Ever wondered if there are ways to strategize your writing or any secret for thinking straight? Many self-publishing mentors suggest that your #1 basic goal in book marketing is to build an email list, writing every day.
This isn’t entirely true. But, by writing from the fun-loving-natural-drive with the mindset of a “called-to-serve” and “always-there-to-serve” writer who is out for the business of writing.
Seeing writing as a business allows you to go miles to test what works in the marketplace before serving the mix to your audience. This is not a “job status” or a “pursue and drop” career, it is a “responsibility” to serve humanity.
You wash and rinse every strategy to make sure it works before feeding the bellies of your tribe. This is what real badass writers do – to provide a solution and it works when the steps provided are followed.
Fundamentals of Writing
Some folks think the only time to write and think straight is when they are alone. But with my #1 (no, two) most loved secret for thinking straight, you can write absolutely anywhere – in class, the dining hall, the street, the library – anywhere.
- being confident and
- being friendly with books.
As a writer, one of your greatest weapon of warfare is having a deep love for your craft. Even when everything doesn’t work perfectly as planned, the burning love keeps you going.
When you see a book you love in a bookstore and you want to read it, walk up directly, make an eye contact with the bookseller and give the book a warm hug.
You may not have the money to buy the book maybe because you ran off budgets. However, from there, just be genuine and say something like “Hi, this book is really cute, my name is {insert name}” and I’d love to have this book added to my library of books.
So, you are in college and you think you’ve found the book of your dreams. You don’t want to mess things up you say? Well, you’ve come to the right place as I’ve been where you are countless times in the past.
Becoming a Pro Writer by Thinking the Right Way
Do you want to live your dreams of becoming a pro writer with style? Follow this tips.
1. Problem: Being Confident
It is hard to think about things you are not confident about. You find a girl attractive and you aren’t confident enough to talk to or engage her? She’s going to go missing like a rough dust, a thin air.
Nobody became a pro writer by being afraid. There is no author you celebrate today that got featured on Forbes, Entrepreneur or Life Hack that got there by chance or with the fear of the unknown and failure mindset.
It doesn’t come off that way. Becoming a professional writer is an intentional activity that occurs with proper discipline. You need to keep building your self-confidence column, every day, always, thinking the right way.
Thinking straight is something that spurs the reality of its content when you – the individual – starts thinking. It is not a fairy tale nor a chess game for the less confident.
Let me take you back to high school.
Before exams how are you able to read, understand, memorize and give a feedback of what you read during exams if you weren’t confident about you grasping that which was taught into your short or long-term memory?
Can you give the answer? Of course, you can.
If writing is your life, you should know the amount of confidence and energy you need to exercise if you want to live and finally become a winner.
I have another question for you;
If you could read a book containing all that has happened and will ever happen in your life, would you? If you choose to read it, you must read it cover to cover.
How confident are you to actually discipline yourself to think while reading? Not just reading any book, but a book containing all that has happened and will ever happen in your life.
It’s going to be a big book, I hope you know?
Think about it and relate it to how serious you are about your writing career. If you can really finish that book no matter how big, then you can become confident almost with anything no matter how hard it appears.
Solution: Choose to Think and Write Confidently
Truth is, most of us are excellent at being self-deprecating and are not so good at the opposite. Tell yourself the favorite thing about you and the passion you have for writing.
Politely guard your thoughts. Honestly evaluate the way you respond to crisis situations. Are you happy with the way you react? How you react to situations could be the reason while you suffer from not being self-confident.
Be confident, believe in yourself – tell yourself that you can and you will see yourself becoming what you believe you could be. Organizing words aren’t always easy but with confidence, decisiveness and the right thinking capacity you can make it.
Strong women don’t need less confident men. They need men with authority – those who can stand firm on what they believe that actually works. The same applies to the women – men needs confident women too.
Note that your ability to think straight begins with you, not with the guy next to your door or a friend/relation. Applying yourself is not an exception if you want to grow in confidence.
Confidence is just an external force, and you need to act on the external force for change to manifest. Think about yourself when you were sixteen: what did you think your life and career would look like? Does it look like that? Is that a good thing?
If you could choose to be a master (or mistress) of any skill in the world, which skill would you pick? Writing? Thinking? Speaking? Storytelling? Marketing?
I need you to do something;
Read the story of Richard Parker and Tom Dudley. Is what Dudley did defensibly? What would you have done? Reading this will unveil the importance of self-confidence and self-discipline to you. Try to relate that to you, as an individual.
Confidence Plus Music
Do you think you need to listen to good music when writing for you to be able to think and write confidently? Well, maybe you do.
Write your own eulogy and apply yourself.
Describe your last attempt to learn something that did not come easily to you. Think about the last time you broke a rule (a big one, not just ripping the tags off your pillows).
Were you burned, or did things turn out for the best? You may need an emotional boost to help you begin to write. But, you must not wait to listen to good music to keep writing confidently.
What if the Mp3 goes bad and coincidentally you could do nothing about getting it fixed when you need to write. What do you do? Skip writing and wait for when you have it all fixed.
Think about the people – your followers, subscribers, fans, haters, and lovers. They need you more as you need them to survive. People worth more than just music. With the people, you can make good music.
See the problem of humanity as a reason why you should write confidently. Make proper research where needed before you begin to write for you not publish what people may tag “incomplete thought”.
Get all the necessary materials or tools required for a successful writing and put it all in place. Write the king and give orders for your ink to never top flowing unless you ask it does.
You are the King, and the kingdom is left at your control. Don’t let the kingdom die if you love the people. Invariably, I mean, don’t let the people die for the kingdom to stay alive.
Vomit your ideas for the harvest of all and never let it go unharvested while in its season. You are magical, so are your thoughts.
2. Being Friendly With Books
I know it’s not going to be easy. Reading is one of the writing activities that need the discipline to do. If we can tell ourselves the truth, sitting at a place reading is not that easy when you have a family to care for, crying baby to feeding or a boss that asks you around.
I hated reading for most of my life. From Nursery one until the summer after Junior Secondary School one I barely read a single book for pleasure. My mom was a huge reader and loved nothing more than spending time in a library or a local bookstore.
When I was growing up she would take me to the library and I’d have to check out a handful of books of my choosing. To her great, unspoken disappointment I found a loophole in her requirement to check out books and would always go for comic books either.
The first book I read that summer for pleasure was Jeff Kinney’s Diary of a Wimpy Kid. It was on my uncle’s shelf and, like everyone, I’d heard a lot about it. Turns out it was the perfect gateway drug for hilarious readers.
I devoured it. I then went to Amazon and looked at all the other recommended books on that page. I learned so much and proceeded to order and read almost all of them that summer.
Since then, I’ve never looked back. I had too much reading for class during the semesters but each break I would line up 5–8 books that I would tear through. Reading is not a huge task, but it relieves pains and builds emotional structures.
There’s something magical about finding a genuinely fantastic book. The book you can’t put down, the one you stay up half the night reading, the book experience you can’t wait to talk about with your friend who is hopefully as equally obsessed with the story and characters as you are. The one that, once you finish, leaves you devastated (in the best way, of course).
Once you start being friendly with books, your whole life changes. Because immediately after you finish one spectacular book, you’ll want more. More books, more genres, more authors to discover.
Solution: Become Friendly with Books to Keep the Think-tank Flowing
Reading is something we do every day, virtually or not. Do you remember how you were able to know who called your phone when you were away? You tapped the phone, and it popped the contact that called, and you read the name to yourself J
Being friendly with something or someone requires discipline. The goal is not for you to look so green to make hungry people come to you when you have no fruits for their nourishment.
If you want to make someone your friend you need to be nice and friendly to that person. If you want to become friends with books, you need to be nice and friendly when you see books.
Remember what I mentioned in point #1 you should do when you visit a bookstore and see a book you love?
Let me put that to you again.
As a writer, one of your greatest weapon of warfare is having deep love for your craft. Even when everything doesn’t work perfect as planned, the burning love keeps you going.
When you see a book you love in a bookstore and you want to read it, walk up directly, make an eye contact with the book seller and give the book a warm hug.
You may not have the money to buy the book maybe because you ran off budgets. However, from there, just be genuine and say something like “Hi, this book is really cute, my name is {insert name}” and I’d love to have this book added to my library of books.
Read the underlined sentence in the quote above, again.
Here is the one to read in case you missed that;
When you see a book you love in a bookstore and you want to read it, walk up directly, make an eye contact with the book seller and give the book a warm hug.
Good.
This is one of the ways to befriend a book – give a book a warm hug, and then go ahead to devour the contents.
Smart move, great win.
Share your Thoughts
How have you been able to write confidently and befriend books you hated at first? I would love to hear your opinions and suggestions on what has worked for you or how best you are able to think straight in this ever busy world.
