Why I Started Writing On Medium
Recently, I joined Medium. To be completely transparent and honest, I’ve never even heard of this platform before, but I’m so glad I did. This place allows me to gain experience writing articles and sharing stories, despite being 15 years old.
Now you might be asking yourselves, what is a 15 year old doing writing articles for complete strangers? Why is he doing this? How did he come up with this idea? Well….
Why I Decided to Try it Out
I’ve never been much of a writer. I always saw myself growing up to be an engineer or doing a computery thing as my job. My writing at school was okay, but nothing remarkable, not something you’d pay to read.
My view on this changed after my English teacher gave out our marked assignments a few months ago. The assignment was to write something creative following Roald Dahl’s short story “Letter of confession”. The story(*spoiler alert*) follows an obedient pregnant housewife in the 1950s on the day her husband asks for a divorce. The wife then goes on to kill the husband with a frozen leg of lamb and serve it cooked for the detectives to eat.
I decided I’d write the wife’s confession to the murder as a letter sent to the local police department, describing the motive behind the killing, and her reaction to the way the case was handled.
When I was given my paper back, it was handed to me with a big smile. After a quick look, I could see that he enjoyed it. It was more than just a grade, grades aren’t a big deal for me. I’ve been given many 100s(A+) before, and was given many more since, but written on that sheet were some grouped words that meant more than the most perfect of scores.
“Wow, wow, wow! You must become a writer!” To me, that was the biggest compliment he could give. It changed something inside me. Ever since, I’ve ditched the idea of going down the scientific route of life, and went towards the writing ways.
Since then, I’ve been thinking more deeply about my writing as if it was my profession. I won’t say I’ve improved, because I don’t think I have. That work was the best piece of writing that I’ve written in my short 15-year long life. I’m very proud of it.
If you’d like to read it yourself, click here. Before you do, I’d recommend reading Roald Dahl’s “Lamb to the Slaughter” to get some context.
How it Led Me to Medium
One day, Covid-19 struck. School was closed and I was social distancing at home. As you would expect, I was bored to death. Then I thought about what my teacher said about being a writer, and it hit me. I should start writing.
At first, I didn’t know where to go, my instinct was to find an online job as a writer, but it wasn’t the right fit for me. I wanted to write whatever I want, however I want, whenever I want.
Next, I thought about starting a blog. I started searching for tips online, only to then discover I needed to buy a domain, a blog host, build a website… Too much work for someone that was only looking for a place to practice his writing and getting feedback.
Then I hit gold. I found an article that listed places where I could publish articles and stories. Medium was soon discovered, and the rest is history, well… not yet.
I created a profile and started sharing and posting, challenging myself to write every day for the first month.
