The Beginning Writer’s Checklist

What do you need to be a writer? Maybe less than you think! Today, young writer and NaNoWriMo participant Larisa Greway is here to give you a handy checklist of the things you do and don’t need to be able to start writing:

Everybody has a story to tell, but too many people don’t write it down. Whether you’re 13 or 73, you might think writers are superhumans, and that a regular person could never be one. Well, that’s simply not true. And to prove that to you, here’s a list of things of the things you do and don’t need in order to be a writer.

Things You Don’t Need:

1. The best equipment

You might think you can’t write a thing without that $5000 laptop with a holographic screen and rainbow backlit keys you barely even have to push down. Sure, it sounds amazing, but you don’t need it. You can write a story on an old computer, word processor, or even a typewriter. But that laptop you think you can’t do without? You can. Plus, a plain old pencil and a piece of paper will never go out of style.

2. Complete originality

Nothing is truly original. Every plot twist you come up with, every character’s desire, someone has written it down before. But your writing style is different from anyone else’s, and because of that you can put all the elements of a story together in a way that no one else can.

A quest + magic shoes + flying monkeys could equal the Wizard of Oz. Or it could equal an amazing story that nobody’s ever heard before. Don’t get discouraged if you can’t think of an amazing idea right off the bat. Instead, take a published story and figure out what twists and turns you can put in to make it completely your own.

You won’t be amazingly original. And that’s awesome.

3. A perfect first draft

People seem to think the story leaves the writer’s brain, gets onto paper, and goes to the publisher in one fell swoop. It doesn’t. Most writers’ brains are jumbled with character backstories, treasure maps, and plot twists, and all of it comes out on the page in a junkyard of words called a first draft. The process of editing comes later, when this thing you hold in your hands gets turned into a coherent story, but the first draft is almost always messy and as far from coherent as you can get.

Things You Do Need:

1. Something to write about

Maybe you struggle with coming up with ideas. No problem: jump online and look up one of the thousands of story idea generators that exist there. The ideas they generate will be pretty random, but most of the time you can find one or two phrases that resonate with you.

A lot of writers have to struggle for their ideas, and that’s when they take a break. Get some fresh air and see the sun for a few minutes, and after you recharge head back to your desk. Getting up resets your brain, making it easier for a flash of inspiration to head your way.

That’s it. That’s all you need in order to start writing. Not as hard as you thought, huh? All you have to do is sit down on your bed or in your armchair and start typing. And when you don’t believe that you’re going to write the Great American Novel on your first try, it gets that much easier to conquer.

Larisa Greway’s first story was written when she was five years old, and she’d like to think that she’s improved since then. Her second home is Hogwarts (she’s a Hufflepuff), but she visits Camp Half-Blood every summer (daughter of Poseidon). Fantasy, science fiction, and dystopian books are her kryptonite. She’s currently rewriting her first NaNoWriMo novel, surrounded by a mountain of pillows, chocolate, and books.

Top photo by Neel on Unsplash.