WRITING

What Type of Writer Are You?

I never thought about how many types of writing there are.

I’m on my seventeenth or maybe it’s the eighteenth day of waking up using my alarm clock in the morning.

Yes, I realize lots of you wake to an alarm clock every day but I am pushing myself to start a routine. It’s been a long while since I have used my clock.

Anyway, I’m on my seventeenth day of waking up with my alarm clock setting it at 6 o’clock.

The plan is so that I can be having a cup of coffee and sitting on the sofa or at my desk by 6:15.

The plan is for the first fifteen minutes of my day to be taken by my morning tasks.

After those busy minutes, I am to then be settled in to write for an hour, like I am doing now.

After I write whatever comes to mind, but not editing or publishing, I then go for a walk of 4 to 5 miles. Out in the sunshine or what is often the early morning rays of the day before the rest the world wakes up completely.

After that, there are numerous other segments to my day that are planned out a day or several days in advance.

This morning when I settled in I was a little bit at a loss exactly what I wanted to write. It wasn’t that I didn’t have any thoughts but instead that I had too many thoughts.

I read a lot of content from other authors here on Medium, and I am happy to watch some YouTube videos that other Medium authors have done. I’m seeing all kinds of suggestions on how to find topics to write about.

I’ve heard some authors say that they just let the topic come to them.

Some authors say they plan a calendar of sorts about what they want to write about. They do this well in advance they say.

I saw that one author suggested that she actually had a specific genre that she planned to stay within. Not “going out of the lines” I believe she said.

Yet another author said that he liked to just talk about, rather write about whatever came to mind. No planning, no specific topic just let his pen flow.

This morning as I settled in, I found myself struggling. I was in the I don’t know what I want to write about camp.

Not knowing what I wanted to write about made me very frustrated. Heck, I set the alarm. I woke up. I’m here now, what?

So I thought I would take a chance and the first thing I did was I scanned Medium. Maybe an article or a headline would jump out at me I thought to myself.

As luck would have it I didn’t quite work that way, but something else did.

What I came to realize, and I guess it’s probably very obvious to most of us. There is a LOT of different types of writing.

Ironically I found a story that actually spoke about how to stop procrastinating. How to prepare yourself when you aren't able to settle on a topic.

Of course when I saw that headline, and I started to read the story. I was certain this article was speaking to me.

Well, actually this specific article was speaking to those writers who were producing works of art. The next great American novel. Maybe a Pulitzer Prize someday?

Yet, as I was reading the story, it did make me realize something else. There are a lot of different types of writing a writer can produce.

I mean in this case, the story was speaking to those writers that I would call an author. I know the words can be interchangeable, right?

I don’t know I guess I always thought that if you were writing a novel or a fiction or nonfiction book, you are an author.

I know it’s silly trying to differentiate the two, or is it? Maybe there is a difference that I am not aware of?

Let me know if a write and an author are the same? I would NEVER want to insult or diminish anyone.

So there is one kind of writing, being an author.

Then you also have writing that would be journaling to most.

I know myself I keep a journal. Though I must admit I’m not as diligent as most people would suggest that I should be.

Now, though this would be a stretch, you also have writers who participate in what you probably see on your Facebook timeline.

Those people who write those really long posts that Facebook will open another tab for. Could they be called writers?

And of course, you have poets, novelists, and people who write short stories. You also have screenwriters, biographers, and the list goes on and on.

In the end, if you’ve read this far you realized I did find something to write about.

I’m not really sure what you would call this other than a story on Medium, but it is written, or rather typed.

So next time you’re sitting at your computer, unsure about what to write, think about where you want to write first.

Will it be your journal which you know you should want to do?

Will it be on social media that you know you probably shouldn’t do?

Is it that you want to write a story on Medium, which you know you can always do? That you will probably enjoy doing.

Or are you going to surprise us all and write on a platform that we won’t see your work today? We won’t see your work tomorrow. But we may see it someday very soon.

So yes, it’s up to you the writer. You just need to get started.

About Michael

Michael Thacker is a not so young adult blogger, aspiring writer, and sometimes seller of real estate.

Michael tweets a LOT on Twitter posts every once in a while on Facebook, and occasionally lets his opinions be known to friends, family, and anyone else that will listen.

Connect with Michael

You can follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/MichaelThackerI.

If you want to connect on Facebook, the best place is https://www.facebook.com/RMichaelThacker/