Tag Archives: Writers Resources

How To Write

How to stop worrying and start writing

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Many of us just know we have it in us to produce some good writing of value. Yet, either anxiety doesn’t let us get there or makes us so slow that there’s no progress over long periods of time.

English: A photo of a cup of coffee. Esperanto...

Some of us lose ourselves in the rituals we develop around writing–getting coffee, cleaning our desks, decorating a study room. Others wait for the perfect moment when writing will appear with the muse.

I’d say the only thing that can exorcise writing anxiety is a few pages of writing itself. And the only thing that can make you better at writing is more writing. Lots of it.

So how do you stop worrying and start writing?
Continue reading How to stop worrying and start writing →

How To Blog, Uncategorized

How to write a successful blog post

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Many of us write well. Many of us also engage with really important or popular issues in our blog posts. Yet, some bloggers turn out more successful than others. How does that happen? What’s the big secret?

The most fundamental answer to this question about the big secret of writing a successful blog post is that there isn’t one. Readers know good content when they see it. They will not read anything that does not add value in some way (unless it’s your mother reading, of course!). So writers need to focus on quality first before anything else.

Yet, I’ve seen many great blogs that fail to engage the reader even with good content. “How does that happen?” I’ve asked myself many a time and have come up with the following cautionary points meant for good writers. Continue reading How to write a successful blog post →

Uncategorized

Why blog?

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Sketch of gallery
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Okay. So I decided to write something little, something small whenever I feel like it. Isn’t that really what writing is all about? I mean, writing doesn’t really move mountains, or solve the economic crisis. You may try to hit someone hard with words, but a baseball bat is better. A few years ago, I saw a big cow eat an entire book. Didn’t make the creature any wiser. She was still standing, tied to a pole, the last I remember. Continue reading Why blog? →

Uncategorized

On grouping blog posts innovatively

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OR On blog content arrangement Part 4

Once readers have been drawn to your blog, they may want more. At this point, you would need some kind of underlying idea to classify your posts. The more critical thinking you put in the classification aspect, the better your blog will be. The underlying principle has to come before you make use of the great features that will enable you to group blogs such as categories or custom menus. Continue reading On grouping blog posts innovatively →

How To Blog, Uncategorized

Of bloggers, Birbal and birds: How to make yourself heard

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How many of us bloggers are out there?

A mind-boggling number very hard to grapple with for sure.

Our sheer numbers  reminded me of a well known tale of Akbar and Birbal I came across recently on my flight back to the US from India. It was a version of the story in animation adapted for kids which I watched on the screen trapped in my little space in the sky.

It goes something like this: Continue reading Of bloggers, Birbal and birds: How to make yourself heard →

Uncategorized

Secrets of popular writers

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Look for These Popular Books on the Shelves
(Photo credit: Enokson)

Why are some writers popular while others aren’t?

A very difficult question with a myriad different answers I’m sure. Merit, context, luck, things outside of the writer’s control. Yes.

But on the whole, popular writing is popular because it’s smart.

Admittedly, a lot of smart writing never gets popular (or even gets unpopular enough to be popular) but all popular, even infamous writing has something about them that sets them apart and makes people want to read them.
Continue reading Secrets of popular writers →

Uncategorized

Five ways to hold your readers’ interest in your blog posts

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Kitten

This post is as much for myself as for my readers.

I’m beginning to take notes as things work and as things don’t as I blog on the blog hoping to help myself and anyone who reads this compendium of evolving experience on writing as I grope my way through the blogosphere.

So here are my words of wisdom to myself.
Continue reading Five ways to hold your readers’ interest in your blog posts →

Most Commented

Why read blogs?

102 Comments

Why do you read blogs?

I’ve been wondering. I’m not sure why I read blogs myself!

Question mark liberal

Why not read articles by established opinionators, stories by reputed writers, whacky visuals on established ads, photographs taken by friends rather than unknown people, instructions on how to do something or solve a problem from established players in a field?

What desires in us, what needs does the blog form satisfy that other forms can’t? What is it doing differently? Continue reading Why read blogs? →

Blog as Genre, How To Blog, Uncategorized

Five drawbacks of blogging

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In an earlier post, On learning writing through blogging, I wrote about the benefits that blogging has brought me. I still stick by my idea that blogging is beneficial overall. But having said that, once the exuberance of maintaining a blog has subsided, I do think there are a few caveats related to the blog form that regular bloggers need to be aware of. This might be even more true of new writers who might be getting into a mould through repeated writing that will set their habit for life.

So one needs to keep in mind the following bloggers’ maladies: Continue reading Five drawbacks of blogging →

Uncategorized

Writing efficiency

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Imagine a place where all roads are numbers. Imagine a school where all the kids sit in order of their heights and all kids greet each other in alphabetical order. Imagine a neighbourhood where kids no longer play but only have play dates. Imagine a country where all tunnels are the same height and all bridges are the same width, where all buses are numbered and all  underground trains are tagged with alphabets. Imagine a river with clearly cut banks in straight lines and trees that bend on cue with the wind. Continue reading Writing efficiency →

How To Blog, Uncategorized

Explore your writing persona

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I write well. Therefore I must be a writer.

No, that’s not enough.

Those of us who may still be young enough to think about our career approach towards writing and bold enough to believe that we can make a livelihood out of it (or at least a life by which I mean derive satisfaction in or find a vocation through writing) need to focus on our writing persona as early on as possible.

It’s not enough to believe we can write and have some proof that others enjoy what we write. Being able to entertain or inform others is a great sign of encouragement no doubt and certainly helps us along on the path to good writing. But we all know what an uphill battle it is from the point we find out we are good to the point where others are willing to take us seriously.

We need to explore who we are as writers very well before we invest a whole lot of time and emotional involvement on a path that provides very few tangible rewards most of the way. By exploring our own writing persona I mean finding out what we want to do or enjoy doing and what we can actually do and achieve through writing. Continue reading Explore your writing persona →

How To Write, Social Media, Writing Discussion

On learning writing from social media

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The medium

Social media has been around for some time now. It’s brought many changes in the way we inhabit our social world, in the way we communicate with others, on what being a friend means and on how we get back in touch with people. We find out about what’s going on in people’s lives on a regular basis without actually knowing them much on these platforms.

How do we manage to do this? Continue reading On learning writing from social media →

Uncategorized

Writer’s Block through Active and Passive Voices in the Head

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The writer’s brain had been left alone for a while. So had his pen. His table was left all messy and dust had gathered on his notebooks. The blinds were drawn in his room every dull morning for days on end. Rust had gathered on all objects on the table from the nib of the pen to the new pins that had been clean and shiny all these years. His computer had been left in a dark recess and the chair had had so many clothes dumped on it that no one but an exceptionally resourceful person would suspect that there was an object meant to be sat on underneath. Continue reading Writer’s Block through Active and Passive Voices in the Head →