15 Lessons From My First Year of Writing Online
In the last year, I’ve published more than 170 articles.
On November 4th, 2020, I published my first article on Medium. It was the first time I ever wrote and published anything. My palms were sweating as I clicked the “publish” button. I didn’t even enable monetization on the article because I didn’t think the article was worth anything.
I had no idea that that piece was going to be just the beginning of my online writing obsession.
In the last year, I’ve published more than 170 articles, nearly 100 answers on Quora, and dozens of other articles for my newsletter, LinkedIn page, and my clients.
I’m still a baby in the writing world, but these are the 15 lessons that have helped me the most.
Writing well cannot be done without practicing a lot.
My first articles took weeks to craft, and no one read them. Now, I write an article in 30–45 minutes. The quality is better now, too.
“Writing a lot” includes practicing in public a lot.
In writing f you don’t publish a lot, you’ll never get feedback for your ideas and your delivery. Practice in public, fail in public, get better in public.
My first 100 articles on here were trash. Some of them still are. You have to put the hours in. Talent exists in writing, but talent alone doesn’t dictate success in the game of writing online.
Just because someone doesn’t love your work doesn’t mean it’s bad.
You aren’t for everyone. Neither am I. Once you accept that, your writing will improve along with your creative freedom.
Just because some people love your work doesn’t mean it’s great work.
The first time I went viral, I thought I had made it. I hadn’t. I wrote a bad article and got lucky. It took a while to correct course after that because of the hit of delusion that “virality” gave my ego.
Creativity is a muscle, not a resource. However, it can be overworked.
I used to be afraid that I was going to “use up” my creativity. Now, all I worry about is that I won’t be able to get all my ideas down on the pad.
I’d rather have an abundance of ideas to choose from than a scarcity.
Good work isn’t the goal, flow is the goal. Good work comes from flow.
I used to sit down and try to “write something good”. Now, I sit down and try to enjoy myself. I only write articles that are fun for me to make.
Without joy and flow, there is no reason to do this every single day.
If you only write content in one place, you’re holding yourself back.
I only wrote on Medium for 6 months. I now also write on Quora, Substack, Twitter, LinkedIn, and even Instagram (not Facebook though, Facebook sucks). The more places your work exists, the more they can be viewed.
Learn to repurpose content efficiently. This will take you a long way.
Practice writing headlines. Your best-performing work will come from your best headlines.
Once a week, I try to write as many headlines as possible before a writing session. I also try to rewrite every headline I write. Headline writing is a micro-drill that will change your writing success (or your success in anything).
Publishing an imperfect article is better than not publishing.
In blogging, “good enough” is better than “not at all”. I almost didn’t publish my best article because I thought it was incomplete. The internet didn’t agree, and I’m thankful for that.
Online writing is a game. if you want to get better, study the best people playing it.
I read books and blogs from the best online writers in the world because they offer the most tried and true perspectives on how to get better. If my advice sounds like it’s been stolen, it probably has. Feel free to source correct me.
If “making money” is your only goal, you will burn out and quit long before you make any real money.
On Medium, a lot of people write “content where they are whining about their lack of views, lack of income, and lack of success. These people will likely beat themselves before the game of writing beats them.
The best writers love so much that they’d do it independent of money. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t think about money, it just means that your ambition for money is blinding you to the true nature of reality.
Just because you publish a lot doesn’t mean you shouldn’t also edit a lot.
Some online writers have said that you shouldn’t edit your early articles. For me, editing has made my work clearer, more thoughtful, and just better in every possible way.
You aren’t required to edit, but I feel I owe it to a reader to deliver a carefully crafted story.
The game is designed to make you give up. Don’t give up.
The best writers on the internet have published a metric fuck-ton of work. It’s really hard to do that, but it’s also very simple. Publishing a lot won’t make you famous, but you can’t become a high-level writer without publishing a lot.
Learning how to write is not the same as learning how to tell stories.
When I started on Medium, I got rejected by publications like it was my job. Now, I get accepted a lot more.
The funny thing is, I’m telling a lot of the same stories. The stories are the same, but the writing skills of the storyteller have improved. Time makes a world of difference.
Living an interesting life doesn’t make you an interesting writer. however, you need an interesting (at least, to you) life to be an interesting writer.
I don’t care about articles about how much money you made. I don’t care about how the sky is falling on this platform or any other. Go live a kick-ass life and then write kick-ass stories about it.
People will like that. Trust me.
Closing thoughts
Some people say that newer writers shouldn’t post writing advice. That’s pretentious and I couldn’t disagree more. My “writing advice” is helping me learn about writing more efficiently through self-examination. If my advice bothers you, don’t take it.
Stay focused, stay consistent, and keep it fun. None of this is as serious as people make it out to be.
It’s just a game, and we’re just grown children looking to play it in a way that makes us feel seen and heard.
Article inspired by this tweet thread.
Other Articles Published in the Last 7 Days
7 Things I’d Tell My Depressed 18-Year-Old Self
Your Stories Are Great, You Just Need More Practice
You’re Anxious Because You Love Yourself Too Much
A Lack of Ambition Isn’t the Problem, Suicide Is
My Top Quora Answer of the Week
How did you change yourself?
I changed myself a lot over the last 5 years.
In the picture on the left, I was depressed, faking Stoicism so my dad wouldn’t think I was weak, and I was existentially lost.
In the picture on the right, I look anxious, but I’m really just out of breath from the grappling match I had just won.
Here’s how I changed myself from a depressed 18-year-old to an irrationally optimistic 24-year-old:
First, I stopped making excuses.
Some people will read this advice and say that I’m propagating a toxic hustle culture, but the truth is that if you want to do anything extraordinary, you’re going to have to work your way past your limiting beliefs.
I realized that my excuses were just verbal expressions of my limiting beliefs that had been hammered into my head by a lifetime of mental illness, bullying, and verbal abuse.
With a lot of hard work on myself, I trained myself to stop making excuses. When I feel an excuse coming now, I don’t deny its existence, I work my way through it. Every excuse is a problem for you to solve.
If you can’t solve the problem, you’ve reached a limit, not an excuse.
Then, I dove headfirst into something I loved.
I don’t really know how to make you or anyone else “successful”, but I can tell you what I did.
At 18, I decided that I was going to either become a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu world champion or die trying. In the end, I achieved my goal, and I almost did die trying due to burnout, mental illness, and overtraining.
Again, it might seem like I’m telling you to work yourself to the brink of death. Don’t work yourself to the brink of death. What going “all-in” on my passion taught me is that passion cannot make you indestructible. If you want to be happy, you also need longevity.
The only way I was able to learn this lesson was by diving headfirst into my passion and finding out what I was really capable of.
Lastly, I processed all the shit I went through.
This is the most important one because if you don’t take the time to reflect on what you’ve seen or experienced, it does not make you stronger. Mental strength comes through reflection, not pain.
If you don’t journal, think, go to therapy, write, or find some other way to reflect on your experiences, what doesn’t kill you will actually make you weaker.
In the gym, strength is built in the time spent away from the gym. It’s built through recovery. The same is true in life.
For the first time in my life, I’m wildly excited about where my life is going and all of the opportunities that I have coming. Everything that I’ve worked for for the last 5 and a half years (not including the 5 years of unconscious work before that) is starting to pay off.
It looks everything and nothing like how I envisioned it, and it’s pretty freaking wild.
Thank you for reading this edition of my newsletter! I’m brewing up some premium content options that will be available after I’m done competing this weekend (Jiu-Jitsu CON this weekend), so stay tuned!
As always, if you enjoyed what you read, feel free to share the article from Medium. It helps me more than you know.
Wishing you the best,
—Chris