I’m a professional writer. When non-writers learn this, they immediately place me somewhere on the spectrum between magician and nerd, depending on how they felt about their high school English teacher. The next thing they do is to tell me they can’t write. This is never true. Everyone tells stories, whether in a cover letter or e-mail, a presentation or even a wedding speech.
The belief that people innately can or can’t write is just one misconception about storytelling. The belief that writers narrate aloud while tapping out polished first drafts (I’m looking at you, Carrie Bradshaw) is another. Here are three more:
1. Always begin at the beginning
Actually, don’t. Opening sentences are your reader’s introduction to the story, not yours. You’re trying to guide the reader in, which means you first need to determine exactly where your story is, and what sort of entrance it needs. To figure that out, it helps to complete the entire piece before tackling the intro. If you are uncompromisingly linear and insist on starting with the intro, here’s a trick that will almost certainly strengthen your piece: take your final story, snip out the first couple of paragraphs, and re-paste them somewhere in the middle.
2. Sentences are the building blocks of stories
Like jigsaw puzzles, stories are built from bits and pieces. Linking and polishing these fragments into sentences is best left for later in the writing process. First, get your thoughts down, be they single words, sketches, clumsy phrases or references that only make sense to you. Once all your ideas are collected on the page, connections and structure will begin to reveal themselves.
3. More words = more persuasive
In almost every case, writing is more effective when there’s less of it. Like a good haircut, judicious barbering adds style and professionalism. If you’re working to a specific word count, write a few hundred words too many and then pare the piece down. No word count? When you finish your story, leave it alone for a day, then open it up and chop out a third. Insert contractions. Get rid of adjectives. Reconsider that “haircut” metaphor. You get the idea.