Although most of you know me only for my tech writing, I pride myself more as a writer and teacher than as a computer expert. There are a lot of people on this site and others that are vastly more skilled than I am, and yet their writing isn't nearly as popular. Why is that?

What makes people enjoy reading tech articles has little to do with technical skills. Reading something for information can be worthwhile, but people get absorbed by a well-written article in a way that transcends the subject matter.

Chasing an Epiphany

The toughest part of writing anything is that constant quest for an original idea. We all have ideas from time to time, but I really think that some people simply fail to recognize them. You have to grab a fresh idea before it leaves your short-term memory or it could be lost forever. You know how you'll be in a conversation and someone says something that you want to respond to, but the thought is gone before you get a chance to speak? The only way to get the same idea back is to replay the whole conversation in your mind.

If you think it's only you, let me assure you that it isn't. All writers go through that. Trying to consciously come up with a new idea is akin to watching water boil. Don't do that; you'll get more ideas in an hour of doing something completely unrelated than you will get in an entire day of fighting writer's block head-on.

The thing that gets a writer the most inspired is obviously an individual preference. For me, it's a tie between going for a drive and reading message boards. We all have our own muses to invoke.

Let me give you the best advice I have on this topic. When I've taught writing, this is something that I've truly struggled to get across to my students: don't write until you have something to say! If you just have a collection of facts to present, then just present a collection of facts. But if you want to write, don't do it until you really have something to say. If you want to write something but don't have anything personal to say, please don't waste your own time or the time of your readers.

Organizing Your Ideas

When it comes to harvesting ideas, I have one cardinal rule for myself: when I get an idea, I drop what I'm doing and write it down. If I don't, I may never find it again. In a traditional setting, this can lead to a pretty messy office. Fortunately, computers allow us to organize ideas into files and folders in a better and more efficient way. I can move files and folders around on a computer much easier than I could in any pile or cabinet.

This may not work for everyone, but the way I organize gives me a lot of freedom to continue thinking about other things while not sacrificing an original idea. On my Windows desktop, I always have a text file and two folders. In the text file, I list all my ideas in no particular order. At any given moment, this list may contain more than fifty items. Some are even more than a year old. But that's fine because they will be there whenever I decide I need them.

The two folders are called "Articles" and "Completed Articles." If I start to write an article and get stuck or busy or just lose interest, I move it into the "Articles" folder. Again, it's there when I need it. Then, whenever I finish and publish an article, I move it to the other folder so that I'll have it archived for the future.

Proofreading

Using proper spelling and grammar is a part of writing and is certainly important, but don't get lost in it. If you hate proofreading, find someone to do it for you. At some point you just have to let go and accept any minor mistakes.

I won't say much more about this because I don't want to encourage sloppiness. Just keep in mind that whether there are mistakes or not, the time you put in will show. It's better to write a great article with a couple minor grammatical errors than an error free pile of meaningless tripe.

Developing Your Own Style

Writing, like any art, has a lot of room for individual style and it's important to find your own. Some writers can move from one style to another like great actors, but others find one vein and stay in it. Either way, you have to start somewhere.

We all have our own perspectives of the world, and that shapes our "voices" in writing. Think about how you speak and try moving from there. My personal writing style shares a lot with the way I teach; I just lead a "conversation" and make use of many examples, analogies, and smart-mouthed jabs. That's the most natural for me and I guess that's why it works.

Beating Your Phobia

I think that what holds back a lot of writers who have mastered all the things I mentioned above is pure fear. I don't mean for that to sound harsh. There is always risk in good writing because you put your heart into it. You expose yourself and that's a very scary thing.

That being said, all you can do is struggle to toughen up. Sometimes, people are going to hate what you write. Sometimes, you will say things that hurt feelings. Sometimes, you will reveal things about yourself that are embarrassing. Guess what? If you don't do those things, you didn't have very much to say.

Just keep putting your work out there and don't quit. Like public speaking, it gets easier with time. And unlike public speaking, you don't have to present anything short of the product you envisioned.