Take Off the Mask: Write with Your Voice!
Stop playing for the crowd. Be you.
You are uniquely you. It’s a gift, not a burden.
God made you, you for a reason. You have something beautiful inside you to contribute to the world. Write that!
We often feel tempted to try and write stories that mimic others so that we can chase some superficial cheap goal. Don’t sell yourself short.
William Zinsser writes:
“Readers want the person who is talking to them to sound genuine. Therefore a fundamental rule is: be yourself. No rule, however, is harder to follow. It requires writers to do two things that by their metabolism are impossible. They must relax and they must have confidence.”
It’s simple but immensely challenging.
“The scariest moment is always just before you start.”- Stephen King
Writers will do anything they can to procrastinate from writing. The reason is straightforward. Writing is hard freaking work. Masterful storytelling comes easy to no one, so don’t fret.
I want you to think about something for a moment:
What would you see if you could watch yourself as you prepare to write? Would we see you approach your desk and start typing away?
Or would we see someone get up twelve times before they settle into that chair to write because, suddenly, every other thing in the world is on their to-do list? Before you put your fingers to the keys, everything in the Universe suddenly seems more appealing than that hauntingly sinister blank page.
If this were not enough of a mountain to climb, a writer must be relaxed.
How, in the name of all that is holy, are we to relax during the process if we can barely muster the discipline to sit down and write?
Well, this is where some weird magic happens, from my experience. The first sentence is usually garbage and will need to be reworked later. The first paragraph is mediocre, but I continue to the second paragraph, and a flow develops. The words are coming. My mind narrows in and focuses on the task at hand. By the time I’m 50 percent through, I’m in the zone.
“Start writing, no matter what. The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on.”- Louis L’Amour
This is a critical point. You have achieved relaxation. Don’t screw it up by allowing for some dumb interruption. Keep going. If you allow for an interruption now, you will have to start the process all over again. Don’t do it once you're in the matrix. Don’t rip yourself out.
After you have reached the end, take a break and read your work. How could you re-word your statements with more authority and confidence? Are you saying something clearly enough for your reader if you really feel something? What words do you use that you could see yourself saying? Try not to sound fake, like some stuffy person who thinks more highly of themselves than they should. Just be you.
“Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart.” -William Wordsworth
Look at the page. Are you on there?
If you can’t find yourself, we must remove the facade to get to you. It’s you we are after!
The world needs to hear your voice. Your voice was given to you for a reason, and your reader wants and deserves to hear that authentic voice. So get in the zone, write, and don’t stop the flow. It’s always a grind to start, but push through it. Tell your story.
Now, go write something extraordinary!
“If something inside of you is real, we will probably find it interesting, and it will probably be universal. So you must risk placing real emotion at the center of your work. Write straight into the emotional center of things.”- Anne Lamott
