work as a freelance content creator

‘Giving an artistic and aesthetic splash to a fact through words’ is a rough definition of creative writing. There is no specified meaning to it as creative writing is a dynamic and flexible form of art that can be manipulated through various different perspectives.

The best way to express oneself through words and to describe things in a way that a mind can’t perceive is the true nature and usage of creative writing. Your inspiration can vary from a small stone to the whole galaxy, the options are infinite.

The fact still remains that everything mentioned above is easier said than done. You might have a high insight for seeing things with a different angle yet, to write it down expressively with a hint of professionalism is the real challenge.

You cannot claim to be a “creative writer” until and unless there is that spark in your words that moves the reader and cajoles them in the idea that you want to portray with your words. You can write a small paragraph with no wit, power or integrity, that paragraph will be considered as a more set of sentences.

The ray of hope still shines as there are ways in which you can convert those mere sentences into a persuasive, inducing and read-worthy piece of writing and manifest that hidden writer within you and we are here to tell you how.

Here are 7 effective ways to improve your creative writing skills

Write as a reader

Writing is an art composed of various elements but the most important one is perspective. Even if you work as a freelance content creator or a full-time writer understanding the reader’s perspective by standing in his shoes to write is the best possible way to improve your writing skills. If you cannot convince yourself then how do you expect to convince others with your words?

To put into perspective, this practice is similar to ‘reciting in front of a mirror’

The sentence above is both an example and a suggestion of why understanding someone’s point of view is highly significant.

There are many professional critiques that will read and review your article but the biggest and most honest critique is the reader who will speak his mind after reading your article, so it is important for you to keep the reader’s perspective in mind.

FLAWLESS ORIENTATION

Structuring your writing in a systematic way is also a strong point in honing your skills as a creative writer. A mess of a paragraph will not grab any reader’s attention. The best way to arrange your article is to follow the three part structure.

Introduction, start with a strong opening that builds the reader’s interest. A sloppy start would make a bad first impression. Having a strong start to your article leaves the reader to the edge of his seat and creates an atmosphere of the element you used while writing the article, may it be suspense, romance, horror or drama.

Body, expand and explain the topic or the agenda you are trying to follow and be clear and confident about it. Your clarity and confidence reflects upon your words. The expansion is supposed to be systematic and story related as it should bridge the start of the article and the end in a way that the reader is forced to read the end of the article.

Conclusion, end the article with a short summary and a good ending that leaves the core and crust of the topic in the back of the reader’s mind.  The conclusion is the most vital part of the article in creative writing as the introduction and the body act as the buildup for how the article will end.

The ending must be strong as, if the introduction and body are average it will compensate for their mediocrity and/or it will make the article an instant hit as it will have an interesting introduction, a well written body and a mind-blowing conclusion. 

FIGURE OF SPEECH

Your command of the language is often gauged by how authentically and organically you use figures of speeches. From basics like simile and metaphors to more complex ones like hyperbole and personifications the correct usage and application is very technical and requires a lot of practice.

Writers like William Shakespeare, Leo Tolstoy, and Grimm Brothers had that command of the figure of speech on a phenomenal scale and the flow of their article is considered the best and flawless. The key idea is to make your article interesting, metaphors use a rhetorical effect on a thing that is factual and known making your article more readable and persuasive.

For example, the concept of vampires as a fiction was made as a metaphor for the violence that was induced due to alcohol. Here the blood for vampires is metaphorically used as alcohol for violent alcoholics. Or the movie Madagascar was a metaphor and a simile for the idea of animal captivity. Here four animal friends try to escape the zoo in order to find their natural habitat, just the idea was not directly depicted in the movie but a human mind can easily figure it out making the movie more interesting and watchable.

Vocabulary

We all know that a sensible use of words, determiners, conjunctions etc formulates a sentence. There are numerous ways in which you can write a sentence and the meaning will remain intact. The only thing that changes is the usage of your vocabulary.

What differentiates an article from a basic and simple to a more professional and complex it the correct usage of a better vocabulary. Rather than using ‘very small’ you can use ‘timid’, rather than using ‘very big’ you can use ‘gigantic’ or ‘colossal’ these little yet significant variations bring out the real potential of an article.

Great depth is added to an article when the vocabulary used is astounding and potent. For example, using conjunctive adverbs like therefore, hence, furthermore etc makes the article more structured and professional. The better the vocabulary the more polished the final product turns out to be. 

Authenticity

Whatever you write should be your and yours only. Getting inspiration from other writers to gain an idea about how you are supposed to write is a different thing but, to write any article that is authentic and well put is based on your skills and caliber.

There are infinite ways to gain inspiration but to stand out and make a face for yourself is only possible when your mind works in a way that is unexpected and unprecedented by the reader. The element of surprise will only exist if your authenticity is maintained.

This also works for the legal matters and other aspects as you have a copyright over the article and no one can steal or copy your idea that you have spent hours thinking of.

Edit!

New writers who initiate their path towards creative writing make a very common and vulnerable mistake, they shy away from rewriting what they have already written. Editing the article is like adding those final touches to an art piece that make the biggest difference.

This helps in reviewing the article multiple times and simultaneously helps you to address your mistakes that you might want to avoid in the future and helps you to gain a clear idea about the concept of what is creative writing and what flexibility your skill set has.

Editing also in future is extremely important as there are various aspects you need to keep in mind like proofreading and plagiarism, polishing your article to its most impeccable version.

Keep a record of your ideas

The ideas that might click in your mind are the real authentic ideas that you develop with passage of time being involved in the genre of creative writing. The idea might just not be a topic or a storyline, it can also be an amazing new way and approach of writing.

Your approach might become monotonous or repetitive, these recorded ideas break that monotony and help you to glimmer out of that slump. Every creative writer abides by a rule of keeping one small notebook handy, this is done to record the ideas that fly by your brain.

Jotting down the bullet points which are enough for you to recapitulate the inspiration in future when you sit down to start writing is the ideal way of honing your skills and developing regularly as a creative writer. This will separate you from other writers who are training as hard as you to succeed as a creative writer.

In this article, we got to know about the importance of creative writing and how we can hone our skills as a creative writer in simple seven steps. Writing a creative piece of work is not everyone’s cup of tea. It takes practice, dedication, perseverance and a lot of inspiring ideas to make it as a successful creative writer.

As it is a dynamic aspect and comprises an infinite number of possibilities, to have a niche and genre decided is also important yet training your mind and thinking beyond the possibilities is the only way to keep the reader’s eyes stuck to your writing.

By Anurag Rathod

Anurag Rathod is an Editor of Appclonescript.com, who is passionate for app-based startup solutions and on-demand business ideas. He believes in spreading tech trends. He is an avid reader and loves thinking out of the box to promote new technologies.