Finding you’re writers voice (A guide)

I’ve been writing for a month now and I don’t know what my voice is!

Same my friends same. When it comes to blogging I’ve heard people preach. Keywords, key phrases, pictures, writing constantly, etc. Oh did I forget that infamous word? NICHE. Pronounced Nee shh. At least that’s how I say it. Here’s the thing. What about your voice?

My voice is at points a bit of dry smart intelligent humor mixed with a weird flow? Look I’ve been blogging for 6 months and constantly writing the past week and a half. I’m telling you how I’ve discovered mine. Maybe it’ll help. Maybe it won’t.

Here’s how the voice is connected. How do you speak? IRL that is. Are you a cusser? Are you intelligent? Are you a smartass?

I’m a bit of a joker. I find myself stupidly hilarious. Yet, when I write. I take on a sense of what to me in my mind sounds like intelligent words. I’ll be spending the next few posts to really clarify what blogging has turned out to be for a new blogger. Essentially a rehash from a new blogger. If you wanna call it that. Harsh…

My voice in my head is this little dot. He’s saying “You’re stupid, you’re literally writing down everything you think upon that moment, how am I YOUR voice?”

I dunno man, Your little voice is what makes you unique in a world where everyone’s getting famous for something either exceptionally amazing or exceptionally stupid. You live in a world where if your ideals align with everyone else and you’re extremely persistent, people like you.

So, after saying all that what is your voice?

Your voice is the one thing people hear when you’re walking into a room and talking. It’s how they know it’s someone they know or not. Think about it. If your mom calls your name. You know it’s her. Her voice is literally saying, “Get your ass down here now and clean these dishes”.

Or when your best friend comes screaming into a room saying, “Yo, dude”. He’s screeching the word dude hardcore to the point of annoyance as your looking at him and say. “Dude, can you quiet your voice you sound like a dying cat” He’s standing there dumbfounded before brushing you off. “Dude, did you play apex? It’s dope!”

Here’s the thing. You know both of them instinctually. You can hear the voice and think to yourself. You know what? This guys’ right. You go off to write some more before you hit the paper. “I don’t know what to write” you mutter. You put some words down.

“This is trash, writings stupid”. You yell frustratedly throwing the papers into disarray.

Your voice is what makes you a human. It’s what brings you closer to others. If you growled and moaned. I’m pretty sure people would be looking pretty strangely at you. Actually, if you do that around me I’m probably going to be dying of laughter. I find it kinda funny. If weird.

How do I find my voice then?

“la, la, la, la, laaaa” you screech so badly trying to find your tune as your dad comes running into the room. “What the hell was that, he asks, I thought someone was dying up here. If you’re gonna sing at least be good at it”. He walks away and closes the door.

Your feelings are hurt. I did my best with that one you think indignantly. Before attempting another screeching rendition of your performance.

See finding your voice is a bit like that. You try new things. You adapt. You re-read books you’ve read a thousand times. You absorb everything that was told to you and you write some more.

The truth about writing for your voice.

Here’s the truth others have written about that makes a lot of sense. Your first 100 posts are going to be trash. Hell, I’m at 20 and my writing and voice have gotten clearer and clearer every post. I posted an old post yesterday. People liked it. I don’t get it. It didn’t have my current voice.

I put on an air of knowledge. For someone else. To post that exact post. I doubt half of them actually read it. Here’s something discouraging. When you write a post. You get feedback. You get whose read it. You get who likes it. Then you get the time read.

Now, here’s a word of wisdom. It takes people hella longer than 54 seconds to read a 1.1k word post. Any word counter or any app says that on average that post should take 5 minutes. What does that mean? They didn’t really read it. You lost them at the beginning.

Here’s a task. Read 1 minute of anything. Hell read your own post for one minute. Tell me where you get. I’ll do it right now with you.

Here’s where I stopped. After a 3 second edit. “everyone’s getting famous”. I made it to the point right before my main header. I read fast. This post alone will take me three minutes to read. Assuming I finish any time soon.

What does that interlude have to do with voice?

That interlude points out one thing. Nobody gives a fudge about you. Your voice is weak. People don’t like it. You ramble. Whatever it is. Nobody likes it.

How’s that for the ancient ice bucket challenge. Are you afraid and determined? Drenched in a cold shirt from all your sweat? Here’s what I’m envisioning.

I stand up and look at my post. It’s blowing up. Excitement and joy flood me as I think to myself. I finally did it. 10, 12, 15, 20. “Omg, I got famous!” I laugh with joy and celebrate the victory. Sitting back down, I feel refreshed. “Finally something clicked”. I look at the next post I’m planning on writing.

This won’t have the same impact, but it’ll work I think to myself. I get up. Click on word-press and look at my stats. 25 people and 10 likes. Cool, that did pretty well, mentally I’m patting myself on the back. I stare at the read time a few days later. My happiness is gone and replaced with dread. AVERAGE READ TIME it screams at me. 54 seconds.

“What? How?” I mutter to myself disappointment. That post did pretty good I think.

Here’s the thing after re-reading the post. 54 seconds is a cumulative number of what everyone read. How long they stayed on the page. Therefore, after everyone read a 5-minute post everyone else looked at it. Said “nah” and went away. You’re voice either makes them say. “Yeah, I wanna read that”. Or the typical “Nah”.

There are other parts to this. Don’t despair. We’ll cover that later.

So the time to answer that question is upon us. Right?

Writing has one rule to it. Write forever and ever. Challenge yourself. Read new works and keep trying.

Here’s my personal rule. Don’t force anything unless you feel it. IF you can’t write. Don’t know how to write? Literally, put down what your mind is thinking. It’s putting one word in front of the other. Your voice will develop. After all, you didn’t start speaking like you did when you came out of the womb did you?

No, you heard others speak. You picked it up. Then you met people and learned how they spoke, You spoke like them to make them like you. That’s what writing essentially is. Don’t worry if people like you. Find what makes you unique and make it work.

Thank you for reading. I’ll be attempting a small series on the art of blogging in the next few days from what I’ve learned of 6 months of writing.

The wannabe poet (Jess, honestly nomadic.)