"Give me writing advice," says random aspiring writer.

I know for a fact I'm not the only writer who gets these types of requests. My reaction is usually:

This request is equivalent to:

-- "Give me music advice," the piano student asked the pianist after the concert.

-- I chased the attorney as he triumphantly ran down the courthouse steps. "Hey you! Give me law advice!" I yelled.

-- She was just walking down the street and bumped straight into Brad Pitt. "OMG, Brad Pitt! I love your movies. Give me acting advice?"

Can you see the problem here?

Aside from the question always appearing rather randomly -- we can live with that -- if it isn't followed by anything specific; how the hell is anyone supposed to answer?

Writing, like music, acting, law, medicine, engineering and even carpentry is not something you learn with a few tips.

It's not even something you can learn with a lot of tips.

There are some prerequisite things you might do well to have when you start writing -- like know the language you choose to write in as well as you can -- but other than that?

There are no hard and fast rules in writing.

Niente!

So it's impossible to get advice on writing? 😨

No! Those lovely published books you see on shelves in bookstores and libraries containing sentences upon sentences of perfectly flowing prose and plots that come fitting in a masterful stroke of genius? Each one is the result of a talented author who received a lot of advice from an entire team of people.

Editors, agents, other writers...

Are you saying I need an editor now? 😭

Of course not. If you're reading this, you're probably in the stage of 'still learning'. All I'm saying is that getting advice is an integral component of the mechanism of writing. It's not wrong to seek it, it's great to get it, and you can't develop as a writer without it.

But this advice has to be specific for your writing and your stories.

And actually, you need to have writing and stories to get advice on them.

But how can I get an advanced writer to read my stories and tell me what to do? Nobody takes read requests. 😡

That's where it gets complicated. I'm sorry, did you think this would be easy?

Essentially, we're on our own, in the dark, making it up as we go along. While to transform great writing into spectacular writing you need outside help, before your writing is great there are a lot of milestones you need to reach.

Writing is an individual experience that no one can teach you.

In other words, you need to find your own way to do it. And even when it comes to advice; if you don't know yourself deeply, what you're going on about, what you're trying to achieve -- how will you know if you're receiving good advice?

I'm confused. 🙀

Congratulations! That means we're getting somewhere.

To be honest, more than half the time, all writers are confused, unsure and have no idea what the hell they're doing. It only seems that they're in control because somehow, in the end, it works out.

I can go on about this for ages, really.

But the bottom line is: You need inside work, trial and error, soul searching. Do what works for you. Find your voice, hone it, polish it, go back, criticise yourself. Ask yourself the hard questions. You're the author so you must become the authority of your work.

When you do that, you'll have questions, things that, no matter how much searching, you're unable to answer yourself. At that point, when you turn for advice, you'll know what to ask, specifically.

I hope this helps.
❤️
Einaty