When it comes to writing for yourself without a copywriter to help, this is something that I get the most feedback and the most questions about. When you’re feeling moved to write something that is compelling and converting and also feels good in your soul as a creative business owner, how do you know what to write about? Where do you start?
Not knowing what to write can stand in the way of that creative process as a writer. So today, I will be sharing with you 4 of my personal favorite tips and tricks to be able to write about anything. Even as a professional writer, I still struggle with writer’s block – all the time. However, my hope is that with these tips, you’ll be able to power through that block – especially when push comes to shove and that deadline is looming.
1. The Oracle of Kevin Bacon
You’re probably asking, “What on earth does Kevin Bacon have to do with writing??” Honestly, it always feels really silly when this comes up in my curriculum but it’s so weird and bizarre that it sticks in your mind – and it works!
If you’ve never heard of the Oracle of Kevin Bacon, it’s basically the principle that any actor, actress, or person in Hollywood can be traced back to Kevin Bacon within six degrees. While it’s possible that this idea originated from some bigger philosophy, I like to stick with Kevin Bacon just because it’s memorable and funny. As an example, Timothée Chalamet has a Bacon number of two. He was in Worst Friends with Katherine Erbe, who was Stir of Echoes with Kevin Bacon – Bacon Degree of 2.
Now, what does any of this have to do with writing? If you apply the principle behind the Oracle of Kevin Bacon to your writing, it just opens the door for you to be able to write about anything. You can start with Kevin Bacon and through a number of degrees and pivots, you can get to the ultimate point as it relates to what you’re writing about in your business.
A lot of times, as creative entrepreneurs, we struggle with knowing what we would love to write about but have trouble relating it back to our business in a way that is relevant and would get people to care. For example, say you love lighting candles. How can candles relate to your business?
I start every day in my business by lighting a candle. It’s a signal to me that it is time for deep focus and that great work is going to be done. The flame reminds me of the flame within that I draw from to pour into my clients in the best possible way. If you want to partner with someone who has the same kind of fire in their belly as you do, I think that you should look to somebody who starts their day with a spark.
Easy, right? Candle to flame to how you serve your clients to Book me! and that’s only in three degrees. This is a fun exercise to do even when you’re not writing just to see what random things in the world you can make relate to your business.
Of course, use this tip to your discretion. We’re all pretty intuitive so we’ll know when something feels too cheesy or like you’re trying a little too hard. Tap into your inner knowing and use your judgment to determine whether what you’re writing is a few too many degrees away from the point you’re trying to make.
However, the big realization that I want you to be able to make is that you can write about anything. Using the Oracle of Kevin Bacon proves that it’s relatively easy to write about two separate things. With some mindset shifts away from “I don’t know what to write about” to boiling things down to their essence to make the connections between them. There are big universal ideas that we all know and understand. If we can just boil those ideas down to their meaning, we can create content that resonates with other people. Plus, it’s human tendency to read into things so this is something we’re inherently good at if we just give it a try.
2. List Your Passions and Inspirations
For the next trick to power through writer’s block and write about anything, I want you to start by creating a giant list of all the things that inspire you. Ask yourself what moves you to create? What are the things that you could just go on and on and on about with passion? What do you know extremely well?
Once you have this list, you’ll essentially have a list of starters and ideas for you to create content on. The reason I want you to first think about the things that inspire you is because when we start with a topic that inspires us, how can we not write about it? The first stopping point when we run into writer’s block is not knowing how to continue to weave a tapestry around an idea. Think about if someone were to ask you about one of your topics and asked, “Well, what inspires you about that?”. How would you answer? When we already have these topics and leading questions in mind, it becomes easier for more thoughts to pour out of us about the topics we find inspirational.
Let me give you an example. Something that I find inspiring is the cherry blossom tree and the cherry blossom season. They’re so transient in the way that they seemingly just explode overnight, littering the ground with a beautiful stippling of dusty pink petals that drift off down the street as rainwater flows into the drains. The blooms only last a few weeks and then they’re gone until the next year when they’ll bloom again. We build up to this one thing all year long and then it’s gone, and we’re waiting for it to happen again. It’s the same in business. We work so hard on creating something. It could be a new launch or a course, but we work so diligently all year long. We water it and sustain it so it can grow a system of deep, strong roots. Then you present it to the world, and everyone is amazed and celebrates it, believing you to be an overnight success. However, no one else understands the work you’ve put into it because they can’t see it.
In this example, it goes from talking about cherry blossoms to their transient nature to comparing that to preparing a new launch in your business. This goes back to the Oracle of Kevin Bacon. Take an idea from your list of inspiring things and pivot it to relate to something in your business.
At the same time, when you’re talking about something that you’re passionate about and find inspiring, your readers will be able to pick up on your excitement. That passionate energy transfers into the words you choose and the way you describe things in your writing. Ultimately, that energy is what’s going to help you sell yourself through your writing. We can try to blame it on Instagram algorithms and such but when we’re writing about something we don’t believe in, it reflects in our business. No one is going to buy into what you’re selling if you yourself don’t believe in it and are inspired by it. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.
When we write about our passions and inspirations, we’re able to craft content that people care about and feels good for both the writer and the reader. From there, that piece of content will compel people to want to engage with you further, to want to learn more from you, and to prioritize finding and seeing your content. It’s just this self-fulfilling, cyclical process in how just a couple of really simple but intentional shifts can change the game.
3. Story Hacking
While those first two tips might feel a little obscure or esoteric for some, a more practical tip that you can do to banish writer’s block and start writing right now is story hacking. There is tons of content that’s already out there all you have to do is use what’s already there and take ideas from it – story hacking.
Personally, I like to use magazines for this and in particular, magazines that I already know my ideal client would be reading. You can use books or online blogs as well, but I’ve found that articles and features in magazines are easier to brainstorm with and bend the way I need them to. Start by collecting a stack of magazines. (It doesn’t have to be a magazine your ideal client would read, but bonus points if it is.) Start skimming them for articles and features that can inspire potential content for you. It doesn’t matter whether they’re baseline ideas or just topics. It can even be the actual form of the article itself whether it’s a roundup of some kind, a listicle, or a longer think piece with a greater idea at its root.
I came across an article in one of my favorite magazines, Kinfolk Magazine, entitled “At Home with the Cult Architect Vincent Van Duysen.” The article began with talking about the architect, his beliefs, his day-to-day life, and the moved into assumptions that people made about him based on his art. An article like that could inspire you to write your own behind the scenes content. What is your life like when you’re not photographing weddings or designing websites? Behind the scenes is a really popular kind of content that brings a bit of humanity and personality into your brand.
What I love about story hacking is that you don’t have to come up with the ideas for content because they’re already there. Some bigger publication has already spent the marketing brainpower to get this content out into the world. When you choose a publication that you know would align and resonate with your ideal client avatar, you already know that this is content they’re already ready to get into. What’s been created already is meant to serve them and you don’t have to wrack your brain to figure out what they would be interested in. I honestly believe that this is something you can do to banish writer’s block immediately.
4. When All Else Fails, Start Journaling
If none of these strategies have worked, how can you start to write with ease in the future? This isn’t the secret ingredient to getting content ideas to start writing immediately but it can help you in the long run if you start today. If you know that coming up with ideas for content creation and writing is something that you regularly struggle with more so than other things, start journaling.
Journaling isn’t as quick of a payoff as just opening up a magazine and seeing a topic that you can write about immediately or something that will help you get to a place where you feel inspired. However, when we’re journaling, we inadvertently give ourselves permission to write with nothing standing in our way. We allow ourselves to write about anything because that’s the point of a journal. There’s no judgment or even self-judgment in journaling because no one else is meant to read it except us. And that alone is a very important writing exercise.
So, when all else fails, why not just look at what you’re writing as if you’re writing in a journal? If you can’t get past the writer’s block, look at what you’re writing as if you were writing in a journal instead. What would you write about or, if you’ve already been journaling, what have you been writing about?
I once wrote in my journal, “All of my plants almost died because I couldn’t muster up the energy to water them, but I finally did.” How can I take that little tidbit from my life and apply it to my business? Again, go back to the Oracle of Kevin Bacon. If we don’t water our business, how can we expect it to grow and thrive? Then take it a step further to engage with your readers: What are you forgetting to water right now?
It could just be that the elements of self-judgment and feeling as though we have to be perceived a certain way is what’s keeping us from writing because of all that we’re doing to censor ourselves or to appear a certain way. Writing as if no one is watching could be exactly what gets you past that block in your mind and in your heart.
Writer’s block is something that affects all of us at some point. Even professional writers get hit with it at times. It’s a silly stereotype about writers that procrastination is just part of the process and we will do anything to actually avoid writing – especially when we’ve hit a wall and we feel like we can’t.
If you’ve gained anything from reading this post, I hope it’s that you can write about literally anything and, if you do struggle, know that you’re not alone. But the next time you have a deadline looming and you just can’t think of anything to write, try using one of these tips and see where your writing takes you.
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