I like to write and I am sure many of you also like writing. Writing has been a big part of my life ever since I was little and it’s the career path I’ve chosen to become a journalist. Writing helps me vent out my emotions rather than keeping them bottled inside me. I started writing songs at the age of 11 and my first song was about some boy that I liked at that time.
Right now though, I have recently taken a break from songwriting as I am suffering a block but I do come up with ideas here and there, but now it’s often short poems, which is easier for me to write if we’re honest.
There’s no way you can go wrong on writing. If you are just beginning on your writing journey and you don’t know where to start, just start writing about your personal experiences, the things you remember going through and then build your way up. Start writing about different things such as sadness, happiness, basically any of the different emotions you feel. You can take inspiration from the things that surround you and apply it to your piece of writing. Another thing, write things that are beyond your comfort zone or write things that you’re not that good at writing usually because it’s another way you can further improve your writing.
Don’t be afraid of sharing your work as you can get feedback from other people, which again will help you impro. No one starts out a perfect writer, so you will slowly improve over time and improving is good because this motivates you to be better.
Personally, the way I write poems or songs is whenever I get an idea in my head, I will jot it down in my notebook and depending on the situation, it can come naturally. You can write a full song/poem or it can be in short pieces where I write a few different lines and ideas and I’ll need to come back to it and see at what lines would mesh well together. Lastly, I combine the lines that I think go well together.
Sometimes I get inspired by things I see online or by other poets and that gives me the energy to write or sometimes I see certain aspects of a poem and I write my input on the situation of what’s happening in the poem, like a response. However, getting inspiration shouldn’t be an excuse to plagiarize other people’s work because it won’t do anything to improve your writing.
If you have written something and you think it sounds right then, you’re heading in the right direction. However, don’t worry, if you think it sounds bad because your writing will always change and improve and when it does, you can then compare it from before and see how far you have come.
Blocks are the worst thing in the world when you are a writer and I hate when I get them. That’s why I have taken a break from songwriting because the ideas I get don’t go well together and it doesn’t create any good lyrics. Getting a block is the most frustrating thing you can go through as you want to get a good idea in your head but you can’t. It becomes harder because you want to write but once you get it out, it’s like the sun comes out and everything in the world is good again. If you’re in a block now just write down all the things that you want to write about and something good will come out of it. Ed Sheeran once said,
“Writing songs and playing live is like turning on a tap in an old house; first you’ll get the mud and dirty water, but the more you get it out, the quicker the good water starts flowing.”
Keep writing the ideas you form in your head and keep going with it because along the way you might find an idea that is good and from that you can keep forming pieces that would go well. Blocks will come and go, but I say keep writing and you’ll find something good in there. Other ways of getting out of blocks can be reading a piece of prose or at the work that other people have done.
My favorite poets that I mostly take inspiration from is this couple, Michael Faudet and Lang Leav. They have amazing books out and I really recommend that you buy them if you’re into lusty, love poems. They have separate books out and they are so lovely to read so look for Dirty, Pretty Things by Michael Faudet and Love and Lullabies By Lang Leav. My other favorites are Idiot Verse by Keaton Henson and Milk and Honey by Rupi Kaur.
That’s it, that’s how I write and how ideas form in my head during writer’s block. I mean there are times when I can’t seem to get out of one, but when I get out of them, it feels good. Don’t worry if you get a block because, to be honest, even though they are horrible, they encourage you to improve your writing and also motivate you to get out of it and write more.
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