I don’t really consider myself a writer. But I write a lot.
All signs point to one incontrovertible truth:
I am, in fact, a writer.
In fact I am a professional writer. As in I get paid to write. Apparently some people like either what i say or how I say it. That’s good cause I tend to say it my way. At my last project I built a foundation of social media and content marketing along with buyer personas, editorial calendars and more. I wrote a lot every day, from blog posts to white papers, case studies, emails and more. It seems the written word dogs my every step.
I have actually written since I was a preteen. I am what the industry terms a ‘voracious reader’. I read like other people watch TV. If it was up to me I would not even have a TV or cable. As it is I have not turned it on myself in more than a year. I read very quickly and comprehend even faster. I always have. When I was young it was my one escape. Now it is my love. I got the reading bug from my mom who is a fellow avid reader.
I tended to not do well in school. I hardly ever saw the point in most of the homework or even classwork so I simply didn’t do it. I did really like tests and pretty much got straight A’s on tests. (not bragging, just true.) So even without doing any class or homework I managed to get straight D’s all the way up to my senior year in high school. That summer I decided to get straight A’s my senior year to raise my GPA. I did. 4.0.
But even way back in 3rd grade I remember the teacher walking up to my desk and asking me if I knew about the Reading Rainbow competition. The words reading and competition were enough to cause me to pause in reading my novel and look up at her. I glanced at the back wall at the reading rainbow tracking system. I took it all in and turned to ask her “What do yo get for winning?” She told me something that apparently was mildly interesting because I glanced back at the wall with its spaces for each book you read. This was the first 3 or 4 months of school by the way so we were early in the running. I turned back and asked her how many you had to read to win. She said well it’s pretty hard but you have to read at least 25 books by the end of the year to win. Her smile was rosy and encouraging. I rolled my eyes a bit and said “Oh, well then I already won cause I already read more than that. Put my name up there and I’ll take the prize.” I then turned back to my book and kept reading.
Because apparently, even then I was an arrogant bastard.
All through my teen years I wrote hundreds and hundreds of poems expressing all that teen angst. I also kept journals. I guess in retrospect I wrote a lot.
I still write a lot. I am half way through my 30 posts in 30 days blog challenge I set for myself to push myself to write.
So in the past 15 days I have written:
- 15 blog posts
- 7 articles on other websites like Technorati, SocialMediaToday and Content Marketing Institute
- 2 articles on LinkedIn Pulse
- And one other article that is about 80% done co-written with a friend
For my fellow math challenged friends that is 1.66 articles per day. For my writing challenged friends that is one hell of a lot of writing.
I stared at this blank blog page for a long time today and kept postponing it. And then literally once I started the second word of the title it flowed like mercury freed from its glass confines. When i am writing it tends to flow fast and punchy like Eminem in a rap battle. (see how I worked in two distinct pictures there.) I like writing. I enjoy the feel of the words as they tumble out of my mind through the clicking finger tips as they mate with the keys. It doesn’t feel like magic, it feels like thinking. Often, I write to find out what I know. I don’t always start with a plan. Although for most writing I do use a framework and create an outline ahead of time. Then I usually just write.
[Tweet “Turn out when you write, you write more. When you write more you write better.”]
One of my rules in my 30 posts in 30 days challenge is that i have to write each post i one sitting with no framework our outline, no edits, no changes and no going back to fix it. It is designed to get me to just write. And as a simple pitch: I can be hired to write for you.
Write more, over think less.
People constantly tell me I should write a book. I always laugh at them and say “But I’m not a writer.” When apparently I am. So I write. And you know what? Writing is good.
