How I started Writing In Medium

My little story

Writing in Medium has changed my perspective of life and my experience. In my elementary and secondary studies, I was not always the type that liked to take notes, read the research, etc. My mind would always wander when writing essays and reading. Simply put, I am a very imaginative type of person, so instead of listening in class, I’d be thinking of how it’s like to be on an island alone and I assume you know what I’m talking about.

I’d either be the last leaving the classroom with my teachers after some long pep talk or having private and nerve-wracking talks with my head-teachers or course managers. I just couldn’t focus for too long, nor effectively put into writing my thoughts and researches. However, when I started writing in Medium, I did not know what I was getting myself into. To be frank, it was tough and challenging. I had so many things to write about, yet I did not know where to start.

Not knowing the right structure to write with, where to find images to put up, or even the language, it was like being in a room with diplomats and your music savvy. However, I got to learn and improve my writing as I was writing, combining different articles and structures and sometimes writing with no structures.

I was slowly gaining confidence where I’d write things, get feedback or people’s reactions, comments, claps, people highlighting some key parts in the article, and through reading time. These things boosted my confidence, it opened my imaginations, and to be honest, my aim wasn’t to make money or anything, I just wanted to try it.

Learning to put my thoughts into it, without really knowing how it could touch or impact people, I’d experienced a few setbacks, such as asking to join a publication. As most publications are, they would ask for drafts, and sometimes they’d ask to see your previous articles. However, I didn’t have any articles under any publication. The articles I had were unfinished, or it was low standard.

I kept looking for opportunities by writing to other publications but I realised a few things were missing but I couldn’t find out what exactly they were so I gave up. A little while later, I was on YouTube watching music videos and an ad came up and a lady was talking about making passing income on Medium. I clicked on the ad; it brought me to her YouTube channel where she talks about how to write on Medium, how to make money, etc.

The thing that caught my attention was how I was doing everything wrong and waste my time trying to convince publications to give me a chance. It was fascinating to admit that I just had no clue of what I was doing and that I would not progress further with my writings, and then I was enlightened by these videos.

Now I had a better idea of how to properly write on Medium and how to contact publications. It didn’t take long until I gave it a go and I contacted a few publications. They rejected me again!. However, I learned to use those rejections to improve my writings and to improve my standard and I’m still learning and improving.

How excited I was when I restarted writing in Medium is an understatement. Upon deciding to come back and write on Medium, I was on Cloud 9. The thought of how many people I could reach and how much I could make here my motivation change as you can tell. It was just so new; I paid more attention to the words I used, how I used them and what my articles would sound like to the reader.

Everything now made sense, understanding why I got refused most of the time and why my writing structures were all wrong and unclear. So I read and pay attention to other people’s articles, those I could relate to and those that just made little sense to me. This became my new hobby and motivation, telling myself “this is the quality I need in my writings”.

So I started going back to my old notes and rewrite them, and I could see where I was getting it all wrong and the silly mistakes I was doing. I also started writing about things I’d want to learn about, my experiences, technology, faith, work, and business-related stuff, poems, relationships, and new ideas keep coming to date.

It’s been very interesting and exciting. Sometimes I was overwhelmed and intimidated by large publications. I thought they’d look down on me because of my lack of experience. I contacted a few publications, and they accepted me and I was over the moon. I started publishing a few times a day, and I was slowly gaining more confidence and getting better.

I wasn’t too concerned about the payment anymore, but my new focus was my target audience. I wanted to have a big audience, some I could share my faith experience to, some I could share my professional experience to, some I could share my creativity too and so I made my writings open for incoming ideas.

Reading articles from other writers encouraged me to also study further and to be more curious, and I can’t thank these writers enough. I was indirectly taught a few life lessons such as never giving up, writing for a good cause. Money doesn’t always bring us joy, and also how our writings can affect the lives of others.