The sun is coming through the window panes and you feel something in the air. There's a surge of excitement before pen meets paper and you fall into a frenzy of thoughts. Without any hesitation, you spill your aching breaking thoughts onto what used to be a blank page.
Days later, you find yourself demoralized by a number of things. From the lack of upvotes or likes, you wonder why no one understood the effort you poured into your writing.
Here's a simple reason why that happens: People don't understand you.
No, not philosophically but quite literally. The way we speak seeps into our writing. It's common that what we perceive will not translate with what people read. We decided to put together a few tips to help you level-up your creative writing game.
Structure
Structure is one of the most important things to remember before you start writing. People enjoy patterns that they're familiar with. Hence, why songs we listen to are usually in the same structure:
Verse 1
Chorus
Verse 2
Chorus
Bridge
Chorus
Planning out your structure before attempting to write is key. Having an introduction that leads to key-points followed by a conclusion makes things easier to understand. Here's a structure you can follow:
Introduction
Key-points
Conclusion
Quick Summary
Bleed
Bleeding is a term some Songwriters use inspired by Pat Pattison the Lyric Writing Guru of Berklee College of Music. For the basic understanding of this concept lets use an example:
The image above is a profile photograph of a person. However, the simple concept of having a portrait sometimes is not enough. If we were to allow a bottle of paint fall from the top of the person's hair onto their face we would have something new entirely. It adds more character and depth. Here's an example in a song:
Without bleeding:
I was the fastest in the world,
I did what I loved and celebrated,
I was free, I was free.
With bleeding
I was a "thought", always faster than an "action",
All that I sought, was drink and passion,
I was free, I was free.
Not only is the bleed example filled with depth that makes you think, it had imagery and analogy. The first line bleeds into the final line as well. Thoughts are always faster than action and with having understood that would bring a far bigger perspective into the lines "I was free, I was free.". I'll let you figure that out.
Let it go
I have a friend who studied writing and went to a top university in Australia. He came back with endless stories of his travels and a very interesting quote that his Lecturer mentioned that stuck with me. She said "Make a story, love your story then kill your story.".
After years of hearing that in the back of my mind, I finally came to a realization. What I think she meant and has definitely worked for us here. We often overthink everything and with more and more rules we find ourselves overwhelmed. Just plan your story, write it and enjoy it. Whether it's good or it sucks just, let it go. After all, there isn't enough time to worry about a story you published yesterday. Salivate and get excited at the thought of all of the stories there are to tell.