- Let me tell you,
there is nothing more intimidating than a blank page.
You've not met your writing target for the day,
you sit down, you're just not feeling it.
You know you should write,
but everything you read back is just not good.
(chill music)
So you wanna write a book, hi,
or maybe you're interested in the book
that I can now say I've written, which is insane.
(Jade laughing)
My name is Jade, and I recently wrote a book
called "The Only Study Guide You'll Ever Need",
which is a very pretentious name.
I can tell you now that my publisher chose it.
(Jade laughing)
And honestly it is one of my dreams.
It is being published in August,
it is the book I would have wanted to read when I was 16,
and going through GCSE's and A levels.
It is a non-fiction book about revision techniques,
the education system, and your place in it
as more than a grade producing machine.
But I wrote this entire book during my university semesters,
which was the closest thing to a work life hell
I've ever experienced.
It was just very stressful,
but it was like a forceful boot camp of learning
how the hell to write a book,
and write the whole bloody thing.
And if you're interested in writing a book,
I really hope this can help you
just hearing about my process, my struggles,
and how I got through it
and wrote all 64,000 words or whatever it is.
First things first,
what are you writing about?
Is it non-fiction?
Is it fiction?
I feel like the process is very different for the two.
I'm gonna speak from my experience of finishing writing
a non-fiction book.
The first thing you can do is break down chapters.
Assumably you're passionate about this topic,
assumably you've got a lot that you wanna cover.
Try and identify some key parts and break them down,
otherwise it feels so overwhelming
to know where to start.
Also really important in this process
is thinking about chronology.
Like, is this the kind of book
where you can take any chapter
and write it in isolation, and get the book done?
Or do you need to be writing these chapters in order?
Are they following some kind of storyline?
I love Notion, which is an amazing productivity tool,
and I had all my chapters,
and within each one I would blurt down
all the research, outlines, details,
flushing out anything that I could in the early stages,
just to see that each chapter had enough to it.
To see if I could split one into two,
could eliminate one, put it in another one.
The second biggest thing I had to learn is time management.
Time frickin' management.
At university over at least one essay a week, sometimes two,
or in finals season, three.
And I had at least six classes a week,
each of which had two hours of preparation work.
And if I miss a single class,
I have to do an essay about the class I miss
as makeup work, which is just like insane.
I also moved two different cities while writing this book
which is insane to try and adjust to a city
and a new way of life,
and I also had roommates while writing this book,
so time management was everything.
I didn't have my own space,
I had a lot of other commitments,
and university is ultimately my priority still,
like I wanna do well in my degree,
which for me just meant being incredibly clear
with my deadlines.
I looked at everything I had to write,
and I broke it down into research and writing.
Some chapters were more dense than others.
Looking at my university deadlines, when I had essays due
I would slot denser chapters in more quiet patches of uni,
and then set myself this self set deadline each week,
when I need to get my research done,
when I need to get my writing done.
And then of course, there's also social life,
and exploring the city, and just being a normal student,
which is why I like to create high level plans,
weekly plans and daily to-do lists,
which then gets locked into my Google calendar.
I'd look at my month, I'd look at my plans
for when I was gonna research,
when I was gonna write, slot them in,
transfer that onto my week,
and then every single day,
start my day by making my to-do list,
checking in with where I am with everything,
making life meaningful through good social interactions.
But number three, most importantly,
is developing a writing routine.
Some people are very sporadic and can write whenever.
I need some element of routine,
I need to get my brain into the frame of writing.
This naturally brings me onto the sponsor of today's video,
and a platform that helped me so much,
and that is Skillshare.
If you're not familiar with them,
Skillshare are an incredible online learning community.
You can take a course on literally anything.
They promote learning for fun, I just adore them.
I've done so many of their courses on productivity,
arts, photography, writing, business, entrepreneurship.
They have everything.
I watch a lot of these videos to help me
think about developing a good writing voice for non-fiction.
And I'd highly recommend if you are going into this
to listen to some experts first.
For example, they really taught the importance
of little writing prompts for fun,
just to get you into the mode of writing.
So for me, I would either start by journaling about my day,
just as a really low friction,
easy way to start putting words on paper.
Or I would take one line, sometimes random.
using prompts from the internet, anything,
or take a word, or take an object in the room,
and write a small paragraph about it,
just to force myself to write.
If you are interested in accessing the wonderful wisdom
of Skillshare, the first 1000 people to click the link
in my description will get a free trial.
They are amazing, you can learn so much,
and for writing I highly recommend them.
But yeah, with writing it's all about discipline.
I'm someone who really operates under inspiration
and feeling like doing things.
And that is horrible for productivity
because you shouldn't have to feel
like you wanna write in order to make yourself write.
'Cause most of the time thinking about it
is worse than doing it.
I found certain cafes in Seoul, which were my writing cafes.
I had absolute sanctity of space over them.
If I go there, I'm not going on my phone,
I'm not chilling with friends,
this is a space where I write.
I sit there, I order almost the same drink every time.
And whether I wrote good words, crap words,
whatever, I would just write and put words down.
And I would always spend about three
or four hours sat in that chair, just writing.
I think it really is about developing some kind of routine.
One space that you write in, one time that you write in,
one drink you have when you're writing, whatever it is,
just build some habits around writing.
Number four, and this is very personal is fears,
and imposter syndrome.
And truly this is the big reason
that stopped me writing all the time.
It's just terrifying.
Like for me, I knew I had a publishing deal,
so I knew that whatever I wrote would be read,
which is special but crazy.
I'm quite an ambitious person.
A part of me is like, I want this book to do well,
I want it to do numerically well.
I want it to, you know, you have these goals as a child,
ah like New York Times bestseller list
and all these crazy metrics,
some of which aren't even determined
by just how many people buy the book.
There's many other factors.
Every time I sat down to write,
before I'd even put the words down,
I'd be thinking about the reception.
And the second you start judging your writing,
especially from the perspective of what you think
other people are gonna think about it, you're done.
That is crippling.
When you start looking at the end point of what it is
rather than the process of you just sitting there,
just writing some words on paper, you're done.
Stop.
You start to doubt yourself.
You start to question why on earth
you think that you can write a book.
Why you think that your voice matters.
Why you think that you can finish it.
'Cause it is hard, it is grueling.
It is you staring at a blank page, or reading back
words you've written feeling like they are rubbish.
It is not feeling inspired,
it is not feeling creative some days.
Wanting to stop writing, it is wanting to give up.
And there's no one sitting there
telling you that you should keep going.
And this leads me on to point five,
which is procrastination.
I think procrastination is not just driven by boredom,
I think it's driven by fear.
Fear of your words not being good, fear of feeling lost.
And this can lead you down a loophole
of reading writing advice.
If you have dedicated time to sit and write,
this is not the time to be going on Skillshare.
Like that is something you do intentionally
to set up your writing process,
but you never replace your writing time
with reading articles about grammar,
questioning your own grammar,
watching experts because you know it's secretly productive.
There are so many tools of procrastination
which are just trying to quell your inner fear,
your imposter syndrome.
Like, oh I'm just not in the mood today
so the words won't be good.
You just have to keep learning to show up.
And I think that's really helped
by having a fixed routine, a sanctity of space.
Also scheduling two different times in your schedule
for research and for writing.
Research needs to be done, planning a plot,
planning the stories you're gonna tell,
that all needs to be planned.
But not at the same time as you're writing,
keep your writing space sacred.
I love writing in the morning
before I've even looked at my phone,
before I've thought about people's opinions or judgment.
And I think when I realized
that a lot of my procrastination was driven by my fears,
it helped me give myself a pep talk
before every time I was gonna write.
Yeah, I really recommend journaling,
or questioning why you struggle to write.
Why is it once you've started this idea
of I wanna write a book, I've got a story to tell.
What is it that stops you writing along the way?
Like really dig into that.
And that comes up to my next point, which is accountability.
When it gets tough,
when you don't wanna respect your own self set deadlines,
when there are fears,
when you're worrying about the end point,
you need someone to tell you to keep going,
you need someone who is looking for those deadlines.
This can be a friend, a family member,
someone you respect who you don't wanna easily let down.
I'm very fortunate that I have an editor,
and I forced her to call me every single week.
And even during the hecticness of university,
just to check in, just for the accountability of,
I need to keep writing.
Even if I have to show up to this meeting today
and tell her that I have written not a single word,
I'm still gonna show up,
and that's just an extra push to keep you going.
But within this, a huge tip that I have
is don't tell people that you're writing a book.
You can tell a few people in your close life,
but do not go around telling the world
that you are writing a book.
Because you will start to get the gratification
of having written it.
When you say, "Oh, I'm writing a book."
People are amazed, they're like, "Wow, this is incredible.
"Tell me what it's about.
"Like that's amazing, good for you."
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And it's so easy to get caught up
in the brilliance of their response
that you don't do the hard, nitty gritty writing after.
You might've heard you're less likely
to complete your goals if you go around
telling everyone them, and I often believe this is true.
I only told the people in my life
who it was essential to tell,
and I didn't let myself over romanticize
or glamorize writing because it is really tough.
I just kept doing it, did the tough part,
and now, now that it's written
I can start to enjoy the glamor of having written a book.
And finally, bringing all of this together is fun.
You have to learn to find fun in it,
to make it meaningful.
Just stop taking it so seriously.
I put so much pressure on myself
in the first few months of writing this book,
and it took so long for me to let go of it.
To stop thinking about the completed book,
to stop thinking about the person reading it,
to stop over questioning every single word I was using,
and just show up, and just write, and make it fun.
Tell yourself how cool this is
that you get to express yourself through words,
and that you're finally doing this for yourself,
and it should be for yourself.
Write this book for yourself first,
anything else is a bonus.
Any numerical brilliance after, a bonus.
Any publishing deal after, a bonus.
If it's received well, that's a bonus.
But at the end of the day, just write the damn book,
write it for you.
I don't care if it's good, just finish it.
If you're trying to write a book after this video,
please don't watch a hundred other videos
about how to write your book.
Just believe in yourself, turn off this video,
and just go write.
Turn off your phone and just go write for an hour.
You can do it.
It's so tough, and so rewarding,
and hard, and teaches you so much about yourself.
Yeah, I hope this helped you in some way.
I really respect you if you're interested in writing a book.
I think everyone has a story to tell, non-fiction, fiction.
I would love to write a fiction book someday.
Also, NaNoWriMo is an amazing resource.
It's like a sprint to write a book in a month,
like write 2000 words a day with a huge community,
worldwide community of people, also writing a book.
So if you need accountability that way
I recommend trying NaNoWriMo.
It's in November, but they also have a summer one.
As a teenager, I actually wrote a fan fiction
which was like 80,000 words.
And as I say,
check out Skillshare's amazing courses on writing.
And if you'd like to pre-order my book,
which is insane to say those words
that I finished the book, then you can do that,
and it's in my description.
Guys, since filming this,
the book became an Amazon number one best seller.
It doesn't even exist yet.
We're number on education
and I haven't sold out.
Thank you.
You can get it at independent book retailers,
you can get it on Waterstones,
you can get it on Amazon if that's easier.
Who knows if it's good, but I wrote the book
and you can too.
Tell me what you're finding hardest about writing a book.
I'm really intrigued, 'cause I'm sure I can relate to it.
Bye.
(upbeat music)