“You Are A Writer” by Jeff Goins took me two days to read through and get helpful insight into my own struggle with calling myself a writer. Goins insight thoughts on what the writing process is, and what it entails opened my eyes up the possibilities out there for me. I love that he uses relationship to build up your writing; he calls them “three must have relationships”. Which are: Fans, Friends, and Patrons.
In my own journey with Vasculitis I have learned the value of relationship with family, friends, doctors, nurses, and other suffers of a chronic illness. When I read this section of his book I said a deep resonating AMEN to his commentary about how important it is to communicate and collaborate with others in order to accomplish anything. I say anything, but he was speaking about writing. From my own experience it includes every single aspect of one’s life. I have heard often that the writer’s life is a solitary practice. Is it in reality? I don’t believe it is, simply because even writers needs readers, editors, publishers, and marketers in order to get their words out to the world.
This book is a great resource book for writers in the world who have blogs, who use social media, and who have issues with making daily writing a habitual practice. If you want it, you will work for it.
Another aspect that Goins touched on was writing for you, not worrying about an audience. I found a great youtube video of his explaining exactly what he means by that. When I started my blog, the only audience I had in mind was my family and friends to catch up with me on my journey. Now I see that I get a lot of traffic from those who read my blog. I don’t have 500 friends who are that interested in my life to read about it. I like to share my experience with living with a chronic disease that is debilitating and erratic in how it attacks my body. I am struggling with weight, choosing an eating plan that fits me. I am interested in a lot of different aspects. I also wanted to share recipes that I am finding that are yummy and don’t taste like crap. When I eat, I want it to engage all my senses and I mean all of them. I am getting off topic here, what I like is he is writing with no audience in mind. I know that in a few of my writing classes they always say write for the audience, focus on the audience. It gave me a huge headache and made me want to shove pencils in my eyeballs. What I like about writing is that I am free to write whatever I want to. I can talk about anything, I am free to type out whatever I want to and then I have that same freedom to delete them too.
I suggest anyone who likes to write or who wants to engage in any creative pursuit read this book. I got the e-book version when it was free on Amazon. Unfortunately, it isn’t free any longer, but it is well worth the investment in time and money.
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You have a blog! Eeeee! And it’s FANTASTIC! Sounds like a great book and a worthwile read, thank you for sharing. When I started my blog I was just writing for myself and friends and family – I really had no idea how to write or blog. It has taken me awhile to find my groove and a lot of trial and error in regards to what people like in a blog. I totally agree about writing for yourself, and I think if you start writing for others, you lose the joy from it. But on the other hand, I reckon it is good to have an audience in mind too and at times be considerate of that. It’s a balancing act really. Ooops, I’m writing a blog post here! I do believe you have inspired me to write about this topic. That’s what I love about blogs – people can write something for themselves, but also inspire someone else. Going back to not writing for an audience though – I think if you don’t have an audience in the back of your mind it can work against you. I have come across so many chronic illness bloggers and their blogs are just blah. All they do is write a couple of paragraphs about their doctors appointments and that’s it. There’s not any depth to it. While that’s ok, and necessary at times, publishing every post on just that becomes tedious for readers. It’s bland and boring. I know some people are just blogging to keep family and friends updated, but I see so many of these bloggers complaining about why they don’t have any readers. Ok, after all that, my point is that I think your writing is amazing and your posts are interesting and definitely not boring. You’re special, and you should keep sharing your story.
Thank you. I have to say that you made my night. My care provider says the same thing that I don’t dwell just on being ill. I don’t want to be one of those people who only whines about my aches and pains and focus on that only. I have other things that make me who I am. That is what I like about Chronically Creative’s blog, you show your creative side with your nail art, paper art, and what ever your art takes you. For me it is cooking, reading, writing, and relationships. Thank you for reading me.
As for your thoughts on audience and writing for yourself. I agree it is a balancing act and Goins was suggesting that bloggers were focusing too hard on getting an audience instead of the content and the art and love of writing. As you said, there are a lot of blogs who focus too much on complaining about the woes, instead of making the complaint and then finding the solution to the problem in a positive way. I believe you can complain in a positive way that gets your pain across and then offer up a solution to the problem for yourself and for your readers to show that you are not just merry sunshine all the time. Believe me I am not merry sunshine all the time. I am glad that I was able to inspire you and if you get the chance you should read the book, it is fantastic and has some great ideas. In fact, his website or blog is amazing: http://goinswriter.com/ check it out for my inspiration. It is a blog and believe me it is not boring at all. 🙂