You Will Never be a Writer If you don’t Master This Basic Thing
Part 1 in “ How to be a Writer Series”
There is no hook for this article to hold your attention if you are trying to find one.
This article doesn’t need one.
I know the people who’d be reading this have already read hundreds of How-to articles and are here to skim this in the hope of finding a way to write one article after all.
I think you’ve already made up your mind to take writing as your career or as a sidekick to your job.
I can bet you’d have subscribed to famous newsletters, followed the top solopreneurs on Twitter ( where the real drama happens), and taken a subscription of medium or substack.
Well.
Good. This is the first step to get into the ecosystem.
But you will stay where you are with a blank page, scratching your head. You feel the urge to write something, but your fingers do not scribble a word.
Because you don’t have this one thing yet.
A Mind that’s in your control(A writer’s Mindset)
Before you sit down to write anything, before you scribble a single letter, you need to control your mind.
It's the most important thing for any writer — an unnegotiable thing.
Only this thing decides if a writer is a great author or an average content writer with no views.
There are ways to make a mindset before sitting down to write.
You may have come across a myriad of morning routines, where you take cold showers, go on a walk, meditate, and drink coffee or tea, and finally feel motivated to sit and write, but you just stare at the screen.
Then, in a few minutes, your mind would find different ways to put its attention somewhere.
If you are a teenager, you’d think about sex, girls, and porn so much that you end up jerking off and later sleep.
If you are an adult, you’d think about doing work you never thought existed, like changing the curtains to match the color of your T-shirts.
The thing is, your mind will do everything but write.
Writing is an art, but it’s a craft. The main problem is having a stable mind when writing. You can learn the techniques, storytelling, and sentence structures with time and effort.
However, having a mindset to show up every day to write atleast 500 words is the ultimate challenge.
It takes high self-discipline and control over your body and mind.
Well, it takes years for sportsmen and army men to achieve this. Then how does an average man with a big fat ass in his pyjamas do it?
Well, can an average man with a big fat ass in his pyjamas achieve this while it takes countless hours of training for a sports or army man?
Well, you can’t right away.
But there is a way.
The challenge is not how to write but getting in the mood to write.
Let's take an example:
There are two types of persons.
A beggar who is starving has no clothes, no house, and no life has no need for the mood to write. He has to write to survive. And he will do that at any cost.
On the other hand, we are all those who have no stakes in their life and nothing to worry about. But we have to do something to secure our future. We can’t wait until we lose everything to make our minds force us to write for survival.
But our minds won’t act until there is an emergency.
So we have to try another way.
Dopamine Is Everything
Dopamine is released when we do something entertaining to make us feel good.
You can feel good when consuming social media. You can feel good when playing outdoors with your friends. You feel good when you do what you love, and you also feel good when reading a book.
It’s your dopamine level that determines what you like the most and what entertaining activity should get most of your attention.
The most entertaining one is social media, and the least one is reading a book.
Therefore, when you get rid of these apps, a void is created. You become bored, and your mind will crave dopamine, and it will eventually settle for something better than nothing.
Reading a book feels entertaining again.
It’s the way to set the dopamine levels back to normal.
You have to do this days before starting to write.
Your mind will screech and scream. It would do everything to avoid thinking. Still believe in yourself, and don’t slip into the trap. Format your phone if needed.
Your goal is to write atleast 100 words a day. Even if it’s not work-related, there is no problem. Journaling is exciting, too. You can be a bitch to anyone, and no one will ever know.
Think about the amount of pleasure you will get doing what you love the most without missing out on a single day. You will feel alive again.
Making up the mind to sit and write is the single most important and most challenging thing to do.
And if you do, You become unstoppable.
Attach your Identity
In the most famous book, Atomic Habits, James Clear mentions: If a habit is associated with a certain identity then it can be made or broken easily.
Similarly, associate your identity with your writing, and your habit becomes your lifestyle.
Mention in your Twitter and LinkedIn bio, “ I am a writer”. Whenever somebody asks what you do, say, “You are a writer”.
Make your mind attached to it so much that writing becomes a way of life rather than an obligation you fulfil to have money.
Reduce the Mental Friction
Choose a time when your mind is at peace. No prior emotions and irritations take up your attention.
When your mind and body are at ease, take a paper and pen, sit at your desk and write whatever the hell your mind thinks.
Set a timer of 1 hour and sit. You have two options: you can either write or sit there and do anything but leave the place.
It nearly takes half an hour to get into the zone.
If you perform this ritual daily, you’ll be able to unlock the sacred flow state that every artist and creator gets into to create marvelous things.
People don’t get it. But this basic thing determines if you can be a writer or not.
Otherwise, it’ll become like one of your New Year's resolutions, which never stays more than a week in your life.
Every time you sit to write, ask yourself this question:
“Am I clear why do I want to be a writer?”
And if you have the answer in a few minutes then great 😊or else……..hmm.
Attach an Emotion
Writing is a way of expressing and you express emotions.
People write to express love, anger, frustration, disgust, or anything they feel.
Like that, write what you feel. Don’t think about your niche, personal brand, or business module. It will all come into place with time.
First, make the habit of writing.
For me, sadness has been a driving force behind my writing.
P.s- It is a three-part series on how to write an article. Read the other two to have a complete understanding of this thing.
As for me, I am a budding writer.
If you like this article, please give it a clap and consider sharing it with your friends. And don’t forget to comment on the parts you agreed or disagreed with.
Connect with me at: https://twitter.com/BobbaTheGunman
See you in the next article, until then, Bye.
