The Blank Page, or How to Begin
You want to write something, but you don’t know where to begin. The page, the screen is empty, waiting. Your cursor blinks.
The problem is that the page is not really empty. The writer sees it filled with critics: the person you are writing to, the teacher who discouraged you from writing years before by pointing out all your errors, your colleagues who are waiting to catch you in a mistake.
Banish them. Push them over to the margins and let them fall off the edge. You will deal with them later. This is your time.
Picture the reader that you most want to see what you are writing. Are you writing a love note? Then picture your beloved’s eyes. Is your task to write a technical document? Then picture a colleague at work with whom you share an interest in this topic. Do you need information from someone you don’t know? Picture the kindest salesclerk or government official you have ever had to ask a question of, and keep in mind that person as you write.
Focus on that person in your mind and begin. You know what you know, and you know what you think. Now try to write as closely as you can to the way you would speak. How would you talk to this person if you were standing across from him or her? Think of your writing as a part of a conversation. You are speaking now through the words you type.
Type what you would say aloud. You can even read the words aloud after you’ve typed each sentence or paragraph. Listen to yourself. You sound pretty good, don’t you? Now keep going until you have said it all.
Don’t stop to correct yourself. Just keep going.
Now you’ve begun.
Related post: English as a Foreign Language
