What I’ve learned about writing

Give yourself permission to write about You. Find a favorite author and read everything he or she has ever written. Write every day. Learn to self-edit. Don’t write anything you wouldn’t want your mother to read. Accept that writing is rewriting, and rewrite everything; your writing will improve by leaps and bounds. Write what you love. Practice Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style. Clear your mind; go to the coffee shop or take a walk. Read every day. Read like a writer. Don’t worry about what others are writing; as Delia Ephron says, only do what you can do. Write for an audience of one. Care about punctuation, because details matter more than you think. Learn to spell without using a dictionary. Proofread your work. Learn to self-edit (I can’t emphasize this enough). Don’t try to be the perfect writer for every job, because you aren’t. Find a favorite place to write. Accept constructive criticism. Practice perseverance; as Longfellow said, if you knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody. Don’t write in uppercase or extra-large font (it’s like yelling). Learn how to format text (bold minimally, use white space generously). Keep a list of interesting words. Make friends with verbs. Write from the heart. Find your style. Style, E. B. White wrote, is the sound your words make on paper. Listen.