12/09/18

Dear Journal,

Writing to me is expressing feelings, thoughts, ideas, opinions; basically anything and everything you want to express. It’s a way to be yourself, another person, or whoever you want in words. Stories that are made up can come to life right before you. I am going to be honest. I used to hate writing. I was afraid of writing those “10-page essays” that everyone in college seemed to complain about. In high school and middle school, I would always do the bare minimum in English. I thought writing was just something that you do when you when you’re assigned something. As a result, writing became extremely frustrating for me. As soon as I sat down in front of my laptop, I would begin squirming in my chair as a multitude of questions arose in my head. There’s a paper due in 10 hours; what am I doing? Why am I writing about this subject? Should I change the subject? Now, I realized that writing is a process. It doesn’t have to be dreadful or something that you are assigned. It can be so much more than that. I learned that my theory of writing is to surround myself with an environment that encourages me to write and be open to change. This makes me feel more intrigued to write.

In order for me to produce a successful piece of work, there are a few guidelines I have to follow. Writing is much easier when I am fully focused, which means no distractions. Something that I never keep around me is my phone. I tend to procrastinate tremendously and I believe that is my biggest weakness. Having my phone around would only worsen this issue, as it inevitably encourages me to go on social media and Netflix. For the final draft of my source-based essay, I actually decided to place my phone in another room until I finished the essay. This increased my efficiency and I completed the draft a lot faster than I had planned. Also, I have noticed that I cannot write in the library or anywhere other than my house. I’m not really sure why, but I feel I have a special connection to my house. I usually write in my bedroom, as it is peaceful and almost like a sanctuary to me. I also prefer writing at night when people are asleep, so there is less noise and interruptions from my family. If I am passionate about the topic, I become invested into writing and my ideas start to flow. Sometimes, as I am writing, I would look up at the ceiling as if it were a blank canvas. This clears my brain and is kind of a checkpoint for me. I find that whenever an idea pops up into my head, I have to write it down anywhere, whether it be on a notepad or in my laptop. This is beneficial because I tend to forget ideas relatively quickly and writing them out is almost a reminder to me. I realized I was a lot more productive with the composition in two genres essay than I was with our first piece, the rhetorical analysis essay, when I went through this “ritual”. I found myself surprised that I had finished so fast and a little piece of myself felt accomplished for what I had completed and yearning to do more. All of this wasn’t easy to find out; there was a lot of trial and error involved throughout this course. I know that this might not work for everyone.

The dictionary meaning of the word flexible is “the capability to bend easily without breaking”. Therefore, in writing, you need to embrace changes and learn from them. For example, my ideas about my research question changed a lot as I was writing. I decided that I would exclude the behavioral aspect of my question from my essay. The reason behind this was simply because there was much more research and studies conducted for the genetic and environmental causes of autism. It made sense to take it out because after writing about the behavioral causes, I only had a small paragraph as opposed to a page each for the other causes. In order for my essay to be as complete as possible, I concluded that I should take it out with your advice. My final research question was: What genetic and environmental factors entail whether Americans will develop autism, and how can the medical community treat autism? Also, even though my question did not contain anything pertaining the diagnosis of autism, I wanted to include it. I felt like it would subsequently help my audience better understand the causes and treatment and give them the background knowledge they might not have. Changing your writing does not necessarily mean removing things; you can add things too.

Furthermore, for the composition in two genres assignment, instead of using my inquiry-based research topic about autism, I found myself leaning towards my source-based topic about social media. I thought it was more interesting to write about, especially when concerning genres. Also, it allowed me to have a stance, which I couldn’t really take with the autism topic. I was going to produce a flowchart. I was having difficulty making it and suffered writer’s block. So, I decided to change my whole genre completely. I wanted to challenge myself by writing a poem. I didn’t really have that much practice, so I thought it would be interesting to see how it turned out. I tried to include a rhyme scheme in some of the lines and repetition to enhance up my writing and keep the reader’s attention. I actually enjoyed producing the genres. They really got my creative juices flowing and were able to capture the essence of my message. Writing has to be flexible; you need to be ready to change the whole outlook of your work. This type of mindset can be applied to other fields besides writing. For instance, flexibility is crucial in the ever-changing business environment. If one marketing strategy fails, you need to be ready to try another. Businessmen have to follow this in order to satisfy the changing needs of their customers.

When you have an open mindset, it becomes easier to revise. I think writing is just a constant cycle of revision. Revision plays an important role in writing to me. As human, it is just natural that we make errors and we overlook them while writing. It also allows you to modify your point as your perspective might have changed over time. Coming back to my first draft for the source-based essay with a fresh pair of eyes made all the difference. I noticed I had a repeated a sentence, cited the wrong article, and forgot to explain the genre for one of the sources. These revisions were useful as they improved the efficiency of my writing. They also taught me a lesson, as I will ensure that I do not make the same mistakes again. You are supposed to write everything that you want to express in the first draft. Once you have written that, you can get it revised and looked at by another person and then go back yourself and break it down to what needs to be left; which brings me to my last point of focus on what is important. You have to cut your essay down to what needs to be said and take out the unnecessary pieces of information that might not allow the reader to connect to your piece of writing.

For this final reflection, I chose a journal as my genre to work in because I thought it would be a lot more personal. I could talk to my audience more directly. Since it is a reflection, it would make sense to include my personal experience regarding my theory of writing. Thus, I felt like a journal would be most appropriate.

I found out a lot about myself through writing. I am so ecstatic that I found what works for me. My theory of writing is still under construction. It is changing as I write more and more. Who knows what writing will entail for me in the future. All I know is that I hope it remains a part of me throughout my lifetime.

Regards,
Hammad