Learning to Write: Part 1

We learn to write so that we can capture what we are thinking. Central to the idea of writing is the ability to communicate effectively with your audience, even with yourself. Even if you have no inclination to write for others, your ability to capture your thoughts clearly will help you understand your thinking when you are reviewing your work months, years, even decades from now. To understand the process of writing, we must first understand the rules of words. We all speak a specific language, cultivated by your culture. Our language was nurtured from birth in a specific manner, with a specific nuances, phrases, twangs, and sophistication. The characteristic of the language is similar across all cultures, but the one commonality is words.
So we begin this series with the intent to cultivate a new way of thinking and communicating because you and I need help with the words we want to write well. It’s not important that you learn everything at once. You can still start writing, just take a few rules and incorporate them in your writing. The great task of a writer is to write. We write because we have something to say, but when we don’t write, we restrict our ability to influence what is going on around us.
Writing is not only the ability to put words down on paper, but to re-write what we just wrote. It’s called proofreading or editing and the intent is to re-read and re-write what was initially written to ensure that what we are thinking is in fact what we wrote. Do not be afraid of writing because your first draft is incomprehensible. That’s OK….give yourself permission to mess-up wildly. Writing is an exercise and with time, we can become experts at the words we communicate.
Understanding the basics of English writing is essential to good content. There is a great book called The Elements of Style, by William Strunk, Jr, that will expand on what this post is about. It’s a short read and will help you understand most of the basics you will need to be able to write well. There are 18 rules to help a writer write well.
​Rule 1: Use the apostrophe correctly.
​Rule 2: Use commas correctly when separating terms in a series
​Rule 3: Use a pair of commas to distinguish an expression.
​Rule 4: Place a comma before a conjunction (and, but, however, etc) when extending a thought with an additional phrase.
​Rule 5: Use a semicolon to join two complete sentences.
​Rule 6: Don’t use a period when a comma will do.
Part 2 in this series will use Rule 1 thru 6 to help you understand the context of the rules.

What is your greatest challenge in writing?
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