is the fastest way to level-up your writing.
In the live sessions, I'll show you every method I use to write stuff that people actually want to read: long-form essays, Twitter threads, maxims like the ones above, you name it. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. You'll also get line-by-line edits from our team of editors on everything you write. You'll leave with a published piece that you're exceptionally proud of... something people actually want to read and share.
Second... I just dropped a conversation with Neil Strauss, who writes about all the taboo things you're not supposed to say out-loud.
As the author of ten New York Times Bestselling books, he’s built his career on getting celebrities like Rick Rubin, Kevin Hart, and Jenna Jameson to open up in a way that most writers are too afraid to do. He's written about everything from pick-up artistry to Rick Rubin's new book: The Creative Act (yep, he was the ghostwriter).
But don’t get it twisted — “being vulnerable” doesn’t mean “word-vomit your deepest, darkest secrets to the world.” It means being real in a way that’s interesting to other people.
In this episode, Neil reveals how to be vulnerable in your work, the right way. He breaks down story structures that hook your reader. He reveals how to cultivate your life to support your writing. And he shows you how to say things in public that most people would be too scared to share with their closest friends.
There's a reason I call this episode: "Is he the world's most provocative writer?"
Watch the episode on YouTube.
Listen on Apple or Spotify.
Have a creative week,
— David Perell
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