Personal Narrative: My Writing Process

What I have learned throughout the year about writing is that it is important to know how to write because you will need to use it for your everyday life, whether it is at school or at your work. My writing process I think that I have changed a little bit on it but I think I need to practice more so I can get better. What I have changed on my writing was that I need to make my writing sound good and that it makes sense. Why I made those changes because I want it to sound good and make sure that it makes sense to what I am being asked to write. My opinion on writing has not changed. My opinion hasn’t changed because I just don’t like to write and I find it boring.

During this spring semester, I have grown in many ways as a writer, and a student. I have started to realize, and accept the flaws that I have created in my writing. In the past, I never looked into my writings and saw my problems, and if I did, I did not accept that they were problems. In my writing pieces in the past, I was very hard-headed about what I thought was correct versus what was actually correct. I have also become More familiar with different formatting options on Microsoft Word to create a more professional piece or writing. However, figuring out all the parts of writing and making them work together is the most difficult part of writing.

I'm not the best when it comes do to writing well. I guess i feel like my writing doesn't sound “smart” it's not full of big words that the reader has to look up and learn more about.

The best writing I’ve ever produced is from last semester I wrote a paper for Sociology on how the movie “Selma” related to what we were learning in class. This is the best writing I’ve produced because I thought long and hard about what I was going to write and ended up making a 100 on the paper which I was very excited about. Another reason is that I’m not particularly exceptional at writing I struggle with what words to use and how to really make my writing mean something to the person reading it, and my teacher left me a comment saying how I had thought outside the box and done very well. When I’m writing, my only fear is that I could be using better words so that’s why after I write a paper I always like to continuously edit it until I’m satisfied. Challenges for me are thinking of what to write I guess you could say that I get writers block and I must take breaks and really think about what I want my paper to convey, but once I get an idea usually I’m and can come up with more ideas it’s just really that first few sentences in a paragraph that get me.

My writing process starts when I am given an assignment. I’m not one to just write for fun, so this is usually the only way I can make myself write. Don’t let that fool you though, because once I start writing something and my ideas start flowing, it’s hard for me to stop. Personally, I love to be able to choose what I’m writing about. I don’t like getting assigned a topic, because that means everybody else has to write about the same topic and that ends up with everybody asking what I wrote in my paper and comparing it to theirs. I HATE when my writing gets compared to other peoples’, because we are all unique and different writers and we shouldn’t be so concerned about who stated certain facts better or got a higher grade.

Would you believe me if I told you that masters of any art still practice the skills that got them to where they are now? This might not come as a surprise to most, but success and perfection is measured in time. Repetition is key when talking about mastering skills. There are many steps that have helped me through my writing process. Thinking planning, and revision are skills that have made me a better writer. These skills are crucial for becoming a better writer because it decides the volume of my work and makes sure the reader understands my intent.

Al, Alde, de, shon, deshon, and Al’Deshon my name takes on many forms. Kind of like my writing in a sense. I have never been a strong writing also being the reason, I took this class first semester I think. If I get it out of the way maybe I’ll have an easier chance of reaching the finish line happening to be graduation.

When I start my writing process, the topic is key. The decision of what I'm going to write about is based on how I feel about the topic. If I have some baseline knowledge about a particular subject and it relates to my life somehow, then it becomes a bit easier for me. For example, if I had to write about Army life, I can easily relate to this subject and can lean on my experience to help guide me in the right direction. Another tool is research, using proper citations in my work to support the opinions or ideas.

Thinking about our first writing assignment, one of the suggestions focuses on the comparison of writing to running, it became apparent to me that this is something I would enjoy writing about. I am a long time running advocate, competing in marathons, and a neophyte writing student, and I find many similarities in both endeavors.

My writing process in the past has never been concrete. It was even very rare that I had a process or even realized that I had a process going on. All I did was write without revision. For example, one time I had a research paper due the next day. I made the decision to take all of the examples I had, write it out, explain it, then give my take on the example, 30 minutes before it was due. Although it was littered with grammar mistakes, I got a passing grade. However, this anxious direction of writing held me back from creating great writing assignments and projects.Because I was being told constantly that I had "great ideas but terrible form" made writing extremely hard and close to depressing.

The first step of my writing process when I write a traditional essay consists of brainstorming. If a certain format is provided, I have to brainstorm the order of my key points. On the other hand, for some assignments I am given the specifics of what I need to talk about (like these Log Its) and even given subheadings which I must include to offer a professor better access and recognition of key parts. Once I begin to write, I never have in mind that what I write is a draft of any sort. Personally, I like to keep up with my grammar, spelling and punctuation as I go, so once I finish, the paper is pretty close to being finished with very few mistakes. Sometimes, I type a word that I doesn’t fit into the context but at that time, I have a couple of sentences in my had that I know will disappear if I don’t type them out, so I type (?) after the word to remember to find a synonym or change the word.

While I've not be an academic tutor at SU, I was formerly an editor of the Austin-based music journal ATX On Record (now VinylList). As an editor, my duties included proofreading and editing article submissions, advising writers on how to strengthen their articles, and teaching them how to master the SEO.

This past month has taught me so much about myself as a writer. The areas I struggle with along with the areas I have improved in. Although my writing process has changed, there are still areas that need improvement. I have a better understanding of a sentence structure. Being able to make a complete sentence and have the correct verb, noun and punctuation makes all the difference with your writing. Your ideas need to be complete thoughts. This is one of the areas that I often struggled with as I had fragment sentences, comma splice errors and punctuation issues. The improvements come from the type of assignments we had this class. Our blog writings, discussions with videos and essay writing has helped me tremendously. The assignments I felt,

Writing presents it’s own challenges to those who write books and articles daily; and to those who write less frequently. Getting around using punctuation, placing commas, and figuring out how to start an essay always seemed to be the biggest challenges for me. Through practice is the only way I’ve come to be masterful over my own writing style, even though there is always room for improvement. Because each time someone sits down to write a letter, article, or book; they are practicing their writing style and ultimately becoming better writers. Many people find writing to be a hassle or too cumbersome in a day in age of technology and the internet supplying information to the public so immediate, but everyone must overcome challenges that they

My writing style, in my opinion, is light-hearted and creative. I don't particularly like bland papers, regardless of the topic, so I tend to add in a bit of humor, if possible, and maybe even a bit of interesting facts. I always tend to wonder if someone else would understand my paper. I enjoy being able to put in a nice flow to my paper so that I'm not going from one topic directly to another. In all honesty, I enjoy other writing styles such as being objective, realistic, complex, and dramatic. My favorite that I try to go for, however, is a light-hearted style because I can have a bit of fun with it while following the designated guidelines.