Five Ways to Make Writing Fun

Writing can be somewhat difficult to start, but if you know the tricks it can be a lot easier. In this article we will work through five different things to make writing more fun. You may want to achieve this to build a daily writing habit or to get a bit of work done. Either way, having a writing habit can lead to a higher level of productivity and happiness. I think part of the trick here is also knowing what it takes to make writing not feel like work. The more fun you have with writing, the better. In addition, the easier you make it to pick up the keyboard and produce, the better. Ultimately, writing is fun for a number of reasons, but every writer has to start somewhere.

1.)    Setup a routine of inspiration (music, art, etc.)

Writing is often the best when you are fully inspired to do so. This may not always be the case. However, the internet is full of potential inspiration for your next writing project. This can range from cool images, to amazing art, to 3D creations and more. There are so many different things that can be used to help you get inspired and write that next piece. If you write fiction you can read / audiobook a selection of stories to help inspire you. If you are non-fiction, or just want non-fiction information, then podcasts can provide you with a wonderful source of enthusiasm. Either way, one of the best ways to make writing fun is to break if off with the ordinary and observe something that inspires you to action.

2.)    Build training wheels (outlines)

Many times the hardest part of writing is the first few moments the cursor is blinking. This is an intimidating time where you may be wondering what to write. The best way to solve this problem or hurdle is to have a rough outline accomplished. However, even that can be difficult to build. If you can’t find the right place to even start an outline, you can make an outline for your outline. While this sounds redundant, I can explain. You can start with a goal or general structure. For example, if you want to write a short story, you can determine what the word count needs to be. From there, you can separate the word count into how many chapters and scenes you need. From there, you can separate these into beginning, middle, end. Now that you’ve made the outline for your outline, you can add in the components. What inciting incident starts the story off? What kind of hero journey or story is told? What kind of question do they have in the middle? After you build these questions onto a frame, you then can start typing up the first chapter. You have a rough outline to use to make things easier, but if you deviate off that path, no worries, because you know where you want to go by the end. This can make it easier to write as you know where to go.

3.)    Point A to Point B (have a purpose)

Speaking of going somewhere, it can also be helpful to answer the question “why”. Why is this being written? Is it for a blog article or a book or a report of some sort? Being able to determine the ‘why’ can help you with motivation and with building the correct quality into your work. Beyond that, you can measure what you are writing while you are writing it. For example, some genre’s will require that you cite your facts while others may be fine with simply stating a fact. Knowing your purpose is a wonderful way to break the ice with writing.

4.)    Pavlov response (treat yourself afterwards)

I feel like this one is the most common for advice. After you do something you want to maintain, give yourself a treat. The next time you do it, give yourself another treat. Soon enough, your brain will associate the positive action with a positive feeling. While I am not fully sure this works, I do think that rewarding yourself can be a wonderful thing. The trick is to reward yourself with a relevant thing, and not just some random goody. Giving yourself a hit of sugar for writing may not associate writing with the feeling in your brain. Instead it could associate getting that sugar in the store with that feeling in your brain.

5.)    Forget perfection

This is the biggest way to have fun with writing. When you need everything to be absolutely wonderful, you end up with very little. Truthfully, wonderful writing never happens in the first draft. Instead, you see the sparks of wonderful in the first draft and through revisions you unbury it. Giving yourself permission to run the metal detector of wonderful against the beach of your brain is a good thing. Sometimes you just need to wander around for a bit to discover the really important components.

Bonus: Daily Creation

I think there is a major component to not wasting your life being “just a consumer”. In a consumer mind set, you are determined by your opinions on products. You’ve found product X doesn’t have the proper features. You now know that product Y is the correct price point for this problem. The knowledge of products goes on and on. However, this is not the only mindset out there.

The producer mind sent has a different set of questions. In that mind set, it’s more about “what good can I do”. In that framework, questions like “can I build this better or faster? Will people enjoy this? Can I sell this so I can make more of my ideas?” are common to the producer mind set. When you are building articles, books, or more, you need to move to a producer mind set. If you get stuck in a consumer mindset, and try to write, you will be looking for which products work best for writing. Does this promotion or tool work better than their competitor? I am not saying that it’s not useful information, but you can get swamped down in the details with this train of thought. It is best to keep your mind on building and producing things than to simply consuming them. If you do consume products, then you can ask things like: “How can I reproduce this? How does this reflect on what I am working on? What do I like about this and can I bring it into my own work?”