TheWritersBag.com

I was hiking with my daughter when I saw the sign on the side of the trail. I quickly realized that the first sentence was not only for hikers. Its message was for writers.

The fact is, every year the world exacts a toll of writing victims from the unwary, the unprepared and the unfit….

• Literary agents and publishers turn up their noses at wonderful story and book ideas because the writers don’t know how to present their ideas and make glaring punctuation, grammar or spelling mistakes in their queries.
• Superiors at work shake their heads and make negative performance notes on employees who write rambling, error-saturated, off-target reports, sales letters and other business communications.
• People turn away from blogs they would otherwise subscribe to because the blog writers haven’t learned how to convey ideas in succinct, logical, compelling and interesting ways.

This list could go on and on. The point is, too many people with the raw talent to become excellent writers – perhaps even famous authors – fail to achieve their goals because they are unwary, unprepared and unfit in terms of writing skills. Too many people in the business and professional arenas are “held back” because they are unwary, unprepared and unfit when it comes to the foundational communication skill that has become so deadly important since the advent of the personal computer and e-mail: writing.

Why do so many would-be authors, bloggers and business people who must write at work think they can survive and prosper without learning the basic skill sets involved? Would brain surgeons keep their licenses if they just “felt their way” through surgeries? Would accountants stay in business if they depended on their intuition alone? Would fine artists sell any paintings without knowing the basics of drawing, perspective and color?

I’m amazed that so many otherwise intelligent men and women think they can become successful writers without first learning and practicing the basics of grammar, spelling, punctuation, style, organization, format, point of view and so on! Such an attitude is the height of hubris.

Be wary of the dangers lurking out there in wait for those who haven’t taken the time to learn how to write effectively. Prepare yourself by learning the rules, the techniques and the strategies of powerful writing. (Read good writing books and manuals, such as those you’ll find here.) Make yourself a fit writer by regularly giving your writing muscles a good workout. (The Word Shot exercises I publish on this blog every Monday are just one excellent way to do this.)

Learn. Practice. Sharpen your skills. Be a winner – not a victim.

Creativity demands experimentation.

But many of us are afraid to experiment. In school we learned that experimentation is dangerous. Most test questions had only one right answer. Even with essay questions, we had to provide the specific information the teachers wanted to read. Experimentation would have gotten us flunked.

If you want to become the best writer you can be, you have to be willing to take the risk of experimentation. Will you fall on your face? Sure you will. Possible several times. But if you stay with it and faithfully pay attention to the whisperings of the muse within you, you will eventually write what only you can write in the way only you can write it. Then you will be a true writer.

Don’t be afraid to fail. In any creative pursuit, failure is the price of eventual greatness. You are not a student in a post-graduate school, where they boot you out if you fail one class or one test. Nor are you an airline pilot or brain surgeon. For them, experimentation and failure can be fatal. You are a writer. For you, the fear of experimentation and failure is fatal.

Think of other people in creative fields, such as inventors. Thomas Edison failed 1800 times in his attempt to invent the light bulb. One success at the end of so many failures brought lasting fame to him and light to the world.

My son was a sponsored snowboarder. One day, when I told him to be careful and avoid falls, he said, “Dad, if I’m not falling, I’m not progressing.”

Novelist James Joyce wrote, “A man’s errors are his portals of discovery.”

Push yourself. Experiment. Fail and try again. Explore new territory in your writing. From where you are now, you can’t know where your commitment to fearlessly push your writing forward will take you. But you can be sure it will be well worth the trip.

PS. In my last post, I invited all of you to share an excerpt from your journal with the rest of us. Come on – don’t be shy!

I’ve seen the little shop for years. It sits across the parking lot from a large backpacking store I frequently visit. But I had never stepped foot inside, though I wanted to many times.

Two days ago I realized I needed a good dart board. (I’ve been under some stress lately and instinctively felt that throwing darts at a bulls-eye would be soothing.) So I drove down to Sally’s Dart Shop and went in. The small store was empty – no customers, no Sally. But it was filled with rows and rows of darts, boards and dart-throwing accessories.

Then Sally emerged from a back room. She appeared to be in her 60s and was probably a beauty in her day. Her personality filled the room immediately. She welcomed me, asked my name, introduced herself, offered me some candy, and then captured me in a flow of enthusiasm for all things darts.

Sally was a championship dart-thrower some years ago, as the medals on the walls around her shop attested. Although wrist problems have prevented her from throwing darts anymore, her love of the sport has continued unabated. Her eyes gleamed as she showed me her large assortment of expensive, competition-grade darts – things of beauty, every one. Her face shone as she described the transcendent benefits I would reap from the sport.

By the time I walked out of her shop a half-hour later, having spent far more than I had anticipated, I was so excited to throw darts that I was tempted to take my new board out of the box right there in the parking lot and have at it.

As I drove home, I thought, “There’s someone who totally loves her work.” Then it occurred to me that because she loves it so much, it isn’t really work at all. It’s play. She can get up every morning and say, “I’m going to play!”

My next thought was, “Do I love writing as much as Sally loves darts?”

I’ll ask you the same question. Do you love writing with that sort of enthusiasm? If you do, you will spend time writing even when you don’t have to. You will find yourself thinking about it in the nooks and crannies of time that come your way during the day and night. Your love for what you’re doing will shine through your work and pull others into it and along with it – not just readers, but editors or bosses or whoever are the gatekeepers of your words. Your enthusiasm for writing will be perhaps even more important to your success than talent.

But what if your answer is no? What if you don’t love writing like Sally loves darts?

Let’s be frank. For most of us, writing is a love-hate relationship. We’re simply not going to love it all the time. There will be times when it’s not going well. When we seem blocked. When we’re frustrated with it. When we hate it.

The trick is … wait – there is no trick. You simply have to weather the storms and hang in there until the clouds part and the sun breaks through. I’m sure there were times in Sally’s competitive career when she was off her game. I’m sure she thought she hated the sport during those times. But really, she didn’t. She loved the game. She was just frustrated.

Had she quit during one of those times and taken a job at a bank, she wouldn’t have as many medals on her walls and would not have gone into semi-retirement as a past-champion with a delightful little dart shop. And I wouldn’t have a dart board on my office wall today.

Don’t quit. Keep writing through the tough, dry times. If you ever truly loved writing, that love is alive and well somewhere inside you. It’s just hiding. It will return, and when your enthusiasm breaks through once again, you’ll be forever grateful that you didn’t quit when it was dark.

PS. Take a shot at this week’s Word Shot! Click here.